Go Go Gadget Charger?

It's time for another installment of Sunday Show & Tell. OK, there's not really a Sunday Show & Tell as far as I know, but there could be. For your enjoyment today, I present my car charger:


(Please note that I'm not a professional photographer. I consider myself more of a scene capturer.)

Car charger is a bit of a misnomer. It doesn't actually charge your car. Though it would be really cool if it did. It would also be kinda cool if it played mp3's, or if it at least had a laser pointer on it. But that's neither here nor there.

What I would like to point out today is the relative shortness of my car charger. (Photo is approximately 1/2 actual size.) This has proved quite impractical as far as talking on the phone while it is charging. I either have to end a call to charge my phone for awhile, or I have to put my ear really close to the cigarette lighter, which is located somewhere between the radio and my knee.

Last night, I went to a minor league baseball game with Kywana and some children. (What? I can't be flipping jet skis every single weekend.) We did the usual ballgame stuff. The kids got a hug from some guy dressed in a polecat outfit (who I hope was the mascot). We sang "Take Me Out To The Ballgame" during the seventh inning stretch. And we discussed the correct lyrics to a Britney Spears song. (Which I thought said, "Oops, I did it again. I played with my heart." It really takes on a much deeper meaning that way if you think about it.)

When we got in the car after the game, I asked the female portion of Kywana to plug my phone in to charge. Upon arriving back at Kywana's house, I retrieved my car charger, and it looked like this:



It appeared that the wire had been violently ripped out of the unit! (Notice the flagellum-like extension protruding from the right side. And also the two golf tees near the top of the photo. They're all over the place around here.) What had happened? I wondered if my car charger would ever work again.

Then a few seconds later... Oh! It's like a tape measure or something. The cord is retractable. Oh! I see now. I've only had this phone for nine months. I would have figured that out eventually.

Hey, cut me some slack. I was in a horrific, low speed jet ski accident last weekend.

"I feel stupid, but I know it won't last for long. I've been guessin', and I could've been guessin' wrong..."

Your text is on my list

"How was your Christmas?"

The text message came as a surprise. I don't recall where I was when I got it. Work, maybe. As we texted back and forth a few times, I began to wonder how long it had been since I had heard from her. I wondered where she was and what she was doing. I wondered if I should read anything into her texting me, beyond just keeping in touch. And not least importantly, I wondered who she was.

That's because, though I've had my Blackberry Curve for two months, I've still yet to transfer the names and numbers from my old phone to it. Therefore, I had not the slightest idea who I was texting.

My last phone was so old, all I had to do was pick it up and say, "Sarah, get me the drug store." No, seriously. It was so old that the sim card wasn't compatible with the Blackberry. So the only way to get all my numbers on the Blackberry is to enter each one manually. Think of it as the technological equivalent of needing to transfer all my Tom Jones 8-tracks to iTunes. In both cases, I've yet to get around to it.

Cell phones have completely ruined me from remembering phone numbers. I feel lost now. I know like eight phone numbers, total. Even those I have begun to recognize, I mostly know only by the area code or prefix. I still couldn't dial the entire number from memory.

Incoming calls aren't so bad, as I can usually recognize someone's voice within the first five minutes of a conversation. But anytime a text comes in, unless it's one of the eight I've committed to memory, I sit staring at the ten digit sequence like it's one of those 3D pictures. And maybe if I squint a little harder and concentrate a bit more, the name that goes with the number will magically come to me. Which, by the way, is also pretty much how I approached most of my tests in college.

Texting has become like my own little game of 20 Questions. I send a series of fairly general, innocuous messages, until finally the other person unknowingly reveals some clue as to their identity. During football season, I would typically have two or three people texting "Roll Tide" to me before, during, and after games. To this day, I'm still not certain who a couple of those people were.

My call list on the Blackberry stores twenty numbers, and has become my ad hoc phone book. If you're not one of the last twenty people who have called me or who I've called, there's a decent chance I won't be able to contact you until you call me again and get your name back on the list.

Anyway, back to the conversation which inspired this post. The unknown "she" eventually sent a message asking, "What is ur address?" Still unsure who this person was and only knowing she had an out of state area code, I chose not to respond. I mean, as a semi-popular blogger, one can never be too careful, right?

About a week later, after a complex process of research and elimination, I finally figured out there was a 99.95% chance the mystery texter was Lil' Booty. (That's almost as good as a DNA match right there!) I called and gave her my address, and we shared a laugh.

And no worries about me getting all my numbers transferred onto the Blackberry. I've officially put that on my bucket list.

"Jenny, I've got your number. I need to make you mine. Jenny, don't change your number. 867-5309..."

Tragedy, technology, & tying knots

The dull edge became a little sharper last Thursday as I received my Blackberry Curve. It immediately becomes the most cutting edge piece of technology I own, followed by my iPod, and then next would be my... um... Remington PG-250 electric shaver, I guess.

Those in the know tell me that I should refer to it as a Crackberry. I can't wait to find out what that's all about. And the girls at the cell phone place had a nice laugh over my old phone, the discontinued Samsung P107 with the 0.1 megapixel camera, which left all my camera phone pictures looking like abstract impressionist paintings.

My excitement was short-lived, however, as tragedy struck my world Friday afternoon. Shortly before 3 PM, someone I have known for roughly twenty-five years suffered a massive heart attack.

That someone is Luke Spencer.

He was found on the floor of Windermere by Scott Baldwin's long lost son, Logan Hayes. As of today, Luke is still alive, but it is unlikely they'll be able to get him to a hospital because of the storm, so please keep him in your thoughts. More importantly, please keep me in your thoughts, because if Luke goes, I... well, I'd rather not think about it.

Remarkably, I was able to press on despite that weighing heavily on my heart. As a few of you may know, I was in a wedding Saturday. My longtime friend Kyle said goodbye to the ranks of singledom and hello to a brave new world. (I was going to say "My BFF Kyle" but guys don't really have BFF's. We just have buddies, or homeboys, or longtime confidants. Wonder why that is?)

During rehearsal, the wedding director repeatedly called me and the girl I escorted "professionals." I'm not sure I want to be known as a professional groomsman. Then again, why the heck not? Maybe I could make some extra cash on weekends, legally for a change.

It was great to see several friends that I had not seen in quite awhile. And hopefully, no footage of me "dancing" will turn up on YouTube. No, trust me, you think you want it, but you don't.

As the weekend was quite busy, I haven't had a lot of time to play with my Crackberry yet. Though I did finally figure out last night how to change the ring tone. That only took four days.

Technology rulz!

"Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to get thru this thing called life. Electric word life. It means forever and that's a mighty long time. But I'm here to tell you, there's something else..."

The voice of a not-so-new generation

According to Wikipedia, my personal source for all things relevant and otherwise, Generation X refers to persons born between the years 1961 and 1981.

I've never cared for the term myself. For years, I didn't even know what it was supposed to mean. When I finally looked it up, I did not feel it described me well at all. Much like my high school code of conduct, I do not think it applies to me. So I set out to redefine, and rename, my generation.

It is a generation who purchased cassette singles and understood the emotional value of a mix tape; who generally have a great appreciation and longing for 80's music, television, and movies; who went to arcades to play video games; who know that Alf is from Melmac and Mork is from Ork; and who can scarcely remember a time when Vanna White was not on TV.

It saddens me to think the next generation will never know the utter joy of purchasing a cassette single. They'll never know the experience of listening to the B-side and hearing either a totally crap song, or a song you wind up liking better than the A-side. Heck, they may not even know what an A-side is.

Sure, spending $3.49 for one or two songs rather than $8.99 for the entire album might seem impractical. But with artists like Deon Estus, Sheriff, and Right Said Fred, you typically didn't want the whole album.

Also, when you were only making $3.85 an hour stocking shelves and collecting buggies at the grocery store, you knew that extra five bucks meant a meal at Taco Bell and two dollars gas to get you home.

It saddens me that the next generation may never know the thrill of having a numeric-only pager. There were no ringtones. Your only two options were tone or vibrate. And unlimited paging was $9.95 per month, also known as, the price of cool.

How will they survive never knowing what 143 means? Not to mention the life skills learned when you got a page followed by "911" and had to drive around and find a payphone to call the person back. I would venture a guess that a significant percentage of the population today have never even used a payphone. What a frightening thought.

It saddens me to think the next generation never got to enjoy Must See TV, the pinnacle of prime time television. To them, Cliff Huxtable, Alex P. Keaton, and Sam Malone are just characters dressed in out-of-style clothes that they might occasionally flip past on TVLand or Nick At Nite. They probably think Reality TV is good TV. Danny Tanner getting caught kissing DJ's teacher at school. That's good TV.

The Cosby Show, Newhart, Cheers, Growing Pains, Family Ties, The Hogan Family, Silver Spoons, Perfect Strangers, Who's The Boss, Head Of The Class, Charles In Charge, Night Court, and on and on--the 80's was the sitcom decade.

Wait a second... I think that's it!

Yes. That's it.

I, Bone, in front of God, bloggers everywhere, and bitter ex-girlfriends who lurk on my blog, do hereby coin the phrase, The Sitcom Generation.

We may be forced to watch reality TV, but that doesn't mean we have to like it. You can kill the sitcom, but you cannot kill us. Why? Because we learned how to obtain infinite lives on Super Mario Brothers.

Now if you'll excuse me, I believe VH-1 is about to replay the most recent episode of Scott Baio Is 45 & Single.

143 all.

"When did reality become TV? Whatever happened to sitcoms, game shows? And on the radio Springsteen, Madonna. Way before Nirvana, there was U2, and Blondie,
and music still on MTV..."

The dull edge

Thanks to Jennifer and Traveling Chica for naming me a Thinking Blogger. That is definitely among the nicer things I have been called :)

As I've mentioned before, although maybe not in so many words, I tend to be on the trailing edge of technology. The dull edge, if you will. I just got my first iPod this past Christmas. I don't have a laptop. My TV is not hi-def. (Although my stereo may be hi-fi.) I don't have a DVR or TiVo. Even my watch is a Fossil.

Being on the dull edge of technology does not mean that I lag behind everyone. While I'm obviously not in the top one percentile of the techno-savvy, I do like to consider myself right in that meaty part of the curve. Not showing off, but not falling behind. Just consider me your typical C-student in the world of technology. Maybe C-minus.

Being on the dull edge means that when I see the latest, fastest, sharpest, neatest new gadget advertised, I don't think, "I've got to have that now!" Instead, I think, "Cool! I'll be getting one of those in two to ten years." After all, I've only had a DVD player for a couple of years. Still, when it's time to upgrade, it's time. And I'm afeared it's time for me to get a new cell phone.

How do I know? Well first, there's the 352 x 288 pixel resolution, which does not exactly provide the crystal clear imagery one might desire. Then there's the loud shutter sound the phone makes when taking a picture, which can sometimes be inconvenient, and also cannot be turned off. And of course, there was the fun phase I went thru a few months ago when almost everyone I called, I had to call twice, because I couldn't hear them on the first attempt. I affectionately refer to that as my Hollaback Phase.

Still, I've managed to deal with all those things. But recently I've encountered something that I fear cannot be overcome. Embarrassed by my lack of technology, I've noticed myself subtly covering up my phone anytime girls are around. Why? Would a girl really be turned off by my low resolution? I don't know. And I don't plan to find out. But I feel like I'm carrying around a bag phone. And I simply cannot face the world with a cell phone that I am ashamed of. The decision has been made.

Now, you should also know that being on the dull edge also means once a decision has been made that an upgrade is necessary, it can take up to twenty-four months until said techno-gadget is actually procured. But once that occurs, ladies, be sure to holla at a baller on his wicked fresh cellie!

In closing, my Samsung P-107 has served me well for the past three or four years. But there comes a point in every man's life when it's time to move on. For me that time is now... or, sometime in the next couple of years. I just hope I don't have to give up my "Sweet Child O Mine" ringtone.

"She's got eyes of the bluest skies, as if they thought of rain. I hate to look into those eyes and see an ounce of pain..."