Normal service may or may not be resumed shortly.

After a whole day of fruitless wrangling with the well-meaning wizz-kids of Mac, I find myself at the mercy of forces against which I am ever more helpless.

Will my updated version of Safari work if I upgrade to OS 14.1.1?
Sure, if you upgrade to OS 14.1 first.
Great! Can I do that?
No.
So I’m completely fucked?
Indeed you are, sir. Have a nice day.

Medieval helpline (excuse my abject failure to reproduce the language faithfully, but you get the gyste):

Estymed Syre! Thyne present Qyll ys incompatyble with ye Vellum thou art usyng. Thyne veyn attempt to use “fowntayne penne” founder on ye fact that it will not invented be for many centuriys. Nor wyll any fantasticalle Appe rescue ye from languyshing in Purgatory. Fare thee well.

Cc Dante, Chaucer

Sure enough, this has already become something of a meme:

All this may heighten our appreciation of oral transmission. Cf. Flora, Amos and the tweet, The wonders of technology, Bunnios—and the priceless speculations of elderly Ukrainian village women on the “Internet”.