Our farm has about 2500 feet of road frontage. Being very rural, we also have a bunch of deer. Unfortunately cars and deer do not get along, so once or twice a year I have to deal with the body of a deer that has been hit by a car and ended up on our side of the road.

In addition to dealing with the body, I have to gather up all the bits that used to be connected to the car that hit the deer.

I recently had to do this, and the car bits were various-sized pieces of black plastic. It takes a couple of tries to get it all as it tends to be spread along the road and the smaller bits can be hard to see.

When I mow along the road I usually bring a plastic bag to pick up the trash that ends up either being purposely thrown from vehicles (didn’t they watch the crying guy on that commercial?) or flies out of the back of pickup trucks. It is useful for picking up bits of plastic bumper as well, and I had to stop mowing and do this a couple of times, as I ended up mowing over bits that I missed. There is a distinctive “chunk” sound when you hit one.

On one final pass I heard that sound and turned around to see a bunch of black plastic behind the mower. I was surprised I had missed picking that much up when I realized that bits of it looked like a band from a wristwatch.

I then looked down at my left wrist to find that my beloved Series 5 Apple Watch had fallen off, presumably while I was picking up the other trash, and I had mowed over it.

It reminded me of that old web series “Will It Blend?” where various things were put in a blender to demonstrate how powerful it was, including electronics.

The answer is: yes, the Apple Watch will blend.

This really depressed me. The first Apple Watch I bought was the Series 3. To all of those influencers and influencer-wannabes that ran out and bought the new iPhone Duo, take it from a veteran: always wait until the third version of any Apple product.

The watch was kind of cute when I got it, but I didn’t come to rely on it until my car accident in 2019. The notifications I got on the watch helped me keep in touch with the “outside world” during my time in the hospital.

That year was also the year we sold our company, so to celebrate I ordered a new Apple Watch, the Series 5, which had just been released.

I know these devices have a lot of features, and I only used a few of them, but those I used, I used a lot.

I use it to tell the time (’natch) and I like how it will update when I travel to different time zones. I really like how it would mirror the notifications on my phone. If I am talking to someone and get a notice, I can just glance at my watch to see if I need to respond immediately or if it can wait.

I use it to set timers, usually when I’m cooking, as well as to add things to my shopping list.

I use some of the other features, like health tracking, but those are the main ones I use. Still, I got very used to having it around, and when I ran it over I realized I was going to buy a replacement.

One main driver is that I work from home and I want to make sure my coworkers can always reach me, so I don’t want to miss a notification, which is easier to do than when I just have my phone. I thought maybe when I retire I would get rid of the watch, but then things like the fall detection feature will be more important, so I’m probably stuck with it.

The next question was to decide which one to get.

The current Watch series is 12, so that seemed to be an obvious choice, but I’ve also been interested in the Ultra (which is now up to version 4 and thus safe to buy). The Ultra is bigger, which helps with my aging eyes, but it is also bigger, which means it is more noticeable when you wear it. It is also supposed to be more rugged, and as I am rarely without my watch even when doing farm chores (like mowing), I thought that extra ruggedness would be useful.

Since I’m trying to wean myself from Amazon (he says as he stops writing for a minute to place an order) I went directly to the Apple Store and ordered the black Ultra 4 with the burgundy wristband. I was leaving on a flight to Europe on Wednesday so I was happy to see it was going to arrive on Tuesday and I would have it for my trip.

Then UPS happened.

UPS used to be the premier parcel service (I’m not including regular, overnight Federal Express, which is more for smaller envelopes) but lately I’ve been having a lot of issues with them. The trend continued when, on Tuesday morning, I got an email from them that my watch wouldn’t arrive until Wednesday instead of that day as promised.

I really wanted it before my trip so I placed another order to be picked up at the Apple Store in Greensboro. Yes, this was going to be a two hour drive for me but at least I would get it on time.

Of course, a few hours later UPS corrected their delivery estimate and it was back to Tuesday (and the website showed it out for delivery).

(sigh)

There wasn’t a way for me to cancel the Greensboro pickup online so I initiated one of those chat thingies. One thing I’ll say about Apple is that they hire some of the best customer service people in the business, and even the AI gatekeeper was easy to get around. Pretty soon I had my order canceled and was eagerly awaiting my delivery.

I do have a side note to this story: please be nice to the customer service representatives you deal with. Even though with the advent of useless GenAI agents that get you angry well before you can reach a human, that isn’t their fault. It’s a thankless job and I can only imagine what these people go through in a given day. Toward the end of our chat the representative wrote:

We need more people like you in the world who can spread love around them and understand the humanity, your few words means a lot to me.

I think my few words were “thank you”.

Getting back to the story, my watch did manage to arrive and I eagerly opened the box. Once again Apple came through in that it was incredibly easy to replace my old watch with the new one. I just paired it with my phone and the magic happened. All of my apps and data were restored, and it was even able to move the wireless phone number supplied by AT&T over to the new device without me having to call anyone.

The only downside came when I was poking around on Amazon and saw that the exact watch I ordered was $100 cheaper. Seriously? Why did I bother to go through that whole bit with Apple to get charged a premium?

Now I was looking at ordering yet another watch, this time from Amazon, and then returning the one on my wrist (it may sound petty but saving $100 on an $800 watch is worth it to me at the moment). I’d also have to go through the whole pairing process again.

On a whim I decided to call Apple to see if they would price match. This is where their customer support fell down a bit, as I found out that, yes, they would be able to refund most of the difference but almost no one actually knew how to do it. I was told I would have to call (no chat) to ask for the match. Thus I first had to talk to the support person, who was top notch as always, but then I would get transferred to a sales person who wasn’t quite at the same level.

I ended up having to do this three times (there was a long delay between try #2 and try #3 as I was pretty much fed up, but my desire to avoid dealing with another new watch made me try a final time) and the third person was great. They still had to ask someone how to do it, but I got 10% off the full purchase price back, which was around $90. Close enough.

Anyway, I do like the Ultra 4. The size did take some getting used to and I have yet to sleep in it, and as I’m still within the return window I’ve thought about getting a Series 12 instead, but a couple of things made me keep the Ultra.

The screen is very nice, and at 49mm it is easier to read than the largest Series 12 screen at 46mm. The battery life is crazy. Now granted, my Series 5 was seven years old, but it would just barely last a day. I can skip charging the Ultra for several days and still have battery left.

It also seems to have a great radio. I have a mesh WiFi network on the farm and I get notices on my watch in places I don’t even think my phone would get them. I don’t have a Series 12 to compare but it definitely beats my old watch.

It is also supposed to have the ability to send emergency SOS messages over satellite. Considering how spotty wireless connectivity is around here it may come in handy, although I hope to never have to use it.

I’ll miss my old watch. I get emotionally attached to Apple products in a way that never happens with other technology, and having something on my wrist for seven years is a long time. I hope I don’t have to replace this one for at least that long.

Oh, there is one downside and that is this watch is capable of supporting those weird “Apple Intelligence” features such as Siri Recap. I’ve been vigilant about making sure I could turn that crap off but I never saw the option.

Turns out you need a newer iPhone, and my 12 Pro Max doesn’t make the cut, so yay. I’m hoping to get at least another year out of the phone before it falls off of support, but when I do end up having to upgrade I’ll be sure to disable those features.

And let’s hope that obsolescence is the reason I get a new phone versus playing another round of “Will It Blend?”