Technical difficulties

Could someone, anyone, STOP the advance of technology! Please I beg you, enough with all the gadgets… I have been in neutral for a long time, probably some defence mechanism against changes. I am no GEEK, I had a solid technical background, could fix radio, teletypes, telephone, telephone switch system, and toasters. It was easy then, just get my multi-meter out, and bang the broken piece with it… Tada! Like new.

I remember in the early eighties, my wife was sometimes ‘on call’ and she was carrying a pager (remember those). When we were going out, as a joke (of course), I would volunteer to carry it on my belt. At the time, having a pager the size of a small fridge… you looked important! When you got to the restaurant, you made sure it was visible and that got you the best table, and, in case of an emergency, close to the exit. Too bad it didn’t stop there!

I remember in the mid eighties, watching a documentary, where they were telling us that soon we would all carry a card to pay for any expenses. This fantastic card would take your money directly from your bank account! I thought it was a joke, who in their right mind would want one of those. Apparently a lot of us insane one did!

In those years, I was running to try to stay abreast with technology… a good thing I was in shape! We were buying computers, which after a couple of moons were obsolete, and then you just got a bigger better one. I had really good dreams… Pentium 2, Pentium 3, 40 meg hard drive, 340 meg, 1 giga… holy crap… The one who came up with “size doesn’t matter” had never had seen a computer. He/she probably wrote that statement on a piece of napkins (if someone find that napkins… on ebay $$$$$$$$).

We got our first TV recorder then. There was that fight between VHS/BETA, we went with a BETA… For the price we paid for it, I could be retired  and living in a castle (probably hire all the staffs to run the place too). It lasted MAYBE half a year, everything shifted toward VHS grrr. You could record 2 shows at the same time; all that was required was to buy 2 of those “wallet emptier” boxes. Learn to program them, check that the tape has enough room to record, and pray that when you want to watch, it was there.

Let’s not forget about cameras.  Back then, we bought a CANON 35mm, you could aim, press, send the roll to a place to develop them, and after a month, enjoy seeing your out of focus pictures. Easy enough! If we could just have stopped there... we bought a VHS Camera, you could carry it anywhere –that is if you were into weight lifting! I don’t know how many times it would have been nice to have the camera with us.

The one thing I hate the most: telephone. If it were only me, the telephone would be in the trash can to never be seen again. Can you tell I’m not a fan? I might just be difficult to please.  There are plenty of telemarketers out there that only want to talk to me.  They supposedly have exactly what I want and they don’t mind if I have just sat down to enjoy a meal, after all, it is worth their time!

Of course when talking about telephone, I am including cellular.  I had one, got rid of it! It was a simple one, you have buttons to dial a number and buttons to answer and some others that the functionality escapes me but that I always pushed when trying to answer a call. Now, you have all these features that come with it, camera, texting, Internet access, MP3 player, and sometimes, you can even use it to call or receive a call… 

Now the kids out there (I am not age discriminating… you might all be kids), you might need an intervention if you do any of the following:

Can’t spend 5 minutes in a restaurant talking with a ‘in front of you’ person without checking if you got email, text, etc.

You go to the store, you won’t say hello to the cashier because you are having an important conversation with your spouse about the migration of the butterfly.  And, when the cashier says “$24.57 please” you look at her like “Don’t you see, I am on the phone!” and then look at the next customer in line, waiting for them to acknowledge their valid point!

At work, your cell rings more often than your office phone.

You bring the offending piece of crap everywhere… washroom, movie theatre, church (there I wouldn’t mind), your coffin…

Sometimes, I dream of a simpler life, moving out in the boonies, nothing around… well maybe electricity, and not to get bored, a TV – No cable (Satellite will do) , if we have satellite, might as well have Internet, a little laptop, possibly a Magic-jack, a Personal Video Recorder for those winter nights… Wouldn’t that be something!

If you are smiling… beep beep beep