Hallelujah Pintest!

I heard there was a “Secret Board”,

Where Jenny pinned her sweet prize gourd
But you don’t really care for pumpkins, not your interest.

Well, it goes like this, the boat, the fish

Then recipes for a tasty dish --

The baffled spouse asked “what’s Pinterest?”

Pinterest…Pinterest…Pinterest….Pinterest

Her squash was eaten but she needed proof

She shot the photo from her roof

The rabbit in the moonlight said, "was this your best?

“Sorry, don’t blame me, it was just a dare

I was challenged by that other hare!

Are you really going to put this on Pinterest?”

Pinterest…Pinterest…Pinterest…Pinterest

“Jenny, we’ve been here before.

Instagram, Facebook, and you still want more?”

Husband asked, “Twitter, Tumbler, is this a test?

You’ve got potpourri, books, tins of cornstarch,

Junior's glove, baby teeth and my accident last March?

TOO MUCH sharing of our lives on Pinterest!”

It's Exhausting!

Droid Incredible Phone

There's some dialogue from the movie, He's Just Not that Into You that has always resonated with me. Drew Barrymore's character (whose name is Mary, ironically) is tying to explain her confusing and frustrating love life,especially the pattern of communicating to schedule a meetup - and also scheduling the actual communicating - that her and and some guy have fallen into.

"I had this guy leave me a voice mail at work so I called him at home and then he e-mailed me to my Blackberry and so I texted to his cell and then he e-mailed me to my home account and the whole thing just got out of control. And I miss the days when you had one phone number and one answering machine and that one answering machine has one cassette tape and that one cassette tape either had a message from a guy or it didn't. And now you just have to go around checking all these different portals just to get rejected by seven different technologies. It's exhausting."

My iPad

For real, this IS exhausting and not far from the truth!

I've written about this before. I have thought about it a LOT. There is an incredible, bizarre, and addictive attachment to technology that is so pervasive in everything we do. And the constant interfacing - the relentless updating - and the fucking over-saturation of information - it's just a fuckload of wild. 

But I love some of this stuff. I love that I can update my laptop's calendar, which automatically pushes to my iPad, and my phone, which are all different platforms and O/Ss, and manufacturers and colors, and I think - Hell yeah, that makes things nice. Hell. Yeah.

Tom with part of the 343 Team, being shown concept art for Halo 4

Of course, having a mobile phone is de rigueur - is it so pathetic that I feel lost without it? But it can be quite a distraction. Not always crazy about sitting with a bunch of friends and everyone is silent - texting, surfing, emailing --- oyyy.


Speaking of lost, there's my GPS, Beatrice. She's gotten me out of a jam or two. 

And there's more good tech like online banking. And shopping. Recipes. Research. Writing.

Some day we'll have these guys in our homes?

But it sure gets wonky at times. Scary - this wonderful crutch.


So, despite our repeated exposure to the EMP, the data dump, and the dancing kittens, WoW, being pwned,  the braying politicos, traffic cams, internet trolls, the unfortunate disposed royalty of [insert African Country here], and the Epic Adventure in 3-Fucking-D...



We gotta make the best of it - and try to find the way to the simple heart of things - at all times.

Random Check-in

House is at it again, Mr. Machiavellian.  Taub and Chase are back, it's nice to have some continuity besides Wilson and Foreman. I'm intrigued by Park. She's odd. Patient nearly needed a liver transplant. 

Speaking of transplants, the Young Prince had a visit to Boston today. Went fine, blood work fine, iron will be decreased, and soon, the Valcyte will be gone. Still sorting out the nausea/vomit episodes, and we will discuss another endoscopy in a month. 

So, I've become enamored by Blunt Cards. These are profane little bits of hilarity dressed up in 1950s garb with a topical message.


But topical and hip and "now" and "wow" aren't all they're crackberried up to be. I've become increasingly dismayed by the speed that life demands of us. We are urged to go faster, do more, and we are saturated to the point of suffocation with information and how can a person even think, let alone breathe?

Speed of Thought

I used to go to libraries pretty frequently. Some of the time the motives were purely social, but I also used the resources there for lots of school work.

Then I used to work in one. A library, that is. It was a bit heady to have all those resources, the reference listings, the microfilm, the Mil-Specs, and all the ACM and IEEE goodness any person with an IQ of 155 could possibly want, all that...information really, really close by. You want the GNP of Algeria? CIA World Fact Book is ready with your info. How about the President's secretary's phone number? Exectutive Yellow Book -- here ya go. The ABCs and 123s of a Russian SCUD missle? Please - step this way.

Those were the easy requests. The harder ones sometimes involved me leaving the comfort of my carpeted cubicle (when I wasn't taking my shift at the Reference Desk), and hoofing it to Kendall Square, Cambridge - to one of MIT's fine libraries. Granted that only happened a few times, and no - I didn't actually "hoof" it. I drove to the subway station and then rode the line to Cambridge. But still, a bit of an unwieldy way to retrieve documents. And as you might have guessed, I worked in a tech library. No story time or quilter's corner here.

This was about 15 years ago, maybe more.

In a way, what I saw, what I dealt with, was cutting edge. Back then, the average consumer did not have or even understand what HDTV was, nor GPS, nor PDA. But these were terms I saw pretty frequently in the research that I pulled together for our staff of scientists and engineers. Much of the jargon and the nuts and bolts technologywas over my head. I didn't know an array from an alogorithm. (well OK I kinda did), but I understood the basic concepts of what HD and the rest meant.

So like, that's all cool and stuff. Right?

But our methods of getting the info, though sophisticated for our time, in retrospect seems so - so --

slow?





Yes, slow, that's the word.

Today, anyone with a computer and a decent connection can get nearly the same information all by themselves - if they know were to look. Of course, tons of erroneous stuff comes up as well, it takes a seasoned surfer to discern the difference. Yeah, like I'm all that.

My mother would have loved this stuff.

The Reading Luxury

Yes, it is a luxury to just sit and read, and read, and -- well it's a luxury to be able to just sit and do anything pleasurable for more than a half hour. And reading is the topic currently.

I just finished tonight, Armistead Maupin's The Night Listener. I have a vague recollection of this coming out as a film, but never saw it. Anyway, the story is incredible. Actually that adjective that I meant to use for "great, awesome, compelling", actually is more apt then I realized. You have to read this to see what I mean, but just remember the word, incredible and it hits home. Definite recommend.

Previously, I enjoyed the sad satisfaction of finishing Brother Odd by Dean Koontz. I actually started a separate piece on authors that surprise me, and Koontz is in that category. But let me just touch on the story. There's this dude - a sort of a wise-ass but kind - young man who lives in a small desert Southern California town. He lives simply and works as a fry-cook at a nearby diner. He has a swell girlfriend, a great boss, and some other dear friends, and he sees dead people. Yep, just like that twerp in The Sixth Sense. Luckily the sheriff understands Odd Thomas's secret, and even recruits Odd for various freaky-deeky cases.

Anyway, Koontz ended up liking this character of Odd Thomas enough to create a sequel or two, or series...and so that brings me to Brother Odd, which places Odd at a monastery/convent/school. The dead and other creepies follow him, of course - and the story is well told. But this telling, it's something special. Something beyond just spinning a good yarn. There are pieces in the pages that make your heart do funny things. Not in the sense of stopping while turning a page, but more in the fashion of "how can he possibly be able to convey this much hope and love without resorting to quoting from Shakespeare's sonnets or at the very least, a tear-jerker Hallmark Card." But really, I shouldn't be so surprised at the texture of Koontz's writing, I've seen this from him before, but certain passages from Odd are extra-amazing. I was struck deeply while reading this last installment, and I'm hoping that when I get around to my little piece on surprising authors, that I can dig up the proper words to explain what the fuck he's capable of.

And there's been some non-fiction too. A nice treat was Truth and Beauty by Anne Patchett. This is the story of the friendship between Patchett and the poet Lucy Grealy. Fantastic writing, even with a somewhat depressing subject matter.
Lastly is James Rollins' Black Order. I had not heard of him when my brother-in-law lent me Amazonia, which was a very good read. Very good up till the part where I inexplicably stopped and still have not finished. I have not heard Rollins mentioned anywhere, but he's got at least two hits on his hands. Black Order is tense mystery thriller type, mixing sci-fi with ethics and morals, and I so would love to see this made into a movie.

And what's funny, but I don't have the energy to start a whole 'thing', is that several of these books touched, even rather deeply, on quantum physics. Whodathunk?

Technology

My computer taunts me. You think I’m paranoid? Come watch while I play Spider Solitaire. I realize I’m not winning and am ready to bag it all and start fresh. Computer though, has another idea. “Are you sure you want to start a new game?” it queries. “Hell yeah”, I answer. Yes, I’m aggravated at the computer. Admittedly, perhaps I’m just a wee bit defensive, I’m thinking the computer is calling me a lazy wimp. Anyway, I’m sure I’m not alone in my paranoia.

Somewhere along the way, we let our machines get too big a piece of the pie. Now we find ourselves paying homage to the Hard Drive, bowing to the Bandwidth, and placating our PDA’s. We sweat (no pun intended) over climate control for our CPU’s. We insure our mobiles are charged up religiously. Our refrigerators are so smart; they are one step away from making the perfect martini. And television can pause live programming? Crikey!

Ah, television. I do so love my nice large screen High Definition set, but it is really still a reminder of our dependence on advanced technology. I think it was the five remotes that sent me over the edge. Five remote controls all lined up at the ready, like soldiers in a high tech war. Now, my husband will argue that we really need just one. As soon as he programs the Onkyo remote to control all the other soldiers, ah - I mean remotes, and then it will be a beautiful thing. Will that make Onkyo like George Patton?

I will not, absolutely not, deny the pleasure that technology has wrought for me, and the world. I am kind of jazzed that my cell phone has a GPS function, and my new dishwasher is ever so quiet. Online shopping, remote vehicle starting, optic fiber and the Segway are innovations that are bringing more good than bad into our lives.

What about the Bad? The stuff of which movies are made and jail terms served? Ever see Enemy of the State? Talk about paranoia! How about I Robot? Yes - I know - Will Smith was in both. You know what they say though, truth is stranger than fiction. There are some very real things going on in the world of science and technology that are both fascinating and chilling. I plan on making my way into the Brave New World, but will I VeriChip? More importantly, will I have a choice?