Technology Rant Alert!
If you are having a pretty good day, then proceed no further into this entry. Take the blue pill and have a nice day.
One Person's explanation of red pill, blue pill
But if you are interested in what the red pill and I were mulling over today, read on.
So this morning I decided to test out my Zune a little more. I have loaded it up with songs and pictures, a podcast or two and even one video of Piper in the back yard. I also have some very nice lectures on there that I got from my daughter-in-law on The history of the middle ages, and the origins of English language and even a lecture about literary science fiction. Woo Hoo!
What a fun and useful gadget!
What an edifiying little companion!
What a wonder of technology!
(Uh oh, she said the T word. I think I have to go wash my socks or something. See you later.)
The reason I am TESTING my Zune is that the few times I have used it, sometimes it just suddenly turns itself off. For no apparent reason. Just for shits and giggles so to speak. A little Zuny techy lark. No big deal right?
Maybe. Maybe not.
Let me tell you something, when you are in the middle of listening to Liquid Mind- Spirit and you hear a loud CLICK as your Zune decides to go for a coffee break, it is a jolt you just can't shrug your shoulders about. Man I was in a Zone at the time, mentally speaking. Talk about rude awakenings.... Dang!
So like any self respecting modern person, I went on the internet to find the answer to my Zune question. Like that little boy in the movie A. I.. I realized how often I go to 'Dr. Know' otherwise known as 'Google' to find out stuff. And just like in the movie, you have to ask the right questions to get even close to the answers you are looking for.
After re-phrasing my question several times, what I found out was that 'Zunes do this'. Huh? The only explanation that made any sense at all was that they are evidently sensitive to static electricity and turn themselves off to avoid having their little nano brains fried to a crisp.
In any case, after several incredulous moments, it was brought home to me with a rude jolt, that if my life depended on it, I could not fix this Zune.
I might be able to fix my bicycle with my bare hands and some bailing wire,
I might be able to fix my old 1950's coffee pot, I might be able to fix a broken lamp, but not so this little black box which is just as enigmatic as those black balls with the answers.... what were they called? Magic 8 Balls.... Remember the one, "The answer is uncertain" ? I always thought that was such a cop out when it came up.
Anyway, don't get me wrong, when it's working that black Zune, about the size of a Heath Bar is a little marvel. It boggles the mind. But when it doesn't work, it's a worthless sack of shit. I hate to be so crude, but somehow what little veneer of gentility I do possess gets wiped away in a trice when I am faced with these situations.
Technology is such precarious stuff. It is balanced on a pin point, and resting atop it is pile of machines that goes way back into the mists of time. And lately I have this feeling that that pin point is at its breaking.... or to be more precise, stabbing point. And guess who is standing under that pile of machines???
Usins. That's who.
I remember when my brother and I had our first cassette tape player. Wow was that something. We could record things! We could take our music with us! Wow! It was very heady stuff to kids who used to have to sit in front of the record player if they wanted to listen to the Beatles. [We had terrible radio reception in our mountainous rural area]. Anyway, when something went amuck with that player, you could take the little door off and clean the tape heads, pull out fuzz, tweak a tape roller, lubricate the thing. .. you know, tinker, adjust, and FIX it. I will never forget the day that my favorite tape got all messed up inside and I carefully unscrewed the cover, opened it up, rewound the tape, repositioned the guides and put the whole thing back together. Ta Da! It worked again! I was a freaking genius! I bossed my machine bits around!
It wasn't long after that, that they stopped putting screws in the cases, and if you wanted to fix your tape you actually had to break the case. [Which I have done using a carefully applied screwdriver, and then glued it back together.] I'm a stubborn little bluestocking...
But now.... if stuff breaks. You get rid of it. If you are lucky, and it breaks early on, they just give you a new one. Which feels kinda funny too, as you have now lost a fair amount of faith in your thing whatever it is. But if you are not lucky and it breaks two days after the warranty is up, then you are laughed into total embarrassment if you suggest that it be repaired.
Then you find out that you are the opposite of a genius, and that your machine has just bossed you AND your debit card around.
Sigh.
Something is so wrong with this picture.
I want to unscrew the case on my Zune and put in a bit of insulation so it isn't so afraid of static electricity any more. Remember that little fiber pad on the cassette tapes that I think protected the tape when you turned it on and off? One of those might do the trick.
If I could just figure out how to open up the case on this Zune.....
[I can hear the Microsoft technicians screaming from here.....]
Too bad it's not because I have their thumbs in a vice....
(/end rant)
[album 65561 GoofyHen2.JPG]
Maybe if you put
this Zune in your nest
and sat on it for a few weeks
something wonderful would happen.
That's what my mother told me.
[I didn't believe that silly story
about the Stork that my
friends kept telling me.
You think I was born yesterday?]