I was waiting for my flight at Heathrow, sitting on one of those little wi-fi desks, when a young Mactard mother with an extremely annoying kid decided to annoy me by sitting at the wi-fi desk just next to mine. They decided that they’d watch a movie while they waited for their flight and this process consisted of the kid screaming “I wanna watch a movie!!!” and the mom screaming back “WAIT, let me start it!” as she turned her Macbook on. This seemed to be taking an extraordinary amount of time, with the kid nagging her and her sitting there trying to figure out something. I was fine with this arrangement - I don’t like kids and I don’t like Mactards, so as long as one of them is having a bad time, I was alright.
Unforunately, after a while, she turned to me (oh dread, my mind reported to me) and asked me “All I want to do is watch this DVD… what is a British Pound?” I told her that it was the currency used here. She then started staring at the screen with one of those expressions, “I heard what you said but I don’t understand so could you come over and help me? Meanwhile I’ll just put on a confused look on my face and continue staring.”
*SIGH*
Empathic human nature kicked in, but not completely, so I went over. I looked at her screen and it didn’t take very long to figure out what had happened: She had started up the Macbook, her browser was on autostart, so it popped up and tried to go to her home page. The Macbook had picked up the wireless network in the area and went to the wireless network company’s home page, informing her that she would have to pay to use the Internet facilities in the area. What confused her was the “British Pound,” but keep in mind that all she had to do was start up the Mac and put the DVD in.
Clearly, the fact that she owned an Apple product was a testament to her intelligence and wisdom.
So rather than explain to her that she could ignore it, I told her that 10 GBP is 5 US$ and that after she paid the charges, she would be allowed to use her laptop in the airport.
I went back to my seat, noticing that the guy sitting next to me was grinning in approval. A fellow Mactard hater? I didn’t ask, as modern day social etiquettes prevented such actions.
Five minutes later, the kid lost interest in the movie that they were watching and started running around. First, she ran into the power cord for the Macbook, knocking it out of its socket. The mom, of course, yelled at her. She started running around again and this time, bumped her head against the table that she had been sitting at, just 30 seconds ago. What’s more worrying is that she was taller than the table, so clearly she must have seen it as she ran into it.
Another five minutes later, she ran around again and this time, tripped the power chord and bumped her head even harder against the same table. She fell on the floor crying and everyone around me couldn’t contain their laughter any longer. They all burst out laughing as this incompetent mother-daughter mismatch started crying and yelling at each other.
I, however, did not laugh. I logged off, packed up my laptop and went to the bathroom, where I curled up in the stall and wept for humanity.