We have to come to terms with the fact that this technology, still in its infancy compared to many other things, is still flawed. Case in point; I haven't been able to access this blog for over a month. I tried it on some other computers. Nada. I am writing now, but this may disappear quicker than you can say what the fu..... ( which is exactly what happened recently.) What's the problem you might ask? I don't have a fucking clue. I just somehow managed to get it to work.
Think about your daily interactions with a computer, whether at home or at work, for couple of minutes. Then ask yourself if you would put up with this kind of horseshit from any other appliance in your home. You probably wouldn't keep a refrigerator that kept gobbling up your steaks and your beer while several technicians shake their heads and tell you they have no idea what's wrong. No. You would haul it off into the alley until a scrap picker in a beat up pick up truck grabs it, or wait for the the fridge to make some of the more annoying neighborhood kids mysteriously disappear.
It would be unthinkable to be philosophical and convince yourself that is is normal to have a stereo that would spontaneously set all your CD's or records on fire. It would just sit there with lights stupidly blinking like a retarded dog waiting for you to go out and buy more CD's. It would then proceed to immediately set them on fire again.
Human interaction in general can have strange moments. There is no shortage of annoying or weird people out there. There are many ways to deal with various people that may cross our paths. Some can be dealt with by simply out-smarting them, others you can simply walk away from and others may require a nice stiff punch in the face. What if a brilliant, but crazed, Frankenstein-like scientist were able to give life to a computer? A walking, talking, breathing human computer. I don't think anyone could hang around with that type of person for too long, chances are that it would render you irrevocably clinically insane. You would spend the rest of your life babbling to yourself in a rubber room. The human computer, on the other hand, would act like it had spent its entire life in a rubber room just like yours, except with more straightjackets.
If the human computer was a Mac, he would be like a deranged hipster with moments of clarity. If the human computer was a PC, he would be like a bi-polar government bureaucrat able to quote 16,000 pages of rules and regulations verbatim, but unable to give you a straight answer when you ask where that bathroom is.
It would be difficult to even start a conversation with this man-machine, because every time you would start a sentence, he would flash a little card in front of his face and attempt to sell you all kinds of shit that you don't need. You would have to swat about 20 of those little cards away before you could even get a hello.
He wouldn't answer any questions before asking you " Are you sure that you want to...." or " Did you mean...." After you tersely said no he may or may not answer your question. He might quote some stupid internet forum where everyone is wrong, give you a questionable source from Wikipedia or just whip out a porno magazine and stick it in your face. Or tell you " fuck it, just Google it."
Alright, so this guy is a little strange but he has decent sense of humor. He also seems to know a lot of hot chicks, but they are all in Russia for some strange reason. He may hook you up one day, but in the meantime he knows a lot good restaurants and bars with good bands and cheap booze. Some days he'll burn you some really good CD's for free but other days he wants to borrow your credit card.
So you decide to go see a band with, let's call him Mack, with Mack and grab a couple of beers. Everything is cool, but after a few drinks in he will just stop moving and talking mid-conversation. You give a few good backhanders, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. When his turn comes to buy the next round he can often be heard saying " Error 404" over and over again and promptly pass out. When he comes to, it's like nothing ever happened and he has absolutely no idea what the fuck Error 404 means. Maybe he does, he just flat-out doesn't want to tell you.
After a few more beers Mack may suddenly start speaking another language. He doesn't suddenly switch to Spanish and start calling everyone " Eh, maricon!" No, it's a language that doesn't seem to have any vowels and sounds something like this. " @##< fmrn> ##
Mack has a good buddy called Bing who claims to be able to translate many languages, but he is almost as deranged as Mack and completely full of shit. I met Bing one night and decided to call him on it. I asked him to translate "? donde esta mi cerveza" and he answered Don flashback United States cigarettes. Thanks Bing, now I can go to Tijuana and get my face punched.
Mack also has a buddy called Frankie B. Now Frankie B knows a shitload of people, but he's a trouble maker. He likes to start vicious rumors and air people's dirty laundry in public. He loves to whine a lot in public and when he's not whining, he's always showing people pictures of food that he ate or dumb looking cats. He loves to waste people's time with all kinds of techno-babble but he keeps changing his phone number so nobody can get a hold of him. Mack and Frankie B used to hang around a skid bar called Mel's Place. It was run down but it always had cool bands. It somehow went out of business and Frankie B. ended up taking it over. Instead of hiring bands, Frankie B. likes to quote obscure song lyrics.
Mack also has a geeky looking friend called Craig L. Craig L. has a million tricks up his sleeve. He sometimes has leads for all kinds of cool stuff, but he's usually too busy trying to sell shitty bicycles for way too much money, trying to get you to haul away big piles of dirt for free or telling a bunch of weirdos where you live. I suspect that Craig L. also deals drugs and is also a pimp on the side. I think he may be wanted for tax-evasion as well. Don't let that unassuming skinny blue suit fool you, that Craig L. is one sleazy sumbitch.
Mack is also a filthy liar. He knows a lot of locksmiths and he somehow got into my house. He "borrowed" my entire CD collection so he could burn copies for himself. He didn't feel like hauling all the CD's back to my place, so he ditched them in the river. The copies he burned don't work on my stereo he keeps promising to replace my CD's. He knows a free CD store called isohunt, but they don't have anything I want and the cops are always casing that joint.
Mack also got a hold of my credit card number and keeps sending strangers on free trips to Puerto Vallarta. There is also some dude in Nigeria that he's been in touch with and and apparently that will pay off big. I got my card back from Mack and cancelled it. Mack seems to be unfamiliar with the concept of cash, so he's been harassing a pal of mine called Pay. Lot of people don't want to do business with my pal Pay, so my money should be safe.
Even though Mack is temperamental, uncooperative and unpredictable, he has many skills that were in great demand at many big companies, so he always had good jobs. Seeing as Mack is mentally unstable however, he kept getting fired and being replaced by younger guys who were able to talk really fast. He kept getting crappier and crappier jobs and was eventually unable to sustain the workload. Last I heard, he was teaching basic math to school kids in Bangladesh.
Man, I gotta get me some new friends. Or maybe I'll see if my old buddies Bob Tube and G.Tar wanna go for a beer.
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