"First World Problems"

So I finally found myself having a few minutes of free “internet time” to give you a quick update on my doings. 

Things have been kind of rough the past couple weeks and I’m a little wary of posting this because of my policy on “whiny” blog posts.  But I figured that I should let people know in case they wonder why I’m not my usually chipper self: 

First off, my orthodontist told me I have to start wearing rubber bands over my braces.  This means I can’t really open my mouth too wide (yawning is kind of difficult now) and my teeth are more tender than usual due to the extra pressure from the bands.  Plus, I look like that much more like an awkward teenager.  I’m not really sure how long I’ll have to keep them on (*at least* five weeks, maybe longer, according to the orthodontist) but I hear that it’s best to just keep them on all the time (except while eating / brushing) to keep from having to wear them too long.  

@#$%^& Hate this

Right after I heard the “great news” about my teeth, my car got “sandwiched” on the freeway after a guy a couple cars in front of me stopped a little too suddenly for the guy behind me.  It didn’t look like a big crash but after taking my car to a mechanic, I found out that it sustained about $1400.00 in repairs.  Fortunately, we all had insurance no one was hurt.  And I’m now driving a rental for the next couple of days while the mechanics repair the damages to my car.  I’m driving a (gas-guzzling) Ford Escape right now and I feel pretty big on the road.  Good news, though – the mechanic called this morning saying I can pick up my car today! 

Not Actual Accident, but you get the idea

After I got home that day, my roommate told me our apartment lost it’s internet service.  I’m not 100% sure how that happened, but my roommate told me it had something to do with the online business he’s starting & how he tried to re-direct the phone number he created for it to his cell-phone.  Apparently, he also re-routed our landline (which we use to run our DSL), cutting off our access to the world wide web.  So now I can only go online at work.  Supposedly this’ll be fixed by Friday (9/23/11), but I’m not holding my breath….!  

A few days later, I got a big scare at work.  I’d rather not mention what happened, but it’s caused a lot of us to wonder about the security of our jobs. 

So yeah…..a lot happening in the past two weeks.  I figure I’ll let the older stuff go unsaid for now…..! 

Internet-dependent thinking?

Do you ever wonder if we rely too much on the internet to "look up" stuff? 

It's pretty easy, if you think about it - someone asks you a question; just google it. 
....or look it up on Wikipedia;

or god-willing, we can even Ask Jeeves. 

And while we all know by now that we should double-check all the info we get from online resources (so sayeth the English major in me), how often do we remember what we look up? 

I ask because in the past week, my co-workers and I have looked up random trivia online, only to forget it later that day. 

- once when my co-worker had to look up who the Lindbergh baby was.  (she forgot it that afternoon)
- and another time today where I looked up if Jehovah's witnesses celebrate birthdays (they don't)

I didn't consider it a big deal at the time, but I was driving home from work today when I tried *again* to remember if Jehovah's witnesses celebrate birthdays (turns out they don't!), I started to wonder if we take all this available-at-your-fingertips information for granted and don't really bother to learn it. 

Kind of makes me appreciate all the studying I had to do in school.  (Or maybe I just have early onset Alzheimers). 

The Internet Storage Closet

Now that the internet has made things like stamps, cable TV, and paper all but obsolete, I just thought I would ask you all out there (all 3 of you?) a few questions:

How many of you still buy CDs?

With the advent of torrenting – and specifically I-tunes – why would you need to? Why would you want to?

What about books? Or DVDs? If the I-Pad and Kindle weren’t so expensive, would you download them instead?

I personally still buy CDs, but it’s usually only because I can’t find songs elsewhere for free. I tried searching for music that I like online, but I’ve learned that the internet is all about what’s popular and modern.

And my love of oldies jazz & neo-swing isn’t exactly either of those, so I usually have to hit the record stores (CD shops?) in hopes of finding a Tom Dorsey CD containing that one song I’ve been searching for.

Sometimes I end up paying around $20.00 for that one song…..and that sucks.

But Fred recently linked me to this article about Sony’s discontinuation of Floppy A: Drives and it got me thinking about how all this “information” that we used to “keep” in physical objects can now be uploaded, downloaded, transferred and stored as intangible “data” in this “other dimension” we call the Internet. It’s become a sort of artificial version of limbo…..or Hammer space closet where we store all our valuables out of convenience.

But are we losing something when we store it this way?

Back in College (before the invention of Facebook & MySpace was still the “IT’ thing) I had a friend, Lucas, who thought this – he used to constantly go to Amoeba music and buy CDs of albums that he’d already downloaded earlier for free.

I asked him once why he did that and he said that there’s just something about owning the album ‘legit’ that made him want to pay for it; some sort of comfort he took in knowing he had ‘the original’ (the label) in addition to the ‘bootleg copy.’

I thought this sounded odd at first until I realized this is the same reason I buy books and DVDs. There IS a certain kind of “legitimacy" to it.

I'm not sure why (maybe it's the prestige that comes with seeing the brand label) but given that I have the money, I would prefer to buy something outright rather than some other way.

Except for porn. Why would you ever go and buy / rent porn when you can download it at home? (Seriously)

God Damn Me!

So I wanted to use this post to plug my new favorite sitcom that Netflix just suggested to me: "Better Off Ted."

I watched several episodes over the weekend, loved it, and wanted to tell you how great it was in hopes of garnering support for it.

But I cant; ABC already canceled it. (just this Month, too!)

I really want to be angry at the Network for canceling this one, but I realized recently that it's partially *my* fault this show got axed.

See, I'm too cheap for Cable TV. And too lazy to get one of those Digitial Converter box things. Plus, I'm usually not home during the evenings (I'm an active twenty-something, y'know) so what's the point?

I still like watching TV though, so I usually rent TV series through Netflix or watch them through internet sites like Hulu.

But since TV shows depend on people actually watching them during their designated time slots (especially if they want to get renewed) this doesn't really help them, does it? Can Networks even calculate ratings through the internet? (Nico - help me out here)

I guess what I'm trying to say is if we don't start paying for things like Cable (and TIVO) I think Networks are gonna stop producing TV shows that are catered to our audience. After all, why should they invest in something that "no one's going to watch"?

In any case, I still reccommend watching 'Better Off Ted" - especially now that it's on DVD. I would go so far as to say you should maybe even buy it if you like what you see.

Don't do the easy thing and just watch it on Hulu.

But if you have to, email the network everytime you do.