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I can't wait until the day comes that I can toss my cell phone in the trash and be done with it. Its one of my fantasies lately. I guess you know you're getting older when you start fantasizing about things that don't involve sex. 10 years ago most of us lived just fine without a cell phone, now we are programmed to think we can't live without them. And then there is our children and their text messaging. You know the first means of transmitting information over a wire was with the telegraph, a bunch of dots and dashes representing text, 1 letter at a time. Kind of ironic after all these decades, here we are now almost back to that, except this time it is done wirelessly, pushing buttons and transmitting text, and this time we pay through the nose for the privilage. Unlimited text "only" costs you $20 a month. How much does it cost a cell phone provider to let your daughter transmit 300 text messages a day? How much money do cell phone providers make each month?
Remember ariels on the roof? If you were really high tech yours could be turned via electric motor, and you picked up TV stations like a radio picks up its stations. Then cable came along, when I grew up cable cost my Dad $6 a month when it first showed up. Now people are paying their cable company over $100 a month, some over $200 a month, mostly for a bunch of stuff they don't want. Seriously, if you have cable TV right now, how many channels do you get versus how many do you actually watch?
Remember plugs, points, and condensers? Remember when you could do some of your own car repairs in your driveway or right on the side of the road? Remember when all you needed for a car emergency was a pair of vice grips, a coat hanger, and 5 feet of rope? Those days are gone forever!
Well I refuse to give up my old school hifi. The days of CarverM400s, of B&O turntables, Nakamichi 3 head tape decks, DBX compressors. I refuse to give up my "old" speakers, from the line of the original Infinity Reference Standards, except slightly smaller than those 7 foot high cabs. I like real wood cabinets, I like big speakers that weigh a ton and rattle windows and send bass vibes through the floor. I refoamed the woofers a few years ago, as I have made this repair several times for others, its not difficult. Driven by a 100 watt Yamaha, I'll match my speakers against anything built today and sold at the chains. They don't make stuff like this anymore, its all made in some Chinese factory now, probably by 8 year old kids too. Remember the small, independent stereo store chains? I sure do miss those places. I miss the quality of what they sold.
"Whats that thing?!" kids ask, when they see my Nakamichi, or the turntable. They are clueless. How many of you realize that for 10 years now, kids graduating from high school have probably never seen an album spinning on a turntable? They are amazed when I turn them on and demonstrate for them what that thing is.
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"you're the cop, you figure it out"
-Lee H. Oswald to Dallas Police detectives, weekend
of 11-22-63.
"Part of the reason why we avoided talking about this thing, because every time you say something, somebody misinterprets what you say."
-James. J. Humes, excerpt of ARRB statement, 2-13-96
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