Me VS The Machine

Yeah, I’m back!  What started out as a two-week hiatus to tweak my blog turned into a six month life-and-death struggle with technology.  It was man versus the machine, and the machine had me outgunned and surrounded.  (Now I know how John Conner felt.)

The problem was (and still is) that I’m a man of the 20th century, and two decades into the future I just haven’t caught up.  Let me put this into perspective – the difference, in years, between 2022 and 1990 (when I still thought I was cool) is the same as the difference between 1990 and 1958!  No wonder I have no idea what’s going on.  I’ve become my grandfather trying to understand television. 

In the beginning, everyone from YouTube to the teenagers at BestBuy said it was easy to upgrade my blog — get a new theme, add stunning graphics, put in add-ons and plug-ins and an endless supply of apps.  Lying bastards!  I clicked one icon (I swear it was one icon) and all hell broke loose.  Suddenly, my Cyber-presence (is that even a word, anymore?) looked like the Wreck of the Hesperus, and I was the one lashed to the mast.  Three or four days and a variety of increasingly creative obscenities later, I knew I needed professional help — but that just made things worse.  Every time I tried to explain or get some answers from the techies, I felt like a medieval peasant asking the priests for directions to heaven.  And no matter how faithfully I followed their instructions, I kept finding myself further and further away from salvation.  For the next few weeks (that turned into months) I alternated between unholy despair and increasingly creative curses on everyone from Johannes Gutenberg to Bill Gates.  I thought (seriously) about just pulling the plug – all of them – even the toaster.  Because, believe me, rock bottom has a basement.

But we folk of the 20th Century are made of stern stuff.  Yeah, the 2000s have crazy jihadists, Vladimir Putin and this petulant pandemic, but I survived Disco, Cabbage Patch Dolls and 80s slang (gnarly?) so the Taliban, Vlad and Covid, don’t scare me – and, come to find out — neither does omnipotent technology.

“You’re not God, you pile of plastic and silicone!  In another life, you’d be somebody’s fake boob.  I run this keyboard.  And don’t you forget it!”

And in one glorious act of liberation, I swept the carnage into a separate folder and deleted it.  So, from here on in, I don’t care about URLs, SEOs, analytics, portals, platforms, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, cuz I finally remembered one thing.  On the other end of my computer screen, there’s a person – not an algorithm!

It’s 2022.  Happy New Year, everybody!

Internet Philosophers

I don’t surf the Net very much.  I don’t have a problem with spending hours wandering through cyberspace – actually, I think it’s kinda cool – I just don’t have the time.  Basically, I stick to my favourite sites every day, and that works for me.  However, every once in a while, I go nuts and get tangled up in the web of The Web — and I’m lost in space for a couple of hours.  I never think of these Cyber adventures as time wasted.  I learned way back in the dialup days that the Internet is an enchanted garden, and once you weed out the idiots, the place is blooming with beautiful flowers.  Here’s just a small bouquet of some front porch philosophers I found the other day.

Taxation is just the yearly subscription fee you pay to live in your country; your childhood was the free trial.

Don’t ask me what’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever done: I haven’t peaked yet.

I just hate it when I accidently step on my dog’s tail because I feel so guilty that I can’t properly explain that it was an accident and I’m really, really sorry.

It’s never a good sign when your fitness watch starts flashing stress warnings and you haven’t even gotten out of bed yet.

You know you were right all along when they name a hurricane after your ex.

It’s definitely love when your girlfriend comes home totally drunk, stands by the bed, starts taking off her clothes, stops and says, “I’m sure you’re awfully nice, but I have a boyfriend.”  And then walks out and goes to sleep on the sofa.

The other day I thought it would be cool if someone invented a hot veggie smoothie; then I remembered — it’s called soup.

Cargo pants are just cleverly disguised purses.

If you eat probiotic yogurt when you’re taking antibiotics, does that mean you’re coming out about even?

When I was young, I fell off my bike and fractured my ankle.  I rode my bike home.  Last week, I stubbed my toe– and I haven’t left the sofa since.

When I was young, I wanted to spend a year backpacking across Asia.  These days, I’m pissed when the bum warmer in my car isn’t warm enough.

When I was young, I thought I’d have a great career, a wild social life, a cool apartment and a retirement plan.  I ended up with mismatched wineglasses and a toilet that won’t quit flushing unless you jiggle the handle.

I hate being the parent because I always have to say no to all the same things I loved doing as a kid.

Every morning, men leave the house with nothing but their phone, their wallet and their keys.  How do they make it through the day?

That awkward moment when you ask a girl out for the first time — and then, five years later you ask her to marry you — and she says no – both times.

Finally realizing that the reason you clean the house before people come over is you don’t want them to think you actually live this way.

When you accidently fart in a meeting and it sounds like somebody’s stretching the neck of a balloon.

Telling all your friends you have a twin so you don’t have to talk to them in public.

The secret to a successful marriage is never hating each other – on the same day.

With all the crap that’s going on in the world, these days I watch The Shining to relax.

The only thing in the universe that’s worse than a Man Cold is being married to someone who has a Man Cold.

Realizing you’re excited about Valentine’s Day because you know chocolate’s going to go on sale the morning of the 15th.

“Ignore this text.  I’m pretending to add some jerk’s telephone number to my contacts.”

It’s always difficult when you find out your wife eats spaghetti with a spoon and divorce lawyers are outrageously expensive — on the same day.

You know you’ve been in lockdown too long when the kids start referring to the Amazon delivery guy as Uncle Freddie.

Single people don’t know there’s a wrong way to load the dishwasher.

The best thing about working from home is you don’t have to fight through all the lunch purses in the company refrigerator — and, sometimes, a pigeon sits on the balcony.

When coworkers, doctors and boyfriends say “we,” they usually mean “you.”

And a couple of my favourites:

You can tell a lot about a person by the way they treat the people who work in restaurants.

People who add a “but” when they apologize aren’t actually apologizing.

Everything Is About Sex

couple

Everything in life is about sex!  Don’t believe me?  Just take a moment, forget the warped sense of sexuality the 21st century has forced upon us (50 Shades of Grey? I’m laughing!) and remember a time before half-baked academics got hold of the word — a time when Lady Chatterley had a lover, Maurice had a happy ending and Anais Nin wrote porn by the page.  Now, are you sitting comfortably?   Then we can begin.  Take a read on the following 15 statements and decide for yourself which ones are categorically wrong.  Not kinda, not maybe, but categorically wrong.  Good luck!

1 — Conversations are like sex — If the other person hasn’t made a noise in a while, they’re not interested.

2 – Reading a menu is like sex – Something might have a fancy French name but if you don’t know what you’re going to get, you better not order it.

3 — Cars are like sex — There’s a standard model, but there are always a number of interesting options available.

4 — Picking your nose is like sex — You really don’t want to get caught doing it in an elevator.

5 — Sports are like sex — Yeah, it’s fun to watch it on TV, but it’s way better if you’re actually playing the game.

6 — Dancing is like sex – Duh!

7 — The Internet is like sex – You need to be careful when you go exploring, or you’ll end up at 1:30 in the morning with nothing to show for it but a vague sense of regret.

8 — Fast Food is like sex – Sometimes you’re looking for something quick and easy cuz you’ve got a lot of other things to do.

9 — Visiting your in-laws is like sex – You know it’s important to your partner, but sometimes you just want to get it over with.

10 — Customer service is like sex – If you don’t get the attention you think you deserve, you’re upset about it.

11 — Grocery shopping is like sex – If you can’t find the one item you went for, it feels like the whole trip was wasted, but it’s too much trouble to keep looking — so – close enough!

12 – Cleaning the house is like sex – You may have spent hours doing this amazingly thorough job on Saturday, but by Thursday, you’re kinda thinking maybe you should do it again.

13 – Having a cat is like sex – Yeah, it’s warm and cuddly and purring, but do you really know what’s going on in that feline’s mind?

14 – Playing the piano is like sex – You can practice all you want, but if you don’t love what you’re doing, you’ll never be any good at it.

And finally:

15 — Riding a bicycle is like sex – You never forget how, but if you haven’t done it for a while, it’s going to hurt the next day.

I rest my case!