If You're Not Waiting for Something, You're Just Waiting.

Recently, I spent 5 days in Florida -- which, if you've ever been to Florida you realize this is 4 days too many. This well-deserved (says me) time off of work thankfully coincided with the release of the new iPhone, which, I wasn't at all interested in until I realized I had the day off and could thus spend it standing in line.

I had planned to get there early. 6am early. Then, I realized that taking my mom and grandma to the airport would thwart these plans, and that if I were still going to commit to the iPhone line, I would have to meet up around 9:45 and probably bring up the rear of the line behind all of the people that got there way before the 8am release. Again, I had the day off. So I did it. I waited in line for the iPhone.

I did it for the experience. The experience -- which saw survival of the fittest and most patient. I weathered the hot Florida sun and humidity, the threat of a downpour, Apple POS system crash they blamed on AT&T, achy feet from standing in heels, and free McDonald's hamburgers. McDonald's --never one to miss a marketing opportunity -- was the official cater of the iPhone line. All the hamburgers, Desani water, and apple dippers you could eat: $0, 6 hours of waiting.

Comments from passersby outside were at a minimum, however, when we graduated from Line 1: outside, to Line 2: inside, mall patrons were less forgiving of the cumbersome line crowding their mall. In such a way that strangers communicate the most pertinent bit of information they can in their passing moments, it is amazing what some of the observers verbally left behind.

Basically: they were better than us. The International Plaza Mall -- snooty even by its namesake -- is not the most forgiving place to wait in line.

An older, petite woman, who appeared sharp in nature, critical in expression, and poised as though her entire person had been raped from a high-end boutique's front, vapid mannequin powered by the line and demanded to know why we were there. She wore a color of green I could never afford.

"What. Are you waiting in line for?" She asked, to no one in particular.
"The iPhone," several people responded with vigor that was oddly excited and exhausted.

With the upward wave of a wrinkled, wretched wizard's hand, she cackled upward into the air as she dramatically tilted her head back and released the coldness in her soul. "Ha!" The echo of her laughter enshrouded all whose eyes were upon her and minimized them to a pile of dust underneath the condescending demeanor of someone who has never waited in line for anything. Anything at all.