If you’re a regular follower you know all about the iCloud sign-in blockage problem on my new iPhone 8 Plus, which I bought two and half weeks ago after my previous phone was stolen. (Here’s my latest report, filed on 7.17.) Five or six days ago I wrote a famous, well-connected hotshot director to see if he knows any powerful higher-ups in the Apple corporation. If so I was hoping he might ask this person to focus on my situation for five minutes and order some senior Apple iCloud technician to fix things once and for all, and no crapping around.

Mr. Hotshot doesn’t know Tim Cook or anyone in that realm, but he did turn me on to a smart guy named Michael Newman, who runs a company called Omegapoint-it.com. I called Newman right away. I’m not out of the woods yet, but Newman has been a godsend — a steady and responsible fellow in every imaginable way, and a shrewd and proactive analyst and problem-solver extraordinaire.

Mike and a colleague visited my West Hollywood abode yesterday morning to try and use an old iMac (which I purchased in 2009) to try and sidestep or outsmart an Apple passcode problem that has prevented me from accessing my iCloud info. This approach didn’t quite work as hoped, but Mike is still working the angles.

At his advice the stolen iPhone 6s Plus has been blacklisted (i.e., deactivated) through AT&T, and now it’s a matter of informing Apple iCloud technicians that this stolen phone is no longer a working device, much less a valid or trusted one.

Once this new reality is recognized by the Apple Empire, the Apple security passcode lockout problem (basically caused by Apple’s six-digit, second-step security code being continually if nonsensically sent to the thief who stole the iPhone on 7.5) will most likely disappear. Or so Mike believes. Who am I to doubt his optimism? He said yesterday that he thinks the problem will be eradicated before the end of the coming business week. Maybe.

I shouldn’t count my chickens before they’re hatched, but I certainly owe Mike and especially Mr. Hotshot a huge debt of gratitude. If this director hadn’t responded to my email and discussed the ins and outs and recommended Mike’s assistance, I would be in the same deep hole I’ve been stuck in for the last two and a half weeks. In my book Mr. Hotshot has racked up good karma points that will last him for at least the next couple of decades.