Friday I had one of the most harrowing experiences of my life. Mind you this is coming from someone who: was hit by a car while walking to school, had a building held hostage by students with guns while I was in class in college, had a murder happen in my dorm when I was a Resident Assistant, had to call 911 and be interviewed by police when a friend was beaten badly outside the mall I worked in, had to call police again from same mall when a man posing as a new employee tried to gain entrance to our store (I was working alone, and other stores in the city had been targeted in the same manner over the preceding weeks), and, AND, I once killed a millipede the size of a dollar bill in my parents' downstairs bathroom. But this? Was much scarier than any of that. On Friday, April 24, 2009, at approximately 10:23am...my iPhone stopped working.
iPhone down!
My thoughts when it suddenly turned off in my hand for no apparent reason and would not respond to my repeated attempts to turn it back on went something like this (paraphrasing) "OMFGWHATDOIDOICAN' TLIVEWITHOUTMYPHONEICAN' TCALLICAN'TTEXTICAN' TTWITTERORPLAYSUDOKUWHATIFSOME ONECALLSHOWDOIREMEMBERWHATIHAV ETODOTODAYOMGOMGOMG."
I then quickly exited all programs I was in at work and immediately left for the nearest Apple Store. It was a long and grueling walk (half a mile in 70 degree weather), but I made it there, only to find out that they were full and I needed to make an APPOINTMENT and I had to WAIT and the next appointment was available in SIX HOURS and no amount of my flailing about and stuttering while gesturing at my iPhone was going to change their mind. I bought a spare wall charger for work while I was there and then quietly left the store, cradling my poor, silent, dark iPhone.
I spent the rest of the afternoon back at work pretending to do Important Things between futile attempts at turning the iPhone on and/or plugging it in for the 800th time. "Maybe it has rested enough and it will turn on now? No? ... How about now? No? ... How about now?" etc. It was shaping up to be a long afternoon.
Then, somewhere around the 6,734th time I tried to get the phone to reboot, I got distracted by something shiny in the middle of holding down the two buttons at the same time. I held them down for probably two minutes straight with no response, and then! Magical silver apple in the middle of the previously-dead screen! IT WAS ALIIIIIIIVE!!!
It seems my iPhone just needs longer to wake up than most phones. Clearly it takes after my wife's side of the family. Figures.

