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| "AMERICA'S FUNNIEST HUMOR"TM
SHOWCASE
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February
/ March 2007 Contest Results |
Teeny-Tiny Technology
By Deirdre Reilly,
Massachusetts
My husband and I finally got a tiny electrical device capable of playing
music that fits in your pocket — also known by the American public as an
iPod. We may be the last people in the charted world to obtain such a
device, I’m not sure. What I do know is that my husband immediately
loaded some very questionable songs onto our new iPod, including “I
Wanna Be Sedated” by The Ramones. I am living with a stranger.
I wasn’t eager to join the iPod craze — technology kind of scares me
with its smallness, to be honest. I’m not necessarily looking forward to
the future, where people in spacesuits can be heard saying, “Hold up a
minute. Can you look inside my ear? I think I dropped my phone down into
my eardrum.”
The next miniaturization of the cell phone will have to
include a stylus (that plays very skinny videos, of course) because the
human finger will be too large to press the tiny buttons. Also, while
technology is getting smaller, everything comes with a ton of
accessories; everyone in my house is always frantically looking for a
charger.
“That’s why I stay with my old pal the boom box,” I say
confidently, hugging my boom box that is the size of a refrigerator with
two huge speakers and an old-fashioned tuner dial that looks like it
belongs on a trucker’s ham radio. The problem is that no one really uses
cassettes anymore, which is all old Boomy is capable of handling; I am
going to have to load my Pat Benatar and Lonestar songs into the iPod,
if I can ever figure out how you get the music inside the iPod.
Technology in general can cause some awkward moments, like when someone
has a tiny phone clipped to one ear, but you are standing on the other
side of their head, and you can’t see it. So, you are innocently
standing with an acquaintance on a ball field or in line for tickets,
and the person blurts out, “Did you ever get those figures? I think I
e-mailed them to you.”
Now, you can’t see their tiny phone, so your mind
feverishly goes into overdrive as it scans your poor, already
overburdened and under-performing memory banks: “Figures? Are we on a
committee that I forgot about? When was the last time I even checked my
e-mail? Oh no, I haven’t received the figures! I’ve somehow screwed up
again — I’ve got to get those figures NOW!”
So, you start to respond,
saying, “Figures? I’m so sorry, for some reason I can’t quite place…”
You don’t get any farther, though, because the person, who is not even
talking to you anyway, pivots away from you (he must be angry at you!)
and says, “We have to act on it, now! I’m depending on your team for
support on this one, frankly.”
Now you are panicking — whatever it is
you have developed amnesia about, you have a whole team that you can’t
remember working on it — you’ve got to get your act together, darn it!
Take more vitamin B or something, but stop forgetting about the figures!
Stop forgetting your team! The figures for the team are not to be
overlooked or discounted, and you are letting people down again! Arrgh!
Just as you are about to start crying literal tears over the figures,
the person turns and you see a tiny device clipped to their ear (which
looks silly, I’ve tried my husband’s on — although you do feel super
important, like you’re involved with research or the space shuttle) and
they motion to their ear, which means, I am talking on this thing, can
you believe it? You really can’t believe it, but you are very relieved
that you don’t have a team, or any support of any kind, and can just go
on reliving the latest episode of SpongeBob in your head while you pass
the time.
So, we finally have an iPod, which is great. But, my husband and I are
sharing one, which is not turning out so great — he has to go everywhere
I go when we’re listening to music, like my Siamese twin. Also, to date
only he has learned how to get music inside the iPod, so he has total
musical control — I don’t know how you do this, but I do know that it
doesn’t happen by gingerly rubbing the iPod itself across the boom box’s
speakers while a song you want to “upload” is playing — I’ve learned
that much. Hopefully in time I’ll figure out how to really use this
thing — actually, I should get the team right on it!
http://www.exhaustedrapunzel.com
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