APPLE’S NEW NEIGHBOR IS OBNOXIOUS this one comes dangerously close to the edge of Apple design nerdery, but here it goes: the space to the left of Santa Monica’s Third Street Promenade Apple Store has, for more than a year, been blockaded by black-painted plywood while construction took place inside. tonight, they took off the bandages. and the shit is gleaming. the fluorescents in this place go beyond any natural color temperature to the point of searing your eyeballs and sterilizing all exposed skin. and by comparison, the Apple Store, once the whitest kid on the block by many American Dental Association standardized shades, is positively yellow. even tobacco-stained. there’s no way that Jobs will stand for this when he sees it. he’ll buy the space out and turn it into a head shop, just to prove a point.