Apptitude

I have never downloaded an app to my phone. It’s a basic phone that I use for calls and texting. I have tried and occasionally succeeded at using the phone to check something on the internet, but so far I have managed just fine without apps on my phone.

Last night I learned that tonight is our book club meeting. I hadn’t read the book. Last night David tried to help me buy the book online so I could read it on my MacBook. We tried and failed to log into the Apple Store to buy the book. There’s something particularly insurmountable about Apple's log in process. I learned this once when I tried to download a song for my iPod.

I got up at 5 a.m. and tried another route--buying the book on Google Books. I’ve done this once before, so had high hopes. The last time, I had problems reading the book and was told I should have downloaded the app as opposed to reading the book in Google Play. This time, I couldn’t get PayPal to work AND I couldn’t get my Visa card to work to pay for the book.

Third time’s the charm, right? I want to Amazon and tried to download the Kindle app so I could buy the book and read it on Kindle. I went through the motions of downloading the app and thought I had succeeded. When I went back to buy the book, Amazon offered me the option of reading it on the Kindle Cloud, whatever that is. I chose that option and got through 90% of the book by the time the book club met tonight. While reading the book, I got an e-mail that my Kindle app purchase didn’t go through because of a problem with my credit card. So I think I still haven’t managed to download an app.

I think the problem I’m having with my credit card is that I have listed my mom’s address as my address. I want to use that credit card to make dollar-denominated purchases when I’m in the US, avoiding foreign transaction fees. The credit card is paid from an American bank, so I thought it should have an American address. The internet being so smart and all it knows I live in the UK and it doesn’t like me paying using a credit card with a US address.

My Aunt Rosemary used to say she had lived too long. She was in her 80s when she said this. I’m in my 50s and I feel the same way. If the internet went away tomorrow and took cellphones and apps with it, I’d be fine. I’m so tired of all the walls I hit when I try to do the simplest things.
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