Well, okay - so it wasn't manic, but it is a little bit crazy to hang out in the heat all day to buy a phone.  I was just up at the La Encatada shopping mall here in Tucson browsing around for a birthday gift for my wife.  Also, I partly wanted to see what the action was like at the Apple Store for today's release of the iPhone.  Well, there was about 20 people in line.  A lot of them had Macbooks, Powerbooks, iBooks, and Macbook Pros - I don't think I saw one PC in the bunch.  Considering we should hit triple digits by noon, I'm glad I'm not getting an iPhone today. 
 
Here's my transcript from the conversation I had with an Apple employee this morning:
Him: Can I help you find something?
Me:  No, not really…  I'm pretty much just mooching off of your air conditioning
Him: That's cool.  I like working here because it's cool in here.
Me: Great. How long have the people been waiting out here to buy telephones?
Him:  Since about 5:30 this morning…  security wouldn't let them line up until today. 
Me: So do you have enough iPhones for the people waiting. 
Him: I don't even know how many we have.  They keep that info top secret.
Me:  I read on Engadget yesterday that all the Apple employees are getting free iPhones.
Him: Really?  Umm… well that's cool…   (he didn't seem too excited - I think he was pretending it wasn't true).
 
Then he went on a whole rant about how he is a kitchen geek and loves Japanese knives.  Right about then a real customer came in… 

Photo: Note the giant fake iPhone in the window to the right. 

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