back for a random

Guess I need to vent a little bit. Technology sucks. Yeah sure, I'm offering up my thoughts to all of Al Gore's internet, for all to see. From Uzbekistan to Cape Horn, anyone with an internet connection or cell phone can see this. Hell, if there are alien beings out there, they can see it too (because if they have the technology to get to it, they surely can translate it).

So technology sucks.

Why?

For all these same reasons. It offers up enough information for people to get a doctorate, but offers zero real world/hands on experience. When it comes to almost anything, everyone is an armchair quarterback. Trust me, it is so frustrating for people to bring a bicycle in because something is broken, only to be interrogated about how to fix it because the customer read about some douche bag some where in the world that had kind of the same issue and it was solved in a different way by an un-named source. Seriously. ...and it's not just bicycle shops.

I can guarantee there are jack-asses out there that question the AC repair guy, car mechanic, or any tradesman that uses years of experience problem solving the same equipment to build skill and real life education. If you didn't know, this is actually offensive to tradesman. There is nothing wrong with asking questions, but you wouldn't second guess a surgeon while he was elbow deep in some one's gut, if the extent of your exposure to open chest surgery is Discovery Channel's web page, no more than you would question the barista on how to pour the foam in your latte.

These people have spent a whole lot of time dedicating themselves to this particular trade, and they should be given, at minimum, enough respect to let them begin working on the job before you start badgering about the finished product because you watched something from one camera angle's point of view.

Yeah, and I'm not done yet. Worry/fear has increased. The wife went to New Orleans for a few days. It's a five and a half hour drive to her parents house from NOLA. I called to check in on her while she was driving. When she didn't answer, and I hadn't heard from her for half an hour, I started getting worried. Stupid, just stupid. If it was just ten years ago, she would have called when she left, and maybe, just maybe, I might get a call from a phone booth long the way, but I wouldn't worry until it had been a solid six or more hours... cuz that's how long it takes to get from NOLA to her parents house. The instant gratification of speaking with some one at your whim is making me crazy.

Now, Facebook. I loath Facebook for so many reasons. Yeah, sure, I got a page. You have to in order to have a business page... and I work the hell out of the business page, because that's business. I do have more than 350 "friends" on Facebook, yet I might speak with 15 or 20 of them on a regular basis. Shit, some I've never had a conversation with beyond maybe a handshake or ridden a bicycle in the same group. There are a few I've never even met in person, never mind those who I haven't seen in years. How then can we really be friends?

Then add the fact that people from your past plow "back into your life" via Facebook. One's and zero's is not how you reconnect after five, ten, twenty years. Remember all that technology? Yeah, pick up the phone. You can't translate emotion, semantics, emphasis, or sarcasm in texts. It is so impersonal. ...and if you have enjoyed your life for the length of time since you last spent time with them, what do you have to lose if it doesn't work out? If you have some sort of void in your life that only this person can fill, why are you hiding everything behind a computer screen? ...and if you are really friends, or had been in the past, what are you afraid of?

Which brings us to email/chat conversations. How easy is it to misunderstand the meaning of an email? I've had arguments with the wife because my email "sounded curt or snappy". Yeah, the email sounded. Text sounds the way you read it. There is a flow to verbal communication that can not be reproduced which carries so many clues to the meaning the person is trying to get across. You can hear a smile. Speed of speech shows excitement. Enunciation and emphasis comes out. A point can be made simply by pausing... but that can not be translated into prose even with three periods after a word. The art of audible communication is dying, and it is taking away from the intimate interactions we need to move forward in life.

I can't remember the last time I read a book. A physical book. I read tons on the internet, but opening a book to page one, seeing how thick it is from cover to cover, feeling the weight, and accomplishing the task of reading every word to the last page and closing it is something I miss. This one has been saved for last because it is the easiest for me to fix, but touches on all the other points. It is much more difficult to read online than it is to sit quietly. You can leave the book open and stop in the middle of a paragraph to click over and see if any one responded to the stupid video of you dog farting that you posted on a "friend's" Facebook page (whom you haven't audibly spoken too in over a year), then check your email, and back to the book. Stupid. By doing that you have killed the flow of the text and prose.

Have you read Rime of the Ancient Mariner? Go do it. Then re-read it but pause at the third stanza of Part VI. Check your email, Facebook, watch a video, then go back and finish. Sucks huh? Yeah, sucks. The flow is dead. The build is dead. It's like stopping right before an orgasm to make sure the cat has been fed. Ruined. You ain't getting that one back and all meaning is lost to interruption.

So, what am I getting at? Well, if I have to explain it, read it again. My expectation is that you are smart enough to figure this one out...