The Honeymoon Is Over When I first got my MacBook in the mail, it was love at first sight. After what happened today, I'm thinking about getting my eyesight checked.

I finally got around to installing Bootcamp and Windows XP on my MacBook. I was working on customizing the appearance of Windows, customizing the wallpaper, organizing the desktop icons, changing system sounds and whatnot. A thunderstorm was brewing outside. Whether or not that had anything to do with what happened next is anybody's guess.

The MacBook comes with this thing that Apple calls the "magsafe" power adapter. The "mag" in "magsafe" stands for magnet, which is how the power adapter attaches to the MacBook. The "safe" stands for keeping your MacBook safe from damage. The idea is that, if somebody trips over the power cord, the cord just pops out of the MacBook, instead of sending it crashing to the floor.

As you'll soon see, the magsafe is anything but safe.

So there I am, inside my house during a thunderstorm, messing with XP on the Mac, and out of nowhere, sparks come flying from the magsafe adapter where it's attached to the MacBook. The screen goes black as the sparks ignite into a small flame. I grab the nearest thing I could to smother the flame, which just happened to be my computer mascot, a beanie baby named "Gobbles." Fortunately, Gobbles put out the fire without getting gobbled up by the flames.

I inspect the magsafe power adapter. The flame had melted the shielding on the cord, which you can clearly see in this picture. I determined that the MacBook was still working using its internal battery, but the adapter was shot. They couldn't possibly know what was about to hit them, but a furious Bernie Michaels was about to make his first phone call to Apple support.

After waiting on hold for about ten minutes, I get an Apple support representative on the phone. "Thank you for calling Apple support. My name is Marie. How may I help you?," Marie asks.

"Your stupid MacBook nearly burned down my house!" I yell.

"I'm sorry that you're having trouble with your MacBook, sir. Could you please tell me what you did?" Marie asks.

"What I did?" I retort. "I did nothing! I was just using my MacBook, and flames shot out of the power adapter. If I didn’t happen to be here, my house could have been burned to the ground! My beanie baby's butt is scorched!"

"Your beanie baby, sir?" Marie inquired.

"Never mind!" I say. "The point is that flames burst out of the power adapter and now the power adapter is shot."

"We can overnight a new power adapter to you, sir." Marie says. "I just need to get some information from you." She asks me for the MacBook's serial number, my name and address, and then, she says she needs a few more details so that she can fill out an incident report. She tells me that Apple keeps track of incidents like this for quality control purposes. "At the time of the incident, was the power adapter plugged into a surge protector?"

"Why is it," I ask, "that you keep trying to put the blame on me?"

"Would that be a 'no,' sir?" Marie asks.

"Yes, that would be a 'no,'" I say in the snottiest tone I could muster. "But it shouldn't matter!" I add. "This thing should not be bursting into flames!"

Marie says, "I understand your concern, sir, and I'll be sure to pass this information along to our quality control department."

I couldn't believe she was being so nonchalant about this. I paid a fortune for this little fire hazard, and all that Apple was going to do was send me another one of their "Magburn" power adapters. I expected them to bend over backwards with apologies. I wanted them to kiss my ass!

"We'll get a new power adapter out to you today. You should have it tomorrow," Marie says. "Is there anything else I can help you with?"

I wasn't quite sure how to put my wish that she kiss my ass into words, so I just said, "No."

"Thank you for calling Apple support, and have a nice day." Marie hung up.

First the sharp edge slashes my wrists, and now this! After getting off the phone, I flipped my MacBook the finger and booted up my neglected Dell. Like an ole reliable dog, it sprang to life, and more importantly, it didn't burst into flames. I don't know about you, but that's one of the things I look for in a computer: the lack of spontaneous combustion.

I'm starting to think that the power adapter isn't the only thing that got burned.
- Bernie  ¶ 5:15 PM