By Chris Coray, The Unmuddled
Mathematician
Our world is getting a little complicated. For example, we have a TV, a DVD player,
the satellite receiver, and a DVR, all about 1 foot apart.
But there are also 3 remotes, one for each of these items. I have to somehow keep track of which buttons
to push, which inputs to select, and a whole variety of choices to make in
order to get proper operation. Push the
wrong button at any point in the process and the whole system goes into
never-never land. I think it’s possible
to buy a single remote to control the other 3 remotes. What I’m looking for is a remote that is so
big that it can’t be lost and will double as a coffin (or maybe a boat) when
the time comes for me to need one. Thank
heavens there will be no need for a mute button at that time.
Then there are phones.
The collective desire of Americans to have phones that pretty much do
everything has produced some amazing stuff.
The Muddled Male can control all the water tanks, pumps, and well houses
on the Sweetwater Hill from his phone.
Plus it does email, photos, sound recording, texting, Skype, data base
management, internet access, birthday parties, and can be a pacemaker if he
needs one. Ah, but what does one do when
a new model or feature comes out, as happens almost every day. The need to be at the tip of the arrow can
ruin a life. New bibles will soon have
an 11th commandment, “Thou shalt not try to keep up with all the
latest electrical gadgets”. A person
could go nuts with updates. Some people have
already reached the stage where they cannot bear to be two iterations behind
the newest item. Further, the “Neener,
Neener, Neener” factor is growing between the Hatfields and the McCoys, by
which I mean Apple and Android. They
don’t get along any better than congress.
There are other issues.
My wife is one of two people on the earth who own a Blackberry, the
other being the President of the United States.
She does not have his tech support staff, however. So when her phone died while still under warranty
she got a new one delivered. She spent
an entire day getting it set up, connected to the wireless, enabling feature A,
disabling feature B, and still was stumped by the process of connecting it to
her car so she could be in compliance with the new Utah laws on cell phone use
in cars. There was no instruction manual
for making the connection. Just sort of
a “Good luck, maybe you should have bought a different phone”. Finally, victory was achieved, followed by a
need for a substantial nap.
I know what’s coming.
Out insatiable need to have a single hand-held device do just about
everything in our lives (even if weighs 30 lbs) will produce exactly that. This omnibus device will come with a beanie
cap to hold the solar power collector to recharge the battery and a shoulder
mounted lightning rod for thunderstorms.
And the ultimate feature will be a water detecting electromagnetic force
field unit that will not allow the device to enter water. This is going to be great for potential
toilet disasters but when you see somebody jump off the edge of a pool or try
to enter the lake and then see that human rejected and bounced repetitively
above the water surface, please have no sympathy, as they are wearing their
phone. An app is available for immediate
back surgery to be carried out by the internal articulated arm that will be
part of each new phone. It’ll be right
next to the on-board pizza oven.
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