I recently accused Google’s Alexa of hacking into my thoughts. Now, it seems my iPhone has gone rogue.
My Apple weather app provides me data for six places: Hamden, Connecticut, where we live, New Haven, where we used to live, New York City, where three of our children and their spouses/partners and my granddaughter live, Carrboro, North Carolina, where two of our daughters, their partners, and my grandson live, Los Angeles, where I once hoped to live, and Rivière-aux-Outardes, a territory in the Cote-Nord region of Quebec, Canada, with a population of 90.
Why Rivière-aux-Outardes? A few years ago, Cupertino, California was in the app, which made sense, as that’s where Apple’s corporate campus is. I deleted it. Then Rivière-aux-Outardes appeared one day out of the blue. I was (am) mystified.
It’s no secret that I fucking hate winter, and the only place I can fly to for a reasonable price, Florida, is tainted by Ron DeSantis. Carrboro, North Carolina, a sweet kumbaya place populated by sweet kumbaya people, is only marginally warmer than Connecticut this time of year. When I look at my phone and see what’s happening, weather-wise, in Rivière-aux-Outardes, I stop whining. This morning I woke to Hamden’s rain and 40 degrees, which sounds pretty shitty until you see that in Rivière-aux-Outardes, it is 1 degree. That’s right. 1.
Just so you know, 1 degree makes this the warmest day of the upcoming week in Rivière-aux-Outardes. Tomorrow it will be 0, and the day after that, -1.
I don’t know Apple’s motive, but that’s okay. While I envy L.A.’s 74 and sunny, I could be in single-digit Riviere-aux-Outardes, expecting three days of snow. It’s like I now have a friend I can hold in the palm of my hand, reassuring me that always, somewhere, things are worse.