I started this entry, and as I wrote, realised how boring this probably will be. It goes into a lot of detail about the Apple store, so I'll put in bold the start and end of those details if you really couldn't be fucked. Here's the website with pictures if you'd rather. Apple Retail Store, Sydney

Today I went to the new Apple flagship store on George st., Sydney, for the second time in a week. It isn't entirely because I'm obsessed with Apple, I had been planning on today's trip for about a week, out of necessity, but ended up visiting on Monday with the college crew. This was because we had a three hour break between these lame 15 minute talks with our teachers to pick up marks. It's pointless except for with one teacher who gives awesome feedback, and I got the shits on Tuesday and didn't bother turning up to the afternoon session. Anyway, back to today's visit; I was originally going to go at 9:40am, because Emma may have accompanied me in the city and made a morning of it. I ended up rescheduling for a number of reasons, firstly because Emma was no longer coming, second I didn't want to get up so early, and thirdly because James wouldn't be working until 2. So I booked for then.

Now my first visit had quite some anticipation behind it, building up from the walk down George st. from Town Hall station, until we were crossing the road at the lights in front of the Maccas, at which point we were all practically jumping up and down in sheer excitement. Of course, this being my second time, I wasn't at that point, but my stomach was doing somersaults, I'm not exactly sure why, either because I'd see James (which would be a first, I have never gotten nervous to see him), or because I was just nervous about talking to someone I've never talked to before who has a lot more knowledge than I do. Regardless, after I had bought some fries from the Maccas next door to the store, I found I couldn't stomach them. I bought a coke too, which I drank just outside Maccas because it was crowded, and I was half an hour early, so there was a chance of saying hi to James before he started. I did indeed see him, but that's all I did, because it provided me with the perfect opportunity to just study him. This sounds like I'm some sort of stalker, but sometimes its good just to step back and watch someone. I'm so glad I did, the observation was priceless. He walks across the road with his iPod in, only half paying attention to his surroundings, and mostly to his music and whatever thoughts. Until he sees the Apple building, at which point this look of pure joy crosses his face. He lights up. It's almost unbelievable. I start laughing to myself, and for most of the rest of the day I smile with this one memory. I'm convinced he will never love a human as much as he loves that company.

Begin of extremely detailed walk through of the Apple store
The store itself is three stories of minimalism, the front of which is encased in non-reflective glass. The glass comes out about two or three meters from the where the solid roof and floors of the other stories finish, giving the impression of space, and also making room for a massive iridescent apple logo to hang from. James tells me its the largest in the world, with an evangelical glint in his eye (yes, those words were somewhat nicked from and SBS article, but it's so well put). In a conversation with one of the staff of the stores' Genius Bar, I'm asked if I feel the store is TOO minimalist, but I argue that with the amount of customers in the store all the time, it would suffer if it were any more cluttered.
The first floor contains six registers, which would get lost if you didn't have staff to lead you to them, and about fifteen of every current laptop, of which there are four (the Air, the Macbook in black and white, and the Pro). As each of the latter three come in a few different sizes, I wouldn't be surprised if there's say, five of each size, but I wasn't looking that closely. Each laptop is on and available to use provided a customer isn't already playing with one, or being shown features by one of the "Specialist" staff, who all wear a bluey/green shirt with small type on the front reading "I could talk about this stuff all day". On that note, the "Concierge" staff who welcome you and help you if you're lost all wear Orange shirts, and the "Genius" staff all wear a very dark blue shirt. They probably said stuff on the front too, but I didn't notice.
To get upstairs you have the choice of elevator or staircase, and the staircase is made, like the front of the store, of glass. This seems scary, but the glass is both opaque (girls) and incredibly solid, you feel like you're standing on concrete. They're wide in terms of room to get around people, and the gradient is gentle on the legs, surrounded by matte aluminium finish walls. It's a cold, sterile looking area, but with the orange-shirted concierges standing either end, and the constant customer traffic, they're never scary or lifeless.
The second floor contains software, hardware and other add-ons at either end, and the rest of the floor is dedicated to their range of iPods (Nano, Classic in every size, Shuffle, Touch), the iTV, and a few odd iMacs.
Up to the third floor and we have about ten iMacs set up specifically for information/learning sessions on each end, then two iMacs on small tables with beanbag type chairs for the kiddies, and then the biggest Genius Bar in the world. The Genius Bar is where Apple users are able to get advice, support and repairs if the need be, and all for free (unless you're no longer under warranty and the problem isn't fixable on the spot, in which case...boohoo). This is basically a long bench with a bunch of the navy-shirted staff on one side with MacBook Pros, and a set of stools on the other side for needy Apple Users. And on the back wall there's a set of screens with Mac tips and a list of customers to be seen next by an available Genius (It was kind of cool to see my name come up for all to see. Such is my narcissism). On the two upper stories, the floor ends, as I've mentioned, about three meters from the actual front of the store. There is a waist high glass railing to prevent people walking off and falling to their doom (which would have the glorious possibility of splattering blood all over the minimalism and glass), but for the faint-hearted, looking down these "balconies" would cause a sense of vertigo. I personally found it fascinating to watch the amount of people walking past and those walking in, the ratio as I saw it almost 2:1, which is really quite incredible if you consider how many people walk down George st. On that note, the store's been open a week today, and although today wasn't as busy as Monday, there was still at least thirty or more customers on each level at any given time, and that's a lot of people. Yeah, it will probably wind down, but I'm still impressed. The reason so many people come in isn't just to marvel at the place, but more likely because the story is more like a free arcade; every computer has free internet, and if you bring your own laptop you can use their wireless for free too. Here you could say that they wont make any money out of such a retail store, but I have to ask, why would a company spend something like $15 million on a store that isn't going to make them any money? Clearly the previous stores, costing as much if not more, have proven effective, otherwise they simply wouldn't bother.
End of probably needlessly detailed Apple store description

The store is a work of probable genius, I'm sure, but when it comes down to it, glass fronted buildings aren't anything new, and frankly, they're ugly to look at. The Queen Victoria Building, just down the road, is absolutely beautiful to look at, stonemasonry and exquisite detail are much more attractive. I love the old buildings in Sydney, but I suppose if these new ugly buildings were never made with such lack of taste, I'd never notice.

Now, onto my visit. I had to go because my Software Updates weren't working, it turned out my love had an error that was preventing it from wanting to install the OS update, but it fixed itself with the gentle encouragement of my Genius staff member, Nick, who was both patient and eager to try and fix the problem. And who was as excited as I was when the problem WAS fixed. And who said "Nice wallpaper!", to my Optimus Prime display. I was severely cheesed off that Matt wasn't there, the guy is a stud and I would have loved to have him help me.

Anyway, twenty minutes and all was right in the world again, and I walked away thanking him over and over. He loved it, I could tell. I then wandered downstairs, stopping to check the price for the Adobe pack, and being totally depressed about it, and only half cheered about the fact I got it all for free on completely legitimate terms *ahem*. I strolled the first floor looking for James, and found him with some old guy, so figured I'd just poke him, give a thumbs up and leave, but he asked me to wait for him. I did, and we talked for a bit about my Genius Bar experience and my laptop, and about multi-touch, which I have been blessed with, and he has only just discovered the joys of. Then he showed me the graphics tablets, which left me more depressed. I could afford one of those small ones with a weekends pay, but its just that--small. I want a big, hardcore motherfucker, and they're equally motherfucking expensive.

I left the store fulfilled and wondering what to do next. I wasn't in the mood for bookstores anymore, I just wanted home, mostly because I wanted company. Though it is nice to wander around the city by yourself; there's no one to whinge about sore legs or pretend they're content with what you're doing, but making a poor effort at it. Nevertheless I could have done with someone to make me feel less alone. So I chose to go home, but not without a frappe from Max Brenner's. It took me a while to find the place even though I'd only been there like a week earlier. For future reference, walk in the Pitt Street entrance of Centrepoint Arcade. Keep to your left (just don't turn left), and make your way down the back. You'll come to what appears to be the entrance of David Jones, but Max Brenner's is right there. So I had my frappe, takeaway, and I made my way home.



Now just because I found this a bit strange, a dream I had last night.


I was walking with Rhys, Bec and a few others, and there's this nature strip between Bass Hill Plaza and the Highway that we were walking in. Anyway I saw a figure, obviously dead, and I made it out to be Nathan. Completely unemotionally, I stated "Look, it's Nathan. He's dead."
Somewhere in my head in this dream, I had decided that he had killed himself, I don't know why I knew this, I just did. Now no one was really highly upset about this, maybe because no-one really believed he was gone. We made our way over to his house (which isn't his grandmas, but neither is it the old G-Hall one, it was some house of my subconscious. I've seen this particular house before in my dreams.), because we wanted to still "be" with him, like in spirit or something. Which is when I started getting upset.
The next day in the dream I went on LiveJournal, and Bec had written about it, saying something along the lines of "So yesterday Nathan died. [Then some apathetic 'told ya so' business, where she seemed to think he got killed via electric shock] Electrical goods are bad."
And then I got really upset at her attitude towards it, then I woke up. And had to message him, just to make sure.

[Edit, 11/08/08]
I looked up the possible meanings of this:
"Seeing something dead in your dream suggests you are realising that some part of yourself, or your feelings, are no longer expressing fully. In fact you may have killed that part of you by denying it, repressing, or freezing it from normal life. The 'death' may even have been caused by a painful experience. But even so, it still means you have made a decision - perhaps unconscious - to shut out that part of your life. This can also relate to a lost opportunity or potential.

A dead person: Dreaming of someone who is dead, a relative or loved one, is quite common. After all, the person may have played a big part in your life, as for instance a husband or wife. Therefore the influence of their existence is still very much alive in you.

As an example of this, you will probably be able to realise that some of your traits, some of the ways that you think or respond to things, have arisen because of the way you related to the person you dreamt about. So in many cases the dead person indicates the feelings you have about them, the traits you still have alive in you from them. When someone close to you dies you go through a period of change from relating to them as an external reality, to meeting and accepting them as alive in your memories and inner life.

Some dreams of dead people are expressive of attempts to deal with feelings, guilt or anger in connection with the person who died; or your own feelings about death.

Death is an everyday part of life. So dreams often use it to illustrate leaving something behind, such as childhood or a relationship. Also parts of ones feelings sometimes die. Our love for someone might die for instance, and so our dream illustrates this with a death, perhaps of that person. Some teenagers dream of their parents dying as they start to become independent. This is a form of killing of dependent feelings about their parents as a means of growth. This happens in some relationships too, where we want to break with the person."


And finally, this evening I went for a drive to one of the more scenic areas of Bankstown (if you can call any part of Bankstown scenic); the hill in Condell Park--Wattawa Reserve, which at night looks over the city, and all the suburban light up to it. I just enjoyed the view, listening to The Eels and contemplating life. The other good view is at the top of the hill on Henry Lawson Drive in G-Hall/Lansdowne. Bankstown has no sights that compare to Ryde, however *grins*.

And now, I shall be off.

Goodnight!