Yesterday I went to Westfield Stratford City in the late afternoon. It was heaving! Why did I do so, you may well ask?
On Thursday my mobile stopped sending and receivng calls. I spoke to my eldest son, who knows about those things (as do the other two!). He tried various options on the telephone but all to no avail. So he booked an appointment with Apple at Westfield - the earliest they could do was Friday at 5.30pm.
That evening Graham FACETIMED me. Had I switched the mobile off and on again, he asked? I have never ever done such a thing, I told him! Do it now he suggested and told me which button to press and for how long. And lo! It reset and I could make calls again! I gather that Danielle was smirking when all this happened for the lovely lady had said to Graham that this would be the answer - and Danielle was right (as Ladies always are, of course).
Graham suggested I keep the appointment to ask the man to do some sort of digital check (he did tell me the name but I have forgotten what it was called).
I found Apple and wandered off to have a look in Foyles. That was the first mistake forI bought a book for myself and another as a Christmas present! Back at Apple at 5.15., the place was packed solid. There must have been 200 folk in there with about 40 staff. It was manic. I reported in. Come back in 15 minutes the man said. I hung about outside like some sort of potential shoplifter.
Back at 5.30 I was told to sit down at a desk and wait to be called. After a few minutes a kindly Irishman of about 40 years or so appeared by my side.
I decided to tell him that I am a bit thick when it comes to mobile phones. I told him my age and he said that he has a grandmother of 86 in Ireland so he knows what its happening in my brain, which was a comfort. I explained that having turned it off and on all was well - but he said he needed to do a digital thingy, which he did for the next 15 minutes. He chatted all the time this was going on - about his grandmother, mainly.
Your mobile, he told me, is in perfect working order - so off I went, thanking him profusely and rejoicing in the fact that I had got away without having pay a penny piece!
And this was when I made the next mistake for I found myself wandering into the M & S shirt department. Here I can only think I was in some sort of post-Apple trance for I selected a non-iron shirt of considerable brightness together with a dark red tie (why the latter I do not know for I have drawers full of ties of every hue under the sun!) and also a pack of coloured handkerchiefs!
Having paid the lady behind the cash desk (who told me she was 62 and was having Saturday off), I made hastily for the rail station and home. Tired but happy (as they say) I rang Radio Cars at Ilford Station to take me home for my old legs would not have got me up Aldborough Road North unaided after such adventures. Is your mobile working again, asked the man at Radio Cars - for earlier this week we had about ten calls from you before you spoke to us? I assured him it was! And the man at Radio Cars was happy again. So that was a blessing.
