Today, in true Apple formality, I received my blue t-shirt.

The (current) blue t-shirt is the shirt worn by all Apple employees in the store. As an employee that has been shadowing for the last few weeks, this is a big deal to me. I’ve had the lanyard with my name on it for some time but the customers coming always wouldn’t recognize that because I wasn’t dressed like all the other employees. There would often be a question of “oh, do you work here?”

So tonight I was finished up with a customer setting up their iPad and Andrew, who has been so very kind and welcoming to me since day one, motioned me aside and said he needed to speak to me. We started discussing aspects of introducing our MobileMe service to customers and how I had approached the different elements this service had to offer. The conversation seemed a little strange, but I presented how I had delivered the different elements of MobileMe to different customers. Then Big Tony (who is a mentor at the store) came along up beside me, mentioned in a booming voice “Can I have everyone’s attention?” to, literally, employees and customers in the store. (So of course Andrew was the fall guy to keep me distracted while Big Tony could getting everything set up. So clever.) He then proceeded to announce to everyone that I was a new Apple employee who had just, basically, earned his stripes and that we should all give me a round of applause. And with this, he handed me the company-issued iPad-branded blue t-shirt that all the other employees were wearing. It was at this point that I’d not be wearing street clothes with the lanyard, but that I was one of them, an equal, someone who would interacted with customers solo without any kind of supervision. Needless to say, I was beaming smiles and gave a gracious bow as the claps from employees and customers alike abounded. Co-workers that either weren’t on the floor at the time or that were out-of-sight of the main room that I had shadowed with had big, beaming smiles on their faces and gave me high-fives or fistbumbs the next time they saw me.

Wow.

I felt so appreciated, so respected for the work that I had done and the interactions with customers that employees had watched me perform during the reverse-shadowing sessions. It was a strike of confidence and acceptance that I carried with me all the ride home.

I am official. Officially Apple.

How can I help you today?

Yesterday Apple and its carrier partners took pre-orders for more than 600,000 of Apple’s new iPhone 4. It was the largest number of pre-orders Apple has ever taken in a single day and was far higher than we anticipated, resulting in many order and approval system malfunctions. Many customers were turned away or abandoned the process in frustration. We apologize to everyone who encountered difficulties, and hope that they will try again or visit an Apple or carrier store once the iPhone 4 is in stock.

Next Thursday on release day is going to be a busy day!

Also, today Apple release iTunes 9.2 which includes the following iOS4-ready features:

• Sync and read books with iPhone or iPod touch with iOS 4 and iBooks 1.1
• Organize and sync PDF documents as books. Read PDFs with iBooks 1.1 on iPad and any iPhone or iPod touch with iOS 4
• Organize your apps on your iOS 4 home screens into folders using iTunes
• Faster back-ups while syncing an iPhone or iPod touch with iOS 4
• Album artwork improvements make artwork appear more quickly when exploring your library

iOS4 stand-alone upgrade will be available for current iPhone users on June 21. (Original iPhone [metal] is excluded and not all new features will be available for all models. More info here.)

Today marks the first time I will be working in an Apple Store while the WWDC keynote happens. This is where Steve usually makes new product announcements and this year’s anticipation I’d all about a new iPhone, rumored to be called “iPhone HD”.

The keynote starts at 1:00 Eastern so I’ll be on the floor helping customers while the liveblogging sites are doing their updates. I’m hoping someone will be upstairs checking these and coming down and keeping us updated.

~

All of the above was written on the way to work and I’m home now after my shift. It turned out that because we’re using iPads now at the concierge that we were able to follow the minute-by-minute on a webpage there, which was totally nice. It’s also nice to work with so many Apple geeks.

So the new iPhone 4 (as it’s being called) is out now and it’s identical to the one that Gizmodo bought a couple of months ago. And while there may not have been many surprises, it still looks pretty sweet. Although I’m not eligible for an upgrade by AT&T until February 2011 so it doesn’t look like I’ll be getting this phone anytime soon. And after February, I may as well wait the few months until June 2011 when iPhone 5 is announced.

One thing I find odd about the announcement is why weren’t the hard drives bumped up from 16-gig and 32-gig to 32-gig and 64-gig?

~

And happy 4th blog anniversary to me!

Today in DreamJob news:

At 2:48 pm I get a call from the Pentagon City store. Odd, I’m thinking, since all the attention has been focused towards the opening of the new Georgetown store. I’m surmising that they’re pulling resources to get the new store open and this is their way of informing me.

After listening to the voicemail a few dozen times, and having a stiff rum & lemonade, I call back. It turns out the Georgetown store is full (their words—meaning fully staffed already) but they’re interested in me coming on at the Pentagon City store.

Now, the Pentagon City store is in a mall and it’s kinda tiny and always crowded and, at least one time when I was there, unbearably hot. But maybe it’s that high-volume hectic environment where it’s best to go in there and kick some ass.

Tomorrow’s appointment with the store manager (whom I spoke with on the phone) is at 3:00. I guess I’ll know by 4:00 then!

At the end of my DreamJob callback interview last week, this certain employer told me I would hear back from them “late next week or early the following week”. Hiring status was to be determined after the dreaded credit check, and then they would let all the potentials knows one way or another.

Today it is officially “late next week”, even more so than yesterday was. And I haven’t heard any word. This is not necessarily a bad thing but I’m a little anxious. Wouldn’t you be? Everytime the phone rings or the email goes bong I’m thinking “here we go, this is it”! But they’re not.

So now I guess it appears I will have to wait thru the weekend to find out any news. Drat!

On Tuesday I received a phone call from the 408 area code, the mothership. In other words Cupertino. (Deep breath… deep breath…)

Cupertino left a message to schedule my callback interview for the DreamJob. So after breathing into a paper bag for fifteen minutes and listening to the message 30 times, I returned the call. They were wanting to setup a “final interview” and listed some times where they had slots open. It seems some from the headquarters were flying across the country to interview li’l ole me. And probably about 50 other people but that’s beside the point.

I agreed to a 3:00 Thursday appt and upon ending the call realized I had the next 48 hours to freak out. But then I calmed down, thinking this is in the bag. There’s not really anything to research anyway, it’s all been in my head for the last 20 years with this company.

The interview went well, if I can say that from what I understand about this unique interview process. I interviewed with another person in an open discussion forum for about 45 minutes and I think I got some good responses from the Columbia store manager.

The next step is the dreaded requisite background check which I’m hoping they’re not going to dwell too much on consumer credit because if they do then I’m fucked yet again. Try being out of work for 16 months and see how timely you’re paying your bills. But I’m going to send a reply to Kiwon, whom I spoke with (and met) from corporate, to explain and maybe buffer the bad news a bit.

Regardless, they said I would hear a response of accept/decline by the end of next week/early the following week. Keep those fingers crossed!

All this week when the email went bong! I immediately and nervously checked it (not to mention all the constant “check email now” refreshes) to see if I had received THE email from the DreamJob. With a promise of “we’ll get back to everybody this week”, time was running out on a Friday afternoon. Maybe then I thought they said “we’ll get back to everybody in the new few weeks” and it would be another couple of weeks of agony. But today it came:

“I have forwarded your information on to the hiring manager of Georgetown. We did indeed decide to invite you back for an interview but since your preference was for Georgetown, they will be talking to you from here on. They have your info and will be arranging interviews through the end of April.

Good luck!

<signature>”

Woohoo w00t booyah and all that good stuff! I’m hoping I didn’t shoot myself in the foot by requesting the Gtown store instead of one of the existing ones, but that one’s right on the D6 line which goes right in front of my apt and I could travel to work above ground and it would be nice to reprahzent DC instead of traveling to the H8ST8 or Murland.

Now I have to wait for the interview setup but at least I can relax a little knowing that I’ve secured the callback. April is the best month evra!

Scruffy crooner Matt Alber finally hits the East Coast, not counting one-off publicity/fundraising shows in New York. The “tour” isn’t substantial by any means but he is coming to DC (yay!).

The first show is January 18 in NYC with Celisse Henderson. He shoots down to Va Beach and then Balmer, hon, before coming to the District on his birthday, February 6. He’s teaming up with singer Tom Goss (who I’m unfamiliar with) and playing at Delaski Theater in Adams Morgan. I’ve never heard of this theater but bought a ticket anyway and I’m excited to go. After the DC gig he heads down to Florida for a few gigs sans Mr. Goss. Hopefully he’ll add some mid-Atlantic cities to this tour, check out all the latest at his website, mattalber.com.

In my excitement of learning of the tour and purchasing an immediate ticket, I tweeted my excitement and received a personal tweet back from Mr. Alber. <swoon>

Today on their website Duran Duran announced an all-encompassing repackaging of Arcadia’s 1985 So Red The Rose, arguably the best Duran Duran album never made. Nick Rhodes had hinted towards this release several months ago and I was eager to see if it would come to see the light.

History: Arcadia was one of the DD splinter groups in 1985, at the height of their fame, being comprised of Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes and Roger Taylor. The other remaining DD members joined up with Robert Palmer and Tony Thompson to form Power Station.

This re-release includes the original album as-is and all 20 remixes of the five released singles from the album, plus the soundtrack-only rarity “Say The Word”. Also included is the über-rare long form version of “Rose Arcana”. The shorter (0:51) version, according to legend, ended up on the original lease due to length of tape and vinyl allowed to be released at that time. I don’t know if that is necessarily true, but it does make for good folklore. Also included are all five videos and making-of documentaries for each video.

This project would also mark the last use of graphic designer Malcolm Garrett of Assorted Images for any of their packaging or branding related efforts.

Just for kicks, here’s video of 80s stalwart Max Headroom giving Simon and Nick a hard time:

From the Duran Duran press release, the complete track listing for the re-release is below:

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