Eve's Fall from Grace

Rome, day 4, was one that was extremely frustrating. It tested the limits of my love. My devotion and my affections were stretched. It was really hard for me to stand by my girl.

Eve, my Mac, got sick.

I don't know what it was. It started with my iTunes library being lost and needing to be rebuilt. Then my desktop became jumbled for no reason. Then all of my passwords and keychains were lost. Things went downhill fast. But, luckily, it went sour in the right place. If it had happened here, in Turkey, I'd be lost. No one I've met in this city knows anything about Macs and as far as I can tell there's only one store that claims to know anything about them and it's in the basement of a very sketchy building. But since Rome is the Capital of the World, of course they have an Apple Store. So off we went!

The Apple Store was on the complete opposite end of town, off the city map. It tooks us a tram, bus, tram, bus, and a long walk to get there. This is tram #1.
The day was a little drizzly, but we started out in good spirits.
The good spirits didn't last long. Between the first bus and second tram, we got a little bit lost. Lane had had enough already.
Getting there is half the fun. It can also be half the torture. Tram, bus, tram, bus, and a long walk made for about 2 hours (or a little more) of travel. We got a little lost once. Then on the last bus ride, we wound up riding in green fields with the sun on our faces (movie quote!). Neither of us could understand why we were driving through the farm to get to the Apple Store. Lane thought for a moment that maybe I had looked up an apple orchard named the Apple Store. But the nice bus driver knew enough English to understand that I was lost and told us when to get off the bus. From the bus stop, it was only a mile along a busy interstate-type road to the massive shopping mall.

Our second tram. It weaved through a huge piece of an ancient aqueduct.
Gotta love Rome.
The shopping mall caught me and Lane both by surprise. It was as crowded as a mall in America the week before Christmas, and much fancier! Neither one of us was ready for the shock of first world commercialism. That shock combined with the stress and aggravation of sitting at the "Genius Bar" for two hours means no pictures of the mall. The one Genius that spoke English could not solve my problem. In fact, if he did anything, he probably made it worse. But he did tell me how I could fix it myself once I got back to Turkey. So we left cautiously optimistic, slightly frustrated, a wee bit tired, and very hungry. A walk, bus, tram, bus, and tram later and we were ready for dinner.

This was the cute couple in the restaurant. We look happy enough. But then...
Lane said, "Alright, now let's take a picture of how we really feel."
This sums it up pretty well.
Overall, it was a little bit frustrating. But in the end, we had a few good laughs, spent some good time together, and Eve is running at full speed again. Everyone is happy.