I was too busy patting myself on the back for realizing I could update my iPhone’s firmware from my company Mac (rather than my home machine, where the iPhone is “registered,”) that I completely missed the possibility that my corporate firewall might block access to the Apple servers necessary to re-activate the phone. (It did.)

Until I get the situation rectified, I am the proud owner of an emergency-use-only phone that tastefully advertises itself as such in at least five languages.

Notruf, everybody!