Mac-cessibility

I stopped into the Apple store today. On a rainy day, there's no better toy store for grown-up boys like me. It's so easy to cause mischief.

There are all kinds of games you can play. They had LEGO Star Wars II set up at one computer, but I couldn't figure out how to get out of the stupid bar. So instead, I played my own favorite game: screwing up the computers on display.

It's easy to do. All you have to do is zoom in, by holding down the Control key and rolling the little scroll ball on the mouse. It zooms in on the pointer. And the best part is, THERE'S NO WAY TO GET IT BACK TO NORMAL. In theory, you're supposed to be able to roll the ball backwards and zoom out that way, but I have yet to meet a Mac mouse that allows you to do that without several minutes of trial and error. What a brilliant feature.

The Mac has always been ridiculously visual. As the supposedly creative type, I should love Macs -- and I do like the idea of an operating system designed for human beings -- but it's virtually impossible for me to use. Even when the zoom thing works, I can't figure out how to make it more like a magnifying glass, where the rest of the screen stays the same and only a spot gets bigger. At least I have a program for that on my PC.

The iPod has the same problem, of course. With displays that small, I'm surprised anyone can see those things -- and how exactly do you type on an iPhone? Did everyone's fingers suddenly turn into toothpicks?

Lucky for me, the cheapest thing Apple makes is the Shuffle: the iPod that doesn't require you to see anything at all. Of course, if I were completely blind, I'm not sure how I'd get my podcasts onto the Shuffle in the first place... but that's for somebody else to worry about.

And now, back to This American Life.