apps

Download them from the app shop, the app market, the app warehouse. Applications. Thirty thousand of them.

To me application means devoting oneself to a task. But the meaning is superseded by application as widget or e-device for an iPhone or iPad. I try a few on my smartphone but can’t overcome the feeling that they’re nothing more than time-wasters and after six months idle time I expunge them.

I’m big on apps: appliances.

My fridge dies and I replace it with a reconditioned second-hand appliance. Then my vacuum cleaner fails utterly—the hose connection to the machine packs it in; the power-head crashed on the last outing. My good woman’s coffee-machine dribbles to a halt. Her kids ask me to join them in buying her a new one for her birthday.

I plug myself into the interweb. The Germans make reliable and effective appliances. I go direct to a Teutonic vacuum cleaner company’s website and order the dog-and-cat super turbo on clearance special.

The Italians do coffee well. I find the best price online and order a fire-engine red Italian espresso machine from a virtual appliance warehouse. They promise to keep me up to the minute on its delivery status.

Meanwhile our owners corporation decides to acquire a lawnmower and delegates me to make the purchase. I research and decide, but must wait for a debit card from the bank. It arrives yesterday. I set off just after eight this morning to buy oranges and a Masport 158cc grass-cutter.

My phone zhings in the car park at Chirnside Park shops. An email tells me that the coffee machine is in a van that departed Mooroolbark at 7:51 bound for my place. I hightail it home. The van is in the driveway. I sign for the box and move my car out of the van’s exit path. But the driver alights, opens the rear door and extracts another box. My new vacuum cleaner.

The JRT and I unbox the apps and  read the manuals together over a nice cuppa. I vacuum the house and turbo clean the furniture. It’s one mean mothersucker. After lunch I’m in the carport sparking up a shiny red lawnmower. Oil, water, another manual. Pull the cord and cut the grass in front of units 2 and 4.

At five I’m in my good woman’s kitchen installing her early birthday present—the el schmicko coffee-maker. My good woman savours its product and gives it a huge thumbs-up.

Apps, eh.

Rock on.