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Yours portly recently returned from one of his many trips to Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida.  It was a fun-filled trip with my family.  We rode all the classic rides, ate all the classic foods, and bought all the classic souvenirs.  It was a testament to middle-class frivolity and excess, which is what vacation is supposed to be here in the United States.

Readers will know all about my prior excursions to Universal Studios; indeed, there’s an essay or two about my trips there in my poor-selling second book, Arizonan Sojourn, South Carolinian Dreams: And Other Adventures (that’s an Amazon Affiliate link; I receive a portion of the proceeds from any purchase made through that link, at no additional cost to you; I also get royalties if you buy the book!).  There’s not much that I haven’t already said about the vaunted theme park and its many fun attractions.

So I thought I’d focus a bit on a side quest, of sorts, that I embarked upon during our visit.  I have an aging iPhone SE.  The phone possesses a battery that is well past its prime and in need of service.  As yours portly does quite a bit of business (and pleasure) via phone, I haven’t taken the plunge to send it off to get replaced.  The idea of being phone-less for a week is rather daunting, my past anti-cellular rants notwithstanding.  Yes, I’m a hypocrite, dear reader, and a proud one.

At this point, I am essentially going to use the phone until I can easily obtain a replacement, and seamlessly port my service to a new phone—no need for that painfully long period of disconnected existence.  Of course, the downside is that I wandering in this world with a phone battery with less charge than a hand-turned jack-in-a-box.  Couple that with a niece and nephews hungry to the fast-paced world of mobile gaming, and you can see the kind of low-battery predicament yours portly found himself in this past weekend.

So, the side quest:  I was on a constant, vigilant hunt for power outlets during our trip.  It may surprise you, but Universal Studios does not exactly have easily accessible power outlets thrown out into the world on full display, eagerly awaiting the powerful connection of a pronged interloper thrusting into its sockets.  As such, I quickly learned the subtle art of eagle-eyed socket detection.

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