Crazy Apple Rumors Site is on indefinite hyenas.
…
Wait, that’s not right…
Oh, no, it is. Upon closer inspection, these do indeed appear to be some indeterminable kind of hyena.
Man, it’s a good thing they’re asleep! Ha-ha! What with the fangs and all!
Ahh…
Anyway, more to the point, we’re also on hiatus.
Every Friday, the staff at Crazy Apple Rumors Site used to answer common help questions based on our vast experience with Apple products and our fervent belief that we know more than you do.
But not any more.
________________
[THE TOP-SECRET CARS HEADQUARTERS. THE OFFICE IS ALMOST EMPTY, THE DESKS ARE CLEARED AND A LONE FIGURE SITS PUTTING ITEMS INTO A CARDBOARD BOX.]
MOLTZ: Macworld media badge. Boba Fett action figure. Lock of Nancy Heinen’s hair. Unreleased CD of HyperCard for OS X. Copy of Schillerworld magazine. Hey, there’s my Apple iPad! Man, how did I not see that was just a Newton with a sticker on it that said “iPad”? Ha-ha! Ahhh, I was so young! Well, 37.
[TAKES A SWIG OUT OF A BOTTLE OF TRES GENERACIONES ANEJO TEQUILA THEN SHOUTS TO ABSOLUTELY NO ONE:] This isn’t a box of objects it’s a box of memories, dammit!
[LOOKING INTO THE BOX] And, um, something wrapped in aluminum foil that says “Rob Enderle’s liver”. I’m kind of afraid to open that. That’s from a weekend in Vegas I don’t remember anything of at all. Which is probably a good thing.
But…
Good times. And now… it’s all…
[SUDDENLY, A LOW HUM BEGINS TO FILL THE ROOM. IT CONTINUES TO GROW AS A WHIRLWIND BEGINS, SCATTERING PAPERS AND FLINGING THE BLINDS ABOUT. AS THE NOISE REACHES AN ALMOST DEAFENING LEVEL, A BRIGHT BALL OF WHITE LIGHT APPEARS, SENDING BOLTS OF ELECTRICITY SHOOTING TO THE NOW-EMPTY OUTLETS IN THE ROOM. A FIGURE EMERGES AS THE BOLTS OF ELECTRICITY CEASE AND THE HUM DIMINISHES. IT IS THE ENTITY, STILL IN THE FORM OF THE HOTNESS THAT IS JENNIFER FRICKING CONNELLY.]
MOLTZ: Hey! What are you doing here? You already left.
THE ENTITY: Re… appearing.
MOLTZ: Right. Well, it’s not that I’m not glad to see you, but we’re not really supposed to be in here. Our lease ran out today. I already gave the keys to the landlord. He just let me in here to clean out my desk.
THE ENTITY: Forgot… [WALKS OVER TO A TABLE AND PICKS UP A PEN] …my pen. Double booked in 4 billion years.
MOLTZ: Huh?
THE ENTITY: [THE ENTITY REGARDS THE PEN THOUGHTFULLY] Interesting. Future uncertain. Again.
MOLTZ: [RAISES THE BOTTLE OF TEQUILA] Well, you got that right. [TAKES A DRINK]
THE ENTITY: Unknown forces now in motion.
MOLTZ: Uh, is that something I should be concerned about?
THE ENTITY: No. Yes.
MOLTZ: Thanks. That’s helpful.
THE ENTITY: Well… goodbye! [TURNS TO THE LIGHT]
MOLTZ: Has anyone ever told you that you’re kind of odd?
THE ENTITY: Jean-Louis Gassée.
MOLTZ: Yeah, well, he’s one to talk.
THE ENTITY: [NODS, THEN TURNS BACK TO THE LIGHT BUT DOES NOT ENTER, AS IF CONSIDERING SOMETHING FOR A MOMENT. THEN POINTS INTO THE LIGHT.] You?
MOLTZ: Uh, you want me to come with you? You want me to step into the light?
THE ENTITY: Yes.
MOLTZ: But, uh, wouldn’t that mean I’m dead?
THE ENTITY: No. Opposite. Alive. Everywhere. Everywhen.
MOLTZ: Oh. Hey, you mean just like Captain Sisko?!
THE ENTITY: No!
MOLTZ: Uh, OK.
THE ENTITY: Stupid!
MOLTZ: Well, it seems pretty much the same. How’s it different?
THE ENTITY: Booze! Wii bowling!
MOLTZ: Oh. Well, those are good differences.
THE ENTITY: Pudding!
MOLTZ: You’re three for three.
THE ENTITY: Baked Lays!
MOLTZ: That’s not terribly surprising.
THE ENTITY: Manual stick transmission!
MOLTZ: OK, now it seems like you’re just shouting random things.
THE ENTITY: Crab!
MOLTZ: Oh. Chesapeake or Dungeness?
THE ENTITY: Don.
MOLTZ: Oh. Two B’s.
THE ENTITY: Yes. Or… not.
MOLTZ: Aye! [NODDING] There’s the rub.
THE ENTITY: …
MOLTZ: …
THE ENTITY: Coming?
MOLTZ: You know… um… no. Thanks. As tempting as spending eternity in a parallel universe is, with all the booze and pudding I can consume, surrounded by Mac pundits of yore and energy beings who can turn themselves into Jennifer fricking Connelly at will… I’m gonna stay here. But… thanks, man. For everything.
THE ENTITY: Ah. Chicken.
MOLTZ: What? No! Hey, I did go to the center of the galaxy with you to fight Tentaculous, if you remember.
THE ENTITY: Cross-town bus!
MOLTZ: Oh, fine. Maybe it was to you, but humans aren’t used to interstellar travel. And the in-flight movie was “Catwoman”! Dear god, that made me sicker than zero G and all the radiation combined.
Anyway… you take care of yourself.
THE ENTITY: Affirmative.
[THE ENTITY TURNS AND STARTS TO ENTER THE LIGHT]
MOLTZ: Oh… hey.
THE ENTITY: Hmm?
MOLTZ: What’s your name?
THE ENTITY: Name?
MOLTZ: You never told me your name. After all these years. Do you have one?
THE ENTITY: Yes.
MOLTZ: What is it?
THE ENTITY: [PAUSES BEFORE ANSWERING] Moof.
MOLTZ: Moof? No. Really?
THE ENTITY: [NODS, THEN SHRUGS] Coincidence.
MOLTZ: [LAUGHS] OK. See you around?
THE ENTITY: [NODS] Round. Like… waffles.
MOLTZ: It always comes back to waffles, doesn’t it. Almost as if the universe were waffle-shaped or something.
THE ENTITY: Kumquat.
MOLTZ: Um… right. Well… you have a nice flight.
[THE ENTITY TURNS AND ENTERS THE LIGHT AS THE HUM RETURNS, BUT ONLY BRIEFLY. THE LIGHT SHINES BRIGHTLY AND THERE ARE SPARKS AND THE NOTHING.]
[MOLTZ LOOKS AROUND AT WHAT IS NOW ALMOST OFFICIALLY THE FORMER TOP-SECRET CARS HEADQUARTERS.]
MOLTZ: I guess this is it. Jeez. Everybody’s gone but me. Chet. Vinz. Albert (whoever that is). Masako. Howard. Ugluk. Thor. The angry Scotsman. The highly effeminate half-Orc. Gloria the Sexbot. Tentaculous. Apple’s friend Gary….
[SCOOTER THE MAILROOM BOY BURSTS INTO THE ROOM, LABORIOUSLY CARRYING A LARGE BOX.]
MOLTZ: … Scooter the mail room boy…
SCOOTER: Oh! Mr. Moltz! You’re still here!
MOLTZ: Scooter, don’t interrupt me. I’m not through reciting names. Gordy, Glaarku…
SCOOTER: Oh, well, it’s just that… there’s a package for you.
MOLTZ: Really?
SCOOTER: Yeah. It came earlier. From a Mr. Skiller?
MOLTZ: Huh? “Skiller”? I don’t know any… Wait. Schiller?
SCOOTER: It’s kind of big. Do you mind giving me a hand? I think maybe it’s a monitor or something.
MOLTZ: You’re kidding.
SCOOTER: [READING] “30-inch Cinema Display”.
MOLTZ: No. Frakking. Way.
SCOOTER: That’s what it says.
MOLTZ: Well, how do you like that?
SCOOTER: Uh, well, it’s OK, I guess. It’s a little big for me, though. I live in an efficiency.
MOLTZ: Uh-huh. Yeah, well, fortunately that was a rhetorical question. Let’s load it into my car, Scooter, my good man. Because my work here…
…is done.
[THEY EACH GRAB AN END OF THE BOX AND MOVE INTO THE HALL. MOLTZ SHUTS THE LIGHT OFF WITH HIS ELBOW AND SWINGS THE DOOR SHUT WITH HIS FOOT. IT CLOSES WITH AN AUDIBLE CLICK OF THE LOCK.]
[THERE IS A BRIEF SILENCE.]
MOLTZ: Ah, crap. I think I just locked my car keys in there.
And my box of stuff.
And my bottle of tequila.
[THERE IS THE SOUND OF THE MARIMBA RINGTONE.]
And my iPhone.
[FOLLOWED BY THE PLAINTIFF BLEATING OF A SMALL BOVIDAE.]
And, uh, apparently, the evil goat.
Darn it.
The outpouring of sentiment from sites across the Apple web community has been pretty overwhelming. I’m sobbing into my morning gin and tonic as I type this.
And you know what? Tears actually make a great mixer. My tears, of course, are not as sweet as the tears of children, but you take what you can get.
Anyway, my thanks to Mike Lee, Brent Simmons, John Gruber, Paul Kafasis, Gus Mueller, Scott McNulty, Tom Krazit, Chris Breen, Dan Moren, Glenn Fleishman, Rich Mogull, Snaggy, Jason Snell, Matt Deatherage (who gets in his last digs at my spelling – like I’ve said, I’m a product of a poor education, Matt!) and all the people in the comments here.
You know what?! Forget it! I’m staying! I love you guys! I could never leave you! We’re getting the band back together! We’re going to pile in the VW microbus and drive around playing our music our way and solving mysteries and we’re gonna rock all night long and if anyone tries to tell us to be quiet we’re gonna say “Go to bed, old man, because rock and roll is here to stay!”
…
Oh, wait, I still don’t have any money.
Plus, we were never a band together or anything like that.
Dammit.
Never mind.
Last day. Final post coming up later.
And it’s a tear-jerker, so bring some liquor.
Shocking news has been leaked from the Microsoft Business Unit today that reveals the reason the release of Office for the Mac was delayed last year. According to sources, some times last year, developers in the MBU discovered a child lost in the voluminous source code of Word for the Mac.
Sources were unable to say how he got in there or whose child he might be, but he apparently had been living in the code in a feral state for a number of years.
Lost in a morass of legacy code, the child was only first glimpsed when Microsoft began to remove Visual Basic support.
“He was apparently hiding behind some of that code,” said a MBU developer who declined to be identified.
The source placed blame on former MBU head Roz Ho and credited new head Craig Eisler with the boy’s eventual rescue.
“Roz ignored the obvious signs there was someone living in the code,” the source said. “There were signs of nesting, old bones and scat everywhere. Craig personally coaxed that kid out of there and saved him from a life that was nothing but a constant struggle to survive.
“Oh, my god, I just realized he probably had to live with Clippy! What a horrible existence. It’s inhuman. I can’t even bring myself to think of it.”
If this child was living in Word for the Mac, one shudders to think what could be living in Word for Windows.
Microsoft declined to comment officially for this story.
We told them it would probably be their last chance but they still declined to comment.
Pff.
Sissies.
The Apple community was thrown upside down today as definitive proof was delivered that Macworld magazine managing editor Jason Snell is on the take.
“His three and a half mice review of the MacBook Air was the final bit of evidence, said Rogue Amoeba‘s Paul Kafasis. “He’s obviously on the take from Microsoft.
“Or Sony. It could be Sony. They had a Vaio ad in the last issue fer Chrissake! How obvious does it have to be, people! Wake up and smell the graft!”
“I personally won’t be satisfied until he corrects his false statements about the MacBook Air, apologizes publicly and is banned from attending Major League Baseball games for the rest of his life,” Kafasis concluded.
Oddly, others contended that Snell isn’t on the take from Apple’s competitors, but is actually on the take from Apple.
“I was going to give the iPod nano four mice,” said Macworld editor Dan Frakes, “and then Jason says, ‘Hey, why don’t we bump this up to four and a half mice?’! And he winks at me! I mean, what’s that all about?!”
When contacted, Snell was surprisingly up front about his greased palms.
“It’s a pretty sweet gig,” Snell admitted. “I get paid by Apple to favorably review their products and then I get paid by its competitors to trash Apple’s products. It’s a win-win! I can’t lose!
“Although, I’ll admit, it does get confusing sometimes. I have to keep careful track of who I’m getting bribed by on any given day in iCal. This week it’s obviously Sony. I mean… c’mon! 3 and a half mice for the Air?! But you know I’m gonna cut me off a slice of that sweet Sony action.”
Apple and Sony both declined to confirm that Snell was on the take, but when reporters peeked in the window of his home, they did see products from both vendors, which is pretty damning.