Confessions of a Former "Gadget Guy"

Just a heads-up: this will not, at any point, devolve into fan-fiction or fandom for Inspector Gadget. So if you came here for that, I'm sorry. 

I used to be a "gadget guy." I did, really. I won't ever claim to have been a "tech guy," but thanks to a couple of college roommates I at least knew how to add and partition a hard drive, among other things. I stopped being able to program once I got beyond learning BASIC, but I was okay with that. I still knew things. I still liked having the latest gizmos. I saw a reason to have the latest, newest, shiniest gizmos, even if that reason was mainly just to have them.

While I still like the flashy shiny things (except for those lens flares in JJ Abrams' films),  I have discovered that somewhere along the line my ability to understand the inner workings of such things got passed by, and that as such I seem to be slipping into more and more of a not-quite luddite mentality. A luddite light, possibly, or even an Amish approach to things, if the Amish had decided to come along in the late 20th Century instead of the late 17th.

(Contrary to popular wisdom, the Amish do not eschew all technology. Instead they periodically review tech things and decide which they should use, and which they should not.)

For example, I do not see the need for a 52 inch plasma TV with shake the ground surround-sound speakers. Which is not to say I don't want a home theater system. By all means, if I had a house and the money for it, I most certainly would, along with a movie-style popcorn machine. But I have neither the space nor the funds, and frankly I'm more likely to invest int the movie theater popcorn maker than I am the television. I am serious about my movie watching, but I am much more serious about my popcorn. Short of having an actual home theater, having a television that will kill you if it falls on you seems like overkill.

I do not own a smart phone. I don't even really want one. My cell phone is essentially a burner phone that I have because I spend a fair amount of time on the road, and because it became cheaper to have that than to have a landline. Also far less hassle, because dealing with Verizon was like trying to navigate Dante's levels of Hell if he'd been writing about office bureaucrats and paperwork instead of damned souls and torture. Though, really, those are kind of the same things, right?

I was also offered a GPS system recently. I turned it down. The only time I want a machine telling me directions are likely going to be places that are either off the grid, or where the grid is so convoluted as to render GPS mostly useless anyway. (Pittsburgh, I'm looking at you.) I like maps. Maps I have. I even have a compass. That really ought to be good enough.

Hell, I wear a pocket watch. (I have three, as a matter of fact. Including one I have to wind. I like the tactileness of it.)

I'm not sure when I started thinking this way. Maybe it's always been my approach to things. While I lamented the demise of Sharper Image, it was mostly because it was a great store to kill time in. I couldn't ever see myself shelling out the cash they wanted for the things they sold, no matter how nifty they were. (With the exception of the Stormtrooper armor in my local store. Some purchases speak for themselves.)

There is some technology I do embrace, and even some gadgets I'd spend the funds on if I had them. For instance, I would like a sextant, though I have only the vaguest idea how to use one and certainly no real use for it. And in all seriousness, I'd like a tablet. I have a use for that, though, and it's not simply an impulse buy. My last move and the endless boxes of books I had to schlepp up into my walk-up convinced me of the beauty of e-readers. But again, those are practical concerns. I'm not about to buy something just because it's new and shiny.

Even though that used to be me.

So when did this happen? I'm not entirely sure, and I have a couple of theories on that, but I think I've rambled on enough for one post.

Right now, I have to put a stamp on this envelope to mail out a check.

Twitter Verse and the Rise of Poetry

Poetry seems to be enjoying a bit of a resurgence, at least in the headlines. Aside from the appointment of the new poet laureate, there was the Wimbeldon Poet (as heard on Only a Game), and then, about a month ago, NPR ran a story about Twitter verse. Not as in the "Twitter Universe" but as in verse - poetry - on Twitter. Given the format of Twitter, this isn't sonnets or odes, but haiku.

I happen to be a fan of haiku, always have been. One of the poetry volumes on my shelves is dedicated to Japanese poetry, so there are a fair amount of haiku on the pages. (At least I think it's still on my shelf. I'll have to check to make sure it didn't get donated somewhere along the way.) Now, in translation, they don't exactly adhere to the rules we all learned back in middle school, but they are all short, succinct, and evocative.

That they have started cropping up on Twitter should probably not be surprising. The 140 character limit necessitates a certain brevity of expression, and while I suspect the vast majority of Twitter users are not waxing poetic, it heartens me a little to think that some of them either rose to the challenge or saw the opportunity for more creative expression. I myself have trouble writing flash fiction, which is less than 100 words (or so), let alone getting things down to haiku level, so I am a little bit in awe of those that can not only do so, but do so with regularity.

I suspect not all the poetic entries on Twitter are intended. The confines of the media lend themselves to accidental poetry, if you will, where in the effort to convey as much as possible in as little as possible, some people are going to craft gems. Some of them may not even realize the poetic possibilities in their Twits - or is that Tweets? It's Tweets, isn't it? - unless it's pointed out to them.

Which I think is just fine. Truth be told, I think a lot of the more traditional haiku were the traditional equivalent of these Tweets in the first place. You have a poet, sitting at a pond, or beneath the leaves of trees (yes, most haiku have some sort of nature theme, but this is in keeping with various aspects of the country they come from, including the heavy presence of both Shinto and animism), who then tried to convey, as briefly as possible, not only what he was seeing but also the emotions and thoughts that were going on at the same time. It's not quite the mundanity of "Walked the dog, did the laundry" but it is in the same spirit.

It is also this trend for poetry on Twitter that has me easing off a little bit of my criticism of Twitter and other social update media (like Facebook) which, on reflection, I think are somewhat overextended, overused, and over-hyped. That's another entry, however. Or two. Yet if it can foster a resurgence in creative expression, I can't really decry it as all bad.

It's not enough to get me using Twitter again - that experiment is firmly in the "tried and died" category - but, then again, I'm not much of a short verse poet, either.

Writing Longhand

I am a byproduct of modern technology. Without it, while I'm pretty sure I'd still be a writer, I have my doubts about whether it would ever go anywhere. I know there are plenty of people out there who could and do get by without a laptop or word processing software when they are writing, but I could never be one of them. They have my utmost admiration, as I think it takes real dedication, but writing a story or a novel long hand is something I don't think I could ever do.

Mainly because I can't read my own handwriting.

This little foible of mine was brought to mind because of something I jotted down in my notebook. An idea, for a blog post, that, well.... I have no idea why I wrote it. I can read this particular note, I just don't know what it means and whatever idea it was meant to jar loose has faded so far into the background as to be irretrievable at the moment. There have been instances where I have been unable to read my writing, however, so it's a very real and tangible problem.

On the one hand, I think I'm missing out on something. I have written a short story or two longhand, or at least written long extensive notes for them, and so I understand the appeal of sitting down with nothing more than pen and paper and seeing what comes out. As I recall, Stephen King wrote one of his more recent works that way, purely as an experiment. I don't think he's stuck with it over the course of successive novels, but the impulse was there, and he went with it. As near as I could tell, it didn't make any difference in the final story. Perhaps it mattered more in the creation of it, though if so then King didn't expound on that.

I am in awe of him and the other, less famous (for now) writers I know who do this. Some of them write consistently in longhand first for their rough drafts, only committing it to type in the rewrite and edit phase. Aside from my issues with legibility, I don't think I'd have the patience to write an entire book twice to get it down in a more permanent and marketable medium. It's an extra step I just don't think I'd be willing to take.

Mind you, without the computer I'd rely on a typewriter, so it's not as if my writing aspirations couldn't materialize before the late 80's (though my spelling would suffer tremendously without those little red squiggly lines to help guide me). Yet Dickens, Shakespeare, Poe, any of those went about their craft without aid of anything more then pen and paper. They didn't even have ball points. It doesn't necessarily add anything to their work in terms of its literary value – Shakespeare would still be Shakespeare had he written on a Mac – yet for me it does add to the respect I have for their accomplishments.

Perhaps the final reason for me to eschew writing it all out by hand is that there's no need. Unlike a typewriter or a desktop computer, I work from a machine that is designed to be portable. If I want to go write outside on my deck, or at the park, or anyplace else, I am limited only by my battery life. Which in my case is sufficient to get me through a few thousand words before I have to quit. Moreover, I don't need a table, I can put it... well, in my lap. Hence the name. With pen and paper I would at least need a notebook with a solid back, and I can carry my laptop just as easily (though admittedly not as lightly).

So I raise my coffee cup to those of you who can do this, knowing full well I shall never join your ranks.

And if anyone wants to take a look at my notes and see if they can help me decipher them, I'm accepting volunteers.

De-Twitting

I am officially getting old. Technology has finally come up with something that, like my grandparents and the VCR, I just don't get. Now, mind you, I am not as digitally attuned as I could be in the first place. I don't have a cell phone. I don't have an iPod or any other mp3 player. I don't have a flatscreen television. The only reason I have a DVR is because it came with my satellite dish. However, those are all things I would have if I had the wherewithal to purchase them. It's not lack of will, it's lack of funds.

Twitter, on the other hand...

Well, I tried. I really did. On the advice of someone I trust, I thought I'd give it a go. I confess as social marketing I wasn't on it long enough for it to go anywhere, but I was on it long enough to see that, while it had its uses for me, it was going to be frustrating and confusing. Those two characteristics are the death knell for any technology in my life.

In terms of use, it became a good way to keep track of my writing, in terms of what I was getting done each day. This, in turn, helped me stay on track and keep with my goals. It also made adding up my word count much easier. I suspect, eventually, it might have become a good way to make various announcements to my adoring public. (Hey, it could happen.) Then Twitter went and ate some of my posts. It didn't eat them completely, but they vanished off the page with just my updates on it.

Which became a problem when I started trying to follow other people. Because then on my home page, I had to scrawl and scrawl to find my own posts. So instead of helping me keep track of my word counts, it was eating my posts (or should that be twits?) and actually increasing the amount of work I had to do in the one area I thought I had found a use for it.

My only solution to this would seem to be not to follow anyone. Which there were two problems with. One, there are some people I wouldn't mind genuinely following, and knowing what was going on. However, I discovered choosing wisely could be difficult. Get someone who updates only a little, and it doesn't clutter things up. Get someone who tweets everything... and suddenly your home page is drowning. Not to mention it starts to feel a little voyeuristic, and not in a good way. I really don't need to know everything some people seem to feel compelled to tweet about.

(One of these was one of my favorite authors, who, if you ask me, could spend less time writing twits and more time writing his next book. Which I'm still waiting for.)

The second problem with this became apparent once other people started following me. I was raised with a certain ethical/moral code that say, if they extend this courtesy to me, I ought to do it to them. Only, this got me back to the first problem. I don't really want to follow all these people, and besides, it started to feel more like a numbers game than anything else. I abhor popularity contests of any kind, always have. (Yes, yes, childhood issues.)

So when those two things combined with the sudden decline in usefulness that occurred when my posts disappeared... I decided I'd had enough. Maybe, given enough time, I could manage it better and learn how to do so. For right now, I'll stick with the resources I have. I can keep track of my word counts the old fashioned way, and anything I really have to say will go here.

Besides, I tend to get wordy, and 140 characters isn't a lot.

Twenty Minutes Into the Future - in 10 Seconds

The tri-corder has arrived. For those who have no idea what I just said, the tri-corder was this little hand-held doohickey (yes, that's a technical term) the doctors in Star Trek could use to scan someone, anytime, anywhere, to figure out what was wrong with them. Think of it like a portable x-ray/MRI/"other medical things I can't even begin to identify" device. Pure science fiction.

Back in the 1960's, that is. Turns out, modern technology has caught up with Star Trek, more or less, and it's no longer a fantasy. The portable medical scanner is, in fact, a reality. It may not be the complete diagnostic tool the tri-corder was supposed to be, but it's darn close.

Then, too, consider the modern cell phone. Which does just about a million and one things besides make calls. It is, for all intents and purposes, a portable computer. I remember back when the best thing to do with a computer was to turn the cursor colors and make pretty patterns on the screen. (I was in grade school, and it was one of those Tandy machines.) Now, if I could afford one, I could have something in my pocket that does most of what I rely on my laptop for. Not perfectly, and frankly, I prefer my laptop, but it's the possibility that blows my mind.

It's the unexpected pace at which the "future" arrives that provides something of a perilous pitfall for those of us in the science fiction genre. You've got a limited number of options when it comes to "when" in the setting - either it's the near future, or it's the far off future. There's kind of a middle ground, something like Star Trek, for example, which is only a few hundred years away, but that kind of falls into the latter category with the space ships and the aliens.

I say "future" as a stand-in for futuristic. After all, my favorite bit of science fantasy takes place a long time ago. And my second favorite turned out to... well, let me stop there before I give away any spoilers. (Hint for those who want to know: Toasters)

Near future stuff is most often the domain of cyberpunk and a few other things like it. "Max Headroom," which gave the particular sub-genre the setting device I appropriated for this entry's title, was something which was clearly in the future without being all that far away. Like most such near future efforts, in some ways it came up a little short. In others... well, sometimes as a writer you get lucky.

Some things kind of fall in between. 2001 looks, on the surface, like a far off future. with spaceships and AI and the like. And considering it was some 40 years away, that seemed like a bit of distance. Now, of course, we've been and gone. Bladerunner is set in a scant 9 years from now, and while I want my flying car I seriously hope the rest of it doesn't come true. And it looks unlikely to.

As a writer who dabbles in science fiction, I tend to set things rather nebulously in the future when I do. I am well aware that whatever I write, even without narrowing down a date for it, will very likely either seem silly or hopelessly outdated just within my lifetime. For example, I wrote an internet-based bit of fiction - as in the internet figured into the central plot - back in the early 1990's. When I blew the dust off it here a year ago, I had to laugh at most of what I'd written then. The reality of the internet had turned out to be far different than the predictions and what all the sci-fi of the time was envisioning. I reworked it, and made it more in keeping with what we know now... and also toned it down a bit so I don't laugh at it in another ten years.

I think if you're serious about it - like William Gibson or Philip K Dick - that near future can actually be a bit more challenging, because you can't make those great leaps that writers like Heinlein and Herbert did. I'm not serious about it, at least not at their level, so I freely admit my own stuff is either a blatant pastiche or a carefully crafted homage, depending on how generous my reader is inclined to be. And you have to write it with the knowledge that no matter what you might predict, the future could catch up with you a lot sooner than you think.

All that said, now that the tri-corder is here, where's my phaser?

Muzak on the Space Elevator

I was listening to a program the other day... not sure which one (program, that is - day, too, for that matter) and they were talking about the concept of a space elevator. For those unfamiliar with the idea, it was first conceived by Arthur C Clarke, of 2001 fame. At least I think the idea is his. Might be some other sci-fi guru's, but I'm pretty sure. And lest anyone dismiss the concept as a flight of fancy, it should be pointed out that Clarke came up with the idea of a communications satellite. Designed one, too.

The space elevator hasn't been built yet, but it's an elegant and simple concept. You stretch a thin yet high-tensile cable up to a geosynchronous position in orbit, and then use that to haul an elevator up to orbit, carrying all manner of things that can then be put up there. It would ultimately be cheaper and easier than a rocket, and probably comes with other advantages I'm not grasping at the moment. (Because I'm not bothering to look it up, per usual, and going with what I can remember at 11:30 at night.)

I've heard about the idea before, and I should mention that it's being discussed as a way to haul cargo, not people, for obvious reasons, starting with the ending destination. I suppose if someone does build it, there would be ways to make it carry people, though, again, I'm a writer, not an engineer. However, it occurred to me ask if it does carry people, would it have elevator music?

It was initially a silly question, but it raised an interesting issue nonetheless: as much as I enjoy sci-fi and technology, for all the fantastic things it does there are still the mundane aspects of life that just never go away. It's like the story of Alan Shepherd having to pee his suit because no one had thought to deal with that particular problem (in part because he was only supposed to be in it for a short while and ended up stuck on the launch pad). People have to go the bathroom in space, just like they do here.

Then there is the tech that becomes commonplace. Think about it. As much as I adore modern communications, I was among the last group of students to come of age without email. I remember using the fledgling version of it on campus. If you'd told me then about all the stuff I can do now, a mere 15 years later, I wouldn't have believed you. Not that we have everything. I want my flying Delorean, dang it. Though I fully expect that if we ever have flying cars, there will be bumper stickers on them.

It's those little touches, when they go into a work of sci-fi, that help ground it for me. I can accept the fantastical if the noodle shop guy is still getting the order wrong because of the language barrier. (Noodle shops, like yellow taxis, apparently being a cultural artifact that survives long into the future. Both Harrison Ford and Bruce Willis have told me so, and they wouldn't lie to me.) It's those little touches that, if a writer can integrate them skillfully enough, manage to work wonders with the believability of the story. Even if the rest of it is just so out there as to be ridiculous - deliberately so or otherwise.

So there is a part of me that hopes that, should the space elevator be built, and should it carry people, it will have muzak.

I just don't want to have to ride it if it does.

Lights and OBEs

[A brief note before I launch into the actual subject of this entry: The radio segment in which I heard about this topic was broadcast originally on either the CBC's Quirks and Quarks or NYC's Radio Lab. I could look it up, but in this case I'm not going to not because I don't feel like it, but because if you're reading this and you are unfamiliar with either of these shows, you ought to check them out. They put out an hour show - each - once a week, they also podcast, and they have some of the coolest science segments on radio.]

So, the truth is out there now. (Yes, blatant X-Files reference.) Turns out that light at the end of the tunnel? Well, unless you're in the subway, it's not the A-train, and it's not the land of clouds and wings and harps, either. Before going any further, let me preface this by saying the following has nothing to do with a belief in life after death, or any religious system of belief, or anything of that nature. I, for one, have a firm belief that something of who we are survives the transition from life to death, and it's based on personal experience. ... Which is probably where some of you have now tuned me out as being slightly more whacko than you thought I was already.

For those of you still reading, there was a series of studies done, not just recently but going back to experiences of test pilots during the 1950's, where they have now been able document both that "light in the tunnel" you see when you're dying, as well as the out of body experience (known as an OBE in the paranormal parlance... at least I think so and will call it such to shorten my typing). OBE's were actually experienced by test pilots, not only in the planes themselves but also after performing tests in ground-based apparatus, so long as the pulling of heavy g-forces was involved. It was some of these experiences which also led to the development of the g-suit as a way to counteract the effects of pulling g's on the body.

Just in case you aren't versed in techno-geek, a "g" is the effect of gravity on your body. Normally, you're at 1 g. Higher g's, known as "pulling g's" can be caused by rapid acceleration, among other things. Lower g's, or negative g's create a less than 1 g feeling on your body. You can demonstrate this yourself on a swing. The little "blurp" your body does at the end of the forward upswing is where, for just a moment, you have a slightly negative g. ... and if I'm wrong, I'm sure some physicist out there will eventually correct me, but I'm pretty darn sure on this one.

It turns out that one of the effects led to the OBEs the test pilots had, as a result of some chemistry/blood flow thingy in the brain. Thingy is a technical term, trust me. The upshot of the study was that they were able to reproduce the effects, and figure out why they had happened in the first place.

Along with that, they also tumbled onto the "light in the tunnel" bit. And, again, were able to reproduce the triggers in the brain that set it off. Without having to kill anyone or bring them near death. Which I think is probably a plus during scientific experiments. Now, this whole set of experiments does some very interesting things, and says some very interesting things about the way our brains and bodies react (mostly our brains) and this is where I again plug the above shows and encourage you to go take a listen.

But it also struck me, that in validating the OBEs as something that does actually occur, in taking what was largely assumed to be a paranormal event and one of those things we laugh at in the tabloids, it ought to make us take another look from time to time at other things we might just flat-out dismiss. Even the light in the tunnel, though it doesn't lead to heaven, is in fact a real phenomena and, while on the one hand it is "just in people's heads" we shouldn't look askance at people who claim they've experienced it.

Also makes me wonder what gets proved next....

Luddite Lite: The Lawn Mower

Mowing the lawn is one of those chores that, now that I've moved into a new place, I have to tackle again. (Seeing as I seem to actually be developing a teensy-weensy following, that move is partly responsible for the lack of posts in July. My own faults bear the majority of the blame, though. Hmm... another entry in that topic, I think, would be warranted. There will be a couple of back-postings for July up here shortly, as I wrote things down elsewhere with the intent to publish them here. Notice how well that has worked out so far. Anyway, I digress.) I have discovered that I like mowing the lawn, which I'm sure my parents would be shocked to hear. Then again, it's been decades since I had a lawn I could mow, so that might have something to do with it.

I am not using a gas mower. There are a couple of reasons for this, starting with the size of my lawn. It's not the proverbial postage-stamp, but it's not huge by any means, either. With the gas mower it took me about 5 minutes for the backyard. That's quick and easy, but also loud, noisy, and courtesy of my nephew, smoky. That's point one against the gas mower. Point two is, it's a waste of energy. Not only mine, because the one I have is a bear to start, but just energy in general. Eventually I'll have to buy more gas for it, so there's also the money issue.

Instead, I have a push mower. That, thankfully, I didn't have to buy, because bizarrely a brand new one costs about as much as a small power mower. I don't understand that at all. After I finished mowing my lawn (took me about 20 minutes with the push mower, so yeah, it took longer, but I got exercise I wouldn't have gotten otherwise) I got to thinking: there's just some technology I think we could do without.

For reasons that should be obvious, I'm not against all technology. Or even most technology. But I think there are certain items, that have often become ubiquitous in our lives, that we just ought to chuck out in favor of a more low-tech solution. (My computer for pen and paper is not one of those. My penmanship is atrocious, and I'm pretty sure editors need to read my submissions.) I'm picking on the lawn mower because I prefer my push mower, but also because the neighbor's landscaping service woke me up earlier this week.

Truthfully though, I don't really think most people need a power mower. Certainly most lawns could be handled with a push mower, which would reduce pollution, increase exercise, and get people and their fat butts out of those monstrous riding mowers that they take about four sweeps across their lawn with. Even out in the country, where you see people with these vast expanse of cropped grass, I have to wonder: if they were only given a push mower, would there be less essentially pointless lawn, and more trees instead?

I confess I've never understood mowing a private lawn the size of a football field, unless of course you intend to play football on it. Which most people don't seem to do. No, they just mow it, probably spray it with chemicals, and spend far more time each week mowing it than they need to. I'd be willing to go so far as to suggest that using a push mower on a smaller lawn might actually save them time over mowing the whole thing on their riding mowers.

What does this have to do with writing? Truthfully, not much, other than I like the idea of a future where we've grown smart enough to dispose of some of this unnecessary technology in order to reap the benefits of a cleaner, healthier, and quieter world.

Nice Work... If You Can Get It

I could wax rhapsodic here about the Cole Porter tune, as it has become a jazz standard, and go on to compare it to that writing trope about how all stories are just variations on a half dozen basic stories or so.... but I've done that post already. Besides, although I was listening the Thelonious Monk run through it on the piano the other day, and even though it is one of my favorite jazz standards... I'm not really musician enough to comment on the perils and pitfalls of playing something that's arguably been done to death already.

So instead I am just going to rant. It's my blog, I'm entitled.

There are a number of advantages to being a freelance writer, even one of my limited caliber, in this day and age, starting with the ability to send in both work and queries without keeping the Post Office or Fed Ex in business. Responses can be immediate, both to queries and to actual articles, giving me the ability to quickly modify my submissions if for some reason I haven't quite nailed the assignment as it was given. Likewise I can get paid faster (thank you, PayPal) and don't have to fuss with sending everyone my tax and account information.

Of course, that also means that most employers aren't taking taxes out. This isn't that big of an obstacle, as even without internet based pay, a number of the people I have freelanced for have not taken taxes out anyway. I don't see why not, as I can't imagine it's easier for me to do it than it is for some publishing vendor who probably has an accountant on staff... but so it goes.

No, the real obstacle is the lack of an office I can stomp down the hall to and complain. Don't get me wrong, I like working from home and if it were slightly more profitable I'd make it a full-time occupation. But when the company you're freelancing for is located more than an hour or two drive from you, you lose the option of being able to approach an actual human being with your complaint. This has drawbacks. Chief among them are the ability to hang out in the office of said human being until your problem gets solved.

Instead, I have to send something off to an anonymous help desk. Where they may or may not get back to me in a timely fashion. And where they may or may not understand the problem as I have first explained it to them. And where they may or may not be inclined to fix it. More often than not, they don't. Then I lose time, patience, and possibly an assignment because some tech guru off in California didn't bother to sort through his queue fast enough.

When the day comes that video conferencing is standard, and everyone can do it, the first thing I hope it allows me to do is to virtually park myself in the virtual doorway of someone's virtual office, until they deal with my problem. Because I can be persistent and stubborn that way, in ways in which sending off an email to some anonymous help desk just doesn't satisfy.

Countdown

I was listening to the radio today, and happened to have it on at the exact moment the shuttle took off. NPR covered it live, I suspect mainly because it occurred at the same time as their hourly news update. I'm a space geek from way back - well, not WAY back given my relative youth, so that by the time I was watching the original Star Trek it was in reruns, not original run. (Though I have to say I think the show holds up pretty well despite its age.)

It occurred to me that the simple act of counting backwards, from ten to one, has been forever altered for all the generations that came during and after the great space race. Prior to that, I don't think it had any significance. The only other counting I can think of that has some sort of cultural significance is the ten paces for dueling, which of course was a count up. And I'm not sure if it was really that prevalent, or if my view on history is simply skewed by all those hours spent watch Bugs Bunny.

(Hey, Bugs taught me opera and to this day, whenever I hear The Barber of Seville by Rossini, the lyrics I inevitably hear in my head go: "Let me cut your mop, let me shave your top, d-a-intilly." That Wagner has been similarly introduced and influenced should go without saying.)

But since the 1950's or so, and certainly since the 1960's when the whole world tuned in, that steady, backwards count has come to symbolize one thing above all others - namely a rocket launch. The phrase "lift-off" seems to naturally follow the number one, and the sequence feels incomplete without it. It creates a sense of anticipation wholly out of proportion with the simple numbers involved, and can invoke - in me at least - both a sense of wonder, exploration, and vicarious nostalgia.

I didn't live through the first space race, and the last trip to the moon finished before I was born. In theory we are heading for a new era in space exploration, as we head to Mars. I look forward to those new days when space launches are covered by the news not just when they happen at the top of the hour; when we wait and listen with anticipation as those ten simple numbers roll back in stately fashion to that moment when rockets roar and the ground shakes, and we reach for the stars again.

Techno Blunder

If a website crashes on the internet, and no one is around to complain, does it make a sound?

I ask because one of the places I use to generate some much needed income seems to be down, dooming me to a middling to nigh insignificant paycheck next week. I can compensate for it the week after, but it's damned inconvenient. Not to mention I have to really hope I don't have much in the way of expenses. (Might be time to take the horses instead of the car. Not that they're cheaper to fill up in the long run, mind you. Horses, especially draft horses, eat a lot.)

I have no idea why they site is malfunctioning, or if it's some combination of my server and their site - though I strongly suspect it's them, not me. Not that it matters, the end result is the same. But it brought to mind all those other sites that are out there, gathering electronic dust and bitmites, long since abandoned by their creators. I suppose eventually someone terminates them, once the electronic rent is left unpaid... but that only covers those sites that do cost money to operate.

Spaces like this one, which are free, can languish for years. (Case in point, this one was neglected two years running other than the shoddy attempt to keep a resolution.) I suspect it's a slow slide into decay. People stop posting, then the faithful readers realize the site's no longer being updated, and move on. Sometimes there is a forwarding address, sometimes not.

Do they take up space in their obsolescence? Does someone eventually have to take them down to make room for other domains? Or do they just sit there until the host server eventually goes down - which presumably it will at some point. After all, no media is permanent, and the next incarnation of the internet or whatever data-sharing method takes it's place will make all of this obsolete. In the meantime, are they like dead trees in the forest, providing a hiding space for the digital wildlife? I have no idea how that would work, mind you, but it makes for an interesting concept, I think.

In the meantime, is their an opening for internet lumberjack? And do I get to wear the cool flannel shirts?

Passing of an Era

My local channels have started going digital. We're covered because we're on a satellite and the company is now providing them for us (though not the DVR to replace the VCR that has become completely useless except for watching those few remaining videos we have on tape). However, it was still a little odd to go and push the buttons for the channel and then ... have nothing.

Some of it is just the passing of an era. Of course there is the whole "converter box" for the antennas, but that's just the last dying gasp of the rabbit ears. I expect that for the majority of hold-outs for free tv that it's only a matter of time before they break down and pay for cable or satellite. Or just go without tv altogether.

Okay, so that last one isn't very likely.

There is also a part of this that is simply a transition from one tech to another. I don't remember 8-track (thankfully) and vinyl albums were already out of date too, but I was around for cassettes to CD, from VHS to DVD. Those transitions went gradually. My relatives had CD's and a CD player long before they were mainstream household items. Even so you could see the change coming. And you had time to get used to it, make the transition.

None of those were government mandated, of course, which also makes a difference. If this were allowed to progress at its own rate I suspect it would be years more before it truly happened. I'm not going to rant about government interference (listening to some yahoo on Fox decry the stimulus bill as something akin to a Soviet invasion cured me of ever turning this political) because I understand the reasons for it. Still, it has a forced and somewhat artificial quality to it that precludes the chance to ease into it.

Nope, you just scroll up the analog dial and there's .... nothing. Here one day, gone the next.

Though at least not all the networks have gone at once. I needed to tape "Lost" tonight.