Sorry I haven't submitted in a while, busy summer. The following is a colomn from earlier this year...
A relative of mine was on Jeopardy recently. Jason won a bunch of money in less than a week. His mother Kathy and I share grandparents and half a century of friendly camaraderie and light spirited conversation. Kathy is clever and funny and she, Emmy, and I have made each other think and laugh through the good and bad years. It is no surprise that all three of her kids are super smart. Jason’s father is no slouch when it comes to mental dexterity either.
I suppose it is a bad habit, but I comment or talk to my TV, usually but not always in a derogatory manner. From my living room chair, I talked at Jason while he was on Jeopardy, trying to be helpful. In the beginning, he didn’t seem to be pushing the button to answer the questions. I mostly yelled, “Push the button” then louder, “PUSH THE BUTTON”. It didn’t seem to have any effect on whether or not he pushed the button, no matter how loud I yelled.
I always knew Jason was a smart young man, but as I watched the show, I couldn’t believe just how smart and fast he is.
In any conversation that turns adversarial, or in any argument, my snappy retorts make less and less sense along the lines of, “so is your mother” or “up your nose with a rubber hose.” Sometimes I just slip into overused repetitive profanities. If given the chance to sleep and regroup my thoughts, muttering to myself overnight, I can come up with a great reply. They don’t give you that much time on Jeopardy.
As I watched the show, I knew few of the answers. When I did know answers, the contestants had pressed their button and replied (in the form of a question), long before the answer made it from the ‘I know that’ stage in my brain to actually verbalizing the words with my mouthparts.
Early on, I was pretty happy with myself and a bit disappointed with Jason because I knew the answer to a question having to do with the planting of our flag on Iwo Jima and an old Johnny Cash song. The song is about superior achievements of persons from which the rest of society would not expect that much. The answer was “Ira Hayes”, more appropriately, “Who was Ira Hays.” It was one of the few questions to which Jason didn’t have an answer.
A line from the song in a time when political correctness was a bit less correct than it is today is, “…call him drunken Ira Hays, he won’t answer any more, not the whiskey drinkin’ Indian, or the marine that went to war.”
That turned out to be the only answer I knew well enough to have pushed the button first and placed in the form of a question.
After that, the questions got harder. Jason won Jeopardy money knowing the names of various Norse characters, some of which I thought he made up. He knew lines from George Washington’s inaugural speech and sports terms I never heard of. He also showed a wealth of knowledge from movies, the serious to the amazingly frivolous. In the TV department, he knew three stooges trivia and daytime soap opera characters. He knew the answers to questions when I didn’t even understand the question.
Jason’s education has been and still is, his own hunger for knowledge. On Jeopardy, most of the competitors Jason knocked out were well-educated, degree holding professional types. He won over $150,000, not bad for an engine assembler from right here in Western New York.
I always wanted to be on a show like Jeopardy, maybe I could do well if they limited the questions to old Johnny Cash lyrics..
Comments: Changinglanesterry@gmail.com or
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Grandaughters, Wives, and Computers
Emmy and I have been chatting online lately. For my fellow computer illiterates ‘chatting’, on the internet is a kind of fast form of email. If you don’t know what email is, you’ve just woken from a long comma, congratulations!
In a two-person chat, both people are on line at the same time, and have a written (typed) conversation. In the old days, you dialed up a person to chat, their phone rang, and they answered. Now both people find themselves online at the same time. In my love/hate relationship with computers and the internet, one thing I love is the communication. I think something almost mystical is at work.
You could be minding your business, doing something important on the internet, like finding out how many people recorded specific rock and roll and blues hits from three decades ago on You-tube. A little balloon window will pop up in the corner of your computers’ screen and tell you someone you are acquainted with is online and ‘available’.
Knowing that someone is willing and waiting for a chat interferes with my concentration. It forces me to put some thought into a talk with a person I may not have been interested in chatting with in the first place. If I ignore the little window, I begin to feel guilty. After all, how many different video versions of Van Morrison’s “Into the Mystic” can I possibly enjoy? (The number is vast)
If the ‘chat’ person went on line for some companionship and I sit like a bump on a log will they feel rejected? Maybe no one will talk to them. Maybe they are having a bad day- personal crisis; maybe they need to talk to someone.
I try to think up something intelligent to say, I type in, “What’s up, dude?”
A little balloon pops up claiming the person is no longer available. I wonder if the person is ‘not available’ because I am the one who responded, maybe I should feel rejected. What I really feel is relief– I don’t have to think up any more great lines like, ‘What’s up, dude?’
If my granddaughter is the individual on line, ready and available, we are always happy to chat with her.
Our son Jon sets up the chat session from their home, and Paige continues chatting as she pleases.
We travel for business, in our little truck camper. The last trip we took was six weeks. The chats with Paige lift our spirits, bringing a third person, a favorite one at that, into our small space. We use Emmy’s computer and she types in my comments as well as her own.
We have a lot of patience for our granddaughter; at six years of age, Paige doesn’t have a long attention span nor is she a fast typist. She sometimes wanders off in the middle of a chat, only to return minutes later. There is a lot of hang-on time between sentences.
In the camper, on our end of the conversation, Emmy spends the wait-time sewing beads onto fabric and leather; I read and write and watch videos.
Though not speedy, our granddaughter most often replies in full sentences with perfect spelling and grammar. She already has a sense of humor and often makes some very adult observations. At one point we were chatting and there was a longer than usual wait.
Emmy typed, “Are you there, Paige?”
Paige wrote, “No.”
I told Paige, I wished I had a mail delivery owl like those in the Harry Potter novels, a nice, fluffy solid white one.
Paige said, “Grandpa, you do know that is only fiction don’t you?”
She was so serious, I couldn’t answer.
Even if she doubts my knowledge or my sanity, Paige will always be welcome in any chat of mine.
Comments? Changinglanesterry@gmail.com
Or http://changinglanesterry.blogspot.com/
.
In a two-person chat, both people are on line at the same time, and have a written (typed) conversation. In the old days, you dialed up a person to chat, their phone rang, and they answered. Now both people find themselves online at the same time. In my love/hate relationship with computers and the internet, one thing I love is the communication. I think something almost mystical is at work.
You could be minding your business, doing something important on the internet, like finding out how many people recorded specific rock and roll and blues hits from three decades ago on You-tube. A little balloon window will pop up in the corner of your computers’ screen and tell you someone you are acquainted with is online and ‘available’.
Knowing that someone is willing and waiting for a chat interferes with my concentration. It forces me to put some thought into a talk with a person I may not have been interested in chatting with in the first place. If I ignore the little window, I begin to feel guilty. After all, how many different video versions of Van Morrison’s “Into the Mystic” can I possibly enjoy? (The number is vast)
If the ‘chat’ person went on line for some companionship and I sit like a bump on a log will they feel rejected? Maybe no one will talk to them. Maybe they are having a bad day- personal crisis; maybe they need to talk to someone.
I try to think up something intelligent to say, I type in, “What’s up, dude?”
A little balloon pops up claiming the person is no longer available. I wonder if the person is ‘not available’ because I am the one who responded, maybe I should feel rejected. What I really feel is relief– I don’t have to think up any more great lines like, ‘What’s up, dude?’
If my granddaughter is the individual on line, ready and available, we are always happy to chat with her.
Our son Jon sets up the chat session from their home, and Paige continues chatting as she pleases.
We travel for business, in our little truck camper. The last trip we took was six weeks. The chats with Paige lift our spirits, bringing a third person, a favorite one at that, into our small space. We use Emmy’s computer and she types in my comments as well as her own.
We have a lot of patience for our granddaughter; at six years of age, Paige doesn’t have a long attention span nor is she a fast typist. She sometimes wanders off in the middle of a chat, only to return minutes later. There is a lot of hang-on time between sentences.
In the camper, on our end of the conversation, Emmy spends the wait-time sewing beads onto fabric and leather; I read and write and watch videos.
Though not speedy, our granddaughter most often replies in full sentences with perfect spelling and grammar. She already has a sense of humor and often makes some very adult observations. At one point we were chatting and there was a longer than usual wait.
Emmy typed, “Are you there, Paige?”
Paige wrote, “No.”
I told Paige, I wished I had a mail delivery owl like those in the Harry Potter novels, a nice, fluffy solid white one.
Paige said, “Grandpa, you do know that is only fiction don’t you?”
She was so serious, I couldn’t answer.
Even if she doubts my knowledge or my sanity, Paige will always be welcome in any chat of mine.
Comments? Changinglanesterry@gmail.com
Or http://changinglanesterry.blogspot.com/
.
Saturday, July 3, 2010
I love MMB-- recycled column
Meredith Baxter Bernie (MBB) announced a few weeks ago that she is a lesbian. Many people last knew her as the wholesome Mrs. Keaton from the classic sit-com “Family-Ties”. I’m sure the declaration upset a multitude of people concerned with other’s sexual preferences.
On the show, she portrayed an ex hippie type mom, opposite her radical-right-wing-Nixon-admiring son, Michael J Fox. As the Mom, the voice of reason, she doled out advice and consolation to her family. In real life, she married three times, but did not realize until lately the pool in which she was fishing contained the wrong gender. If common sense could have carried over to her real life, maybe she would have stopped marrying men. She could have at least given it some thought between weddings.
I was head over heels infatuated with her back when ‘Family-Ties’ was popular. I liked her almost as much as Emmy hankered after Willy Nelson.
Somehow, in my fantasy I saw Mrs. Keaton and me, running off. We would consummate our relationship on some tropical island beach, living in a grass hut, existing on sushi and margaritas, happily ever after. Being a fantasy and my chances of success so small, I didn’t mull over details such as, what would become of my spouse and kids. Maybe Tiger Woods should have put a little thought into that.
I know my chances were not good with Mrs. Keaton but I have a vivid imagination.
One year, while the Family-Ties sit-com was still in production, Emmy, our two boys, and I were on vacation in Washington DC. I saw Michael Gross, the Dad on the Family-Ties series, at a table near ours in a Bennigans.
Under the guise of getting his autograph for my kids, (not for me, of course) I went over to his table with a pen and piece of paper. I am fully aware that actors on TV are most often not married to, or related to the people they perform with on sit-coms, but I remember studying the people he was sitting with to see if the woman I adored was in attendance. I didn’t even care if the wildly popular Michael J Fox was there. It turned out Mr. Keaton was with regular people, most likely his own family. How boring is that?
I felt bad that I disturbed him; I was committing an unwelcome act. He got up from his chair and walked me back to my table, explaining that he didn’t believe in giving autographs unless he was at a publicity event. He was friendly and courteous then shook my hand and went back to sit with his family. Though I felt like a lout for bothering him, I thought if I were he, I would probably just tell someone like myself to go away or conversely, just sign the piece of paper and be done with it.
I was in a funk about Meredith Baxter, coming out of the closet. Married women tire of their spouses, opening up the possibility for good-looking blond stars to run away with fat old men like me. I can fantasize that they would love to spend their lives in abject poverty on a beach in Samoa. However, when women realize they are batting for the other team they seldom start back with the original line up.
Emmy Lou has been well aware of my fixation for MBB; I’m pretty much an open book. When she came home from shopping I glumly told her I found out Mom Keaton was no longer interested in men. I said I guess that is one more fantasy I’m was going to have to leave behind.
Emmy told me I didn’t have to give up the dream, pointing out that Mrs. Keaton is just as likely to run off with me now, as before she discovered her new sexual orientation. “The odds of it happening haven’t changed a bit.” She said.
As often happens, Emmy’s keen observation brightened my day.
On the show, she portrayed an ex hippie type mom, opposite her radical-right-wing-Nixon-admiring son, Michael J Fox. As the Mom, the voice of reason, she doled out advice and consolation to her family. In real life, she married three times, but did not realize until lately the pool in which she was fishing contained the wrong gender. If common sense could have carried over to her real life, maybe she would have stopped marrying men. She could have at least given it some thought between weddings.
I was head over heels infatuated with her back when ‘Family-Ties’ was popular. I liked her almost as much as Emmy hankered after Willy Nelson.
Somehow, in my fantasy I saw Mrs. Keaton and me, running off. We would consummate our relationship on some tropical island beach, living in a grass hut, existing on sushi and margaritas, happily ever after. Being a fantasy and my chances of success so small, I didn’t mull over details such as, what would become of my spouse and kids. Maybe Tiger Woods should have put a little thought into that.
I know my chances were not good with Mrs. Keaton but I have a vivid imagination.
One year, while the Family-Ties sit-com was still in production, Emmy, our two boys, and I were on vacation in Washington DC. I saw Michael Gross, the Dad on the Family-Ties series, at a table near ours in a Bennigans.
Under the guise of getting his autograph for my kids, (not for me, of course) I went over to his table with a pen and piece of paper. I am fully aware that actors on TV are most often not married to, or related to the people they perform with on sit-coms, but I remember studying the people he was sitting with to see if the woman I adored was in attendance. I didn’t even care if the wildly popular Michael J Fox was there. It turned out Mr. Keaton was with regular people, most likely his own family. How boring is that?
I felt bad that I disturbed him; I was committing an unwelcome act. He got up from his chair and walked me back to my table, explaining that he didn’t believe in giving autographs unless he was at a publicity event. He was friendly and courteous then shook my hand and went back to sit with his family. Though I felt like a lout for bothering him, I thought if I were he, I would probably just tell someone like myself to go away or conversely, just sign the piece of paper and be done with it.
I was in a funk about Meredith Baxter, coming out of the closet. Married women tire of their spouses, opening up the possibility for good-looking blond stars to run away with fat old men like me. I can fantasize that they would love to spend their lives in abject poverty on a beach in Samoa. However, when women realize they are batting for the other team they seldom start back with the original line up.
Emmy Lou has been well aware of my fixation for MBB; I’m pretty much an open book. When she came home from shopping I glumly told her I found out Mom Keaton was no longer interested in men. I said I guess that is one more fantasy I’m was going to have to leave behind.
Emmy told me I didn’t have to give up the dream, pointing out that Mrs. Keaton is just as likely to run off with me now, as before she discovered her new sexual orientation. “The odds of it happening haven’t changed a bit.” She said.
As often happens, Emmy’s keen observation brightened my day.
Friday, June 18, 2010
Allentown
Travels with Emmy...
Our show this past weekend was at the Allentown Art Festival. Allentown is a party/artsy section of Buffalo NY. The weather report for both days included passing showers, of which we got few to none. Crowds on Saturday were sparse but we enjoyed a just-below-average monetary intake. There was heavier traffic on Sunday, but they didn’t spend much, at least not at our booth..
My wife is the artist, she builds beautiful bead embroidered jewelry, I am a retired truck driver. I get to do all things that are not actually artistic. We travel to the shows with our pickup truck camper and display trailer. It far easier for us to walk a few minutes to the camper and stay overnight even if the location isn’t ideal, than to drive the hour or so home and back in the morning.
This year’s overnight stays in Allentown were the quietest to date. Two years ago a security alarm started to ring loudly around 2PM during the first day of the show from the building whose parking lot we were taking advantage of. It rang for over 30 hours. I was surprised nearby residents weren’t alarmed and up in arms themselves. The police came shortly after the noise started but could not locate the owners to access the building and shut the alarm off.
The ringing bell wasn’t so bad, it helped to cover the noise of the college-aged drunken kids singing and arguing loudly as they roamed the streets from bar to bar. It has been pointed out to me that these are suburban children, not locals. I believe that to be true, when I was an inexperienced drinker I was one of those noisy young people. I lived in Hamburg, a suburb of Buffalo; I came to Allentown to enjoy the night life, noisily roaming the streets and frequenting the bars in that section of town.
I am always amazed at the patience the locals have for these arts and crafts festivals. I live in rural Western NY and when I have to wait for a car at a stop sign on the end of my road where there usually is no traffic I can be slightly perturbed.
Residents, who live where these shows take place, often have to park blocks away from their homes. Before and after ‘show hours’, while we are tying up loose ends or opening for the days show, neighborhood folks walk by with their dogs or hoof it to the market. They always have a cheerful “good morning” or “hello”.
‘Twere it I, it would probably be a growl… I’m just saying.
Our show this past weekend was at the Allentown Art Festival. Allentown is a party/artsy section of Buffalo NY. The weather report for both days included passing showers, of which we got few to none. Crowds on Saturday were sparse but we enjoyed a just-below-average monetary intake. There was heavier traffic on Sunday, but they didn’t spend much, at least not at our booth..
My wife is the artist, she builds beautiful bead embroidered jewelry, I am a retired truck driver. I get to do all things that are not actually artistic. We travel to the shows with our pickup truck camper and display trailer. It far easier for us to walk a few minutes to the camper and stay overnight even if the location isn’t ideal, than to drive the hour or so home and back in the morning.
This year’s overnight stays in Allentown were the quietest to date. Two years ago a security alarm started to ring loudly around 2PM during the first day of the show from the building whose parking lot we were taking advantage of. It rang for over 30 hours. I was surprised nearby residents weren’t alarmed and up in arms themselves. The police came shortly after the noise started but could not locate the owners to access the building and shut the alarm off.
The ringing bell wasn’t so bad, it helped to cover the noise of the college-aged drunken kids singing and arguing loudly as they roamed the streets from bar to bar. It has been pointed out to me that these are suburban children, not locals. I believe that to be true, when I was an inexperienced drinker I was one of those noisy young people. I lived in Hamburg, a suburb of Buffalo; I came to Allentown to enjoy the night life, noisily roaming the streets and frequenting the bars in that section of town.
I am always amazed at the patience the locals have for these arts and crafts festivals. I live in rural Western NY and when I have to wait for a car at a stop sign on the end of my road where there usually is no traffic I can be slightly perturbed.
Residents, who live where these shows take place, often have to park blocks away from their homes. Before and after ‘show hours’, while we are tying up loose ends or opening for the days show, neighborhood folks walk by with their dogs or hoof it to the market. They always have a cheerful “good morning” or “hello”.
‘Twere it I, it would probably be a growl… I’m just saying.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Machine whisperer recycled column
I am not the only one; there is an army of bewildered backyard mechanics with average abilities out there. We did the simple things. We adjusted carburetors, changed spark plugs, replaced oil and filters, brake shoes, mufflers and shocks.
We always expected a Ford or a Chevy, even an old Volvo, to last a decade or two with a few repairs and some routine maintenance. You’d have to open the hood or crawl under and get your hands dirty, but in the end, you could make it run.
Then there is the above average mechanic. I have a neighbor and friend whom I’ll call Bob. He has a machinist’s mindset and mechanical character. Bob has been retired twenty years and is having a particularly hard time giving up his old ways. He has built machines from the ground up, creating them a piece at a time, on a lathe or a horizontal mill from brass and iron. I think of him as the ‘machine whisperer’.
I’ve seen Bob, walk up to a dead car or dismantled engine. He’ll scratch the side of his head; maybe shake it ever so slightly from side to side. He will then roll up his sleeves and work it like a puzzle, “is the engine getting air? Is there spark? How about fuel?” When the puzzle comes together and the pieces function like the well-tuned machine it was meant to be, Bob would be satisfied, but no one was surprised, because he is the machine whisperer.
Bob recently bought a brand new computer and had high-speed internet installed in his home. He unhappily carried his old PC to his shop and spread it out on a flat-topped cart, where many of his mechanical projects begin. The big old CRT monitor, tower, printer, external modem, speakers and the connecting cables covered the three by five foot surface.
The old computer had let him down. Even though Bob performed routine maintenance on it- defragging, blowing the dust out of it, the aged PC failed him. He didn’t even get a decade out of it.
He is a fan of several on-line forums, reading posts from other motor-head types. Discussions are of machines, their care, and construction. As we all know though, it is a high-speed world. The motor-head forums became harder for Bob to view with dial-up internet service and his old PC’s super-slow processor. Other motor-heads sent pictures to him, and though he is a patient man, the long wait for a single old tractor photo to upload was disturbing. Video links were out of the question, click on one and it would choke the life out of the ancient PC.
It’s winter now, and it takes a lot to heat Bobs’ shop. He won’t work out there much until spring. The old computer still sits on the flatbed cart. The machine whisperer walks out to his shop occasionally and sees the parts arranged on the cart. He walks around it, viewing it from different angles. He scratches his cranium, shakes his head imperceptibly side to side, he can’t fit the pieces of the puzzle together, he can’t bring it back to life.
No amount of thinking or shrugging of shoulders or nodding his head will bring this puppy back to life. It is as obsolete as a blunderbuss.
It is good the cold makes his shop unusable for now. Though defeat is inevitable, Bob has time to accept it. He realizes there is no resale value for the junk computer. At least a car would bring him money for parts. He will chuck it in the spring.
He’ll spread the parts of an ailing, but real machine, made of steel and aluminum on the cart. He will have it running, smooth in no time, clicking or humming or thumping the way it was meant to- for he is the machine whisperer.
Comments? Changinglanesterry@gmail.com
We always expected a Ford or a Chevy, even an old Volvo, to last a decade or two with a few repairs and some routine maintenance. You’d have to open the hood or crawl under and get your hands dirty, but in the end, you could make it run.
Then there is the above average mechanic. I have a neighbor and friend whom I’ll call Bob. He has a machinist’s mindset and mechanical character. Bob has been retired twenty years and is having a particularly hard time giving up his old ways. He has built machines from the ground up, creating them a piece at a time, on a lathe or a horizontal mill from brass and iron. I think of him as the ‘machine whisperer’.
I’ve seen Bob, walk up to a dead car or dismantled engine. He’ll scratch the side of his head; maybe shake it ever so slightly from side to side. He will then roll up his sleeves and work it like a puzzle, “is the engine getting air? Is there spark? How about fuel?” When the puzzle comes together and the pieces function like the well-tuned machine it was meant to be, Bob would be satisfied, but no one was surprised, because he is the machine whisperer.
Bob recently bought a brand new computer and had high-speed internet installed in his home. He unhappily carried his old PC to his shop and spread it out on a flat-topped cart, where many of his mechanical projects begin. The big old CRT monitor, tower, printer, external modem, speakers and the connecting cables covered the three by five foot surface.
The old computer had let him down. Even though Bob performed routine maintenance on it- defragging, blowing the dust out of it, the aged PC failed him. He didn’t even get a decade out of it.
He is a fan of several on-line forums, reading posts from other motor-head types. Discussions are of machines, their care, and construction. As we all know though, it is a high-speed world. The motor-head forums became harder for Bob to view with dial-up internet service and his old PC’s super-slow processor. Other motor-heads sent pictures to him, and though he is a patient man, the long wait for a single old tractor photo to upload was disturbing. Video links were out of the question, click on one and it would choke the life out of the ancient PC.
It’s winter now, and it takes a lot to heat Bobs’ shop. He won’t work out there much until spring. The old computer still sits on the flatbed cart. The machine whisperer walks out to his shop occasionally and sees the parts arranged on the cart. He walks around it, viewing it from different angles. He scratches his cranium, shakes his head imperceptibly side to side, he can’t fit the pieces of the puzzle together, he can’t bring it back to life.
No amount of thinking or shrugging of shoulders or nodding his head will bring this puppy back to life. It is as obsolete as a blunderbuss.
It is good the cold makes his shop unusable for now. Though defeat is inevitable, Bob has time to accept it. He realizes there is no resale value for the junk computer. At least a car would bring him money for parts. He will chuck it in the spring.
He’ll spread the parts of an ailing, but real machine, made of steel and aluminum on the cart. He will have it running, smooth in no time, clicking or humming or thumping the way it was meant to- for he is the machine whisperer.
Comments? Changinglanesterry@gmail.com
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Internet Sales
Terry Stephan
Changing Lanes:internetsales
According to the flyer a friend gave me, I would receive an MP3 player and lunch, just to sit in on a FREE 90-minute “2009 Internet Marketing Conference”. The leaflet included testimonials - people had already made bazillions of dollars following the advice given at these conferences.
I knew it was a sales pitch, probably software. The leaflet added, “join us at this fun, relaxed, informative 90-minute Conference that is guaranteed to give you a new way to think about making money like never before.”
I hoped to glean some internet savvy by attending. The invitation insisted on ‘business casual’ attire. The ironic thing is, people I talk to list working in their pajamas as the number one benefit of working on the internet at home.
I have attended sales seminars with “free” giveaways in the past and found them to be time consuming and irritating, the giveaways junk – I decided to go anyway.
As people showed up for the meeting, one and two at a time, staff ushered them to specific seats. I couldn’t help but notice the younger people were placed up front. They would be more enthusiastic and, had less shyster-exposure. As I write this, I think it likely there were one or more ‘plants’ in the front row. I have nothing to back that claim, other than the fact that those up front had an unrealistically enthusiastic passion for the sales pitch.
The further from the front, the greyer the hair was.
The speaker began by claiming to be a former FBI special agent and asked if there were any law enforcement people in the room. Negative responses assured him there were no police in the audience. That and the notice requesting no one record the event, made it so there was no need to stay within the confines of the law in this assembly.
The presentation started late and lasted far longer than the originally stated 90 minutes. The speaker was friendly and funny. He pitched software and a support system to build a website. You could vend whatever products you choose to, on line. There were stiff monthly fees and internet tool packages, some costing upwards of $3200.00.
The sales group passed around “business order forms”. The forms asked for your credit card information, needed so you could attend another conference in Erie Pa, to be held in several weeks. It would only cost $48. There, you would sit through a second push so these wonderful people could gain access to a larger portion of your bank account.
Our friendly speaker said we could eat lunch as soon as we filled out our order forms. The whole pitch had boiled down to this, after two hours of camaraderie, jokes and an impassioned plea for this software it would be an embarrassment not to fill out the form for this superb company. I did not feel friendly or pliable; I never do when backed into a corner.
As I stood to leave, I noticed the people in the front rows, bent over their forms, eagerly filling in the demanded information. I turned; most of those seated behind me, hair just a bit more grey than mine, had their arms stubbornly crossed in front of them, no pens in hand, no credit card info entered on their forms, they were ready for a fight. They wanted their “free” MP3 player and lunch.
It was nearing 2PM and I was hungry and extremely perturbed. I had not ‘gleaned’ a single useful fact.
Including drive time, I had invested four hours. I figured the lunch and MP3 player were at least half hour away, possibly longer, depending on how the standoff between the grey-hairs and the ‘friendly’ staff ended.
I cut my losses and walked out the door. Half an hour later after a nice lunch for which I gladly paid, I savored coffee and something I remembered.
There is no such thing as a free lunch.
I’m not sure about free MP3 players.
Comments: changinglanesterry@gmail.com
Or http://changinglanesterry.blogspot.com/
Changing Lanes:internetsales
According to the flyer a friend gave me, I would receive an MP3 player and lunch, just to sit in on a FREE 90-minute “2009 Internet Marketing Conference”. The leaflet included testimonials - people had already made bazillions of dollars following the advice given at these conferences.
I knew it was a sales pitch, probably software. The leaflet added, “join us at this fun, relaxed, informative 90-minute Conference that is guaranteed to give you a new way to think about making money like never before.”
I hoped to glean some internet savvy by attending. The invitation insisted on ‘business casual’ attire. The ironic thing is, people I talk to list working in their pajamas as the number one benefit of working on the internet at home.
I have attended sales seminars with “free” giveaways in the past and found them to be time consuming and irritating, the giveaways junk – I decided to go anyway.
As people showed up for the meeting, one and two at a time, staff ushered them to specific seats. I couldn’t help but notice the younger people were placed up front. They would be more enthusiastic and, had less shyster-exposure. As I write this, I think it likely there were one or more ‘plants’ in the front row. I have nothing to back that claim, other than the fact that those up front had an unrealistically enthusiastic passion for the sales pitch.
The further from the front, the greyer the hair was.
The speaker began by claiming to be a former FBI special agent and asked if there were any law enforcement people in the room. Negative responses assured him there were no police in the audience. That and the notice requesting no one record the event, made it so there was no need to stay within the confines of the law in this assembly.
The presentation started late and lasted far longer than the originally stated 90 minutes. The speaker was friendly and funny. He pitched software and a support system to build a website. You could vend whatever products you choose to, on line. There were stiff monthly fees and internet tool packages, some costing upwards of $3200.00.
The sales group passed around “business order forms”. The forms asked for your credit card information, needed so you could attend another conference in Erie Pa, to be held in several weeks. It would only cost $48. There, you would sit through a second push so these wonderful people could gain access to a larger portion of your bank account.
Our friendly speaker said we could eat lunch as soon as we filled out our order forms. The whole pitch had boiled down to this, after two hours of camaraderie, jokes and an impassioned plea for this software it would be an embarrassment not to fill out the form for this superb company. I did not feel friendly or pliable; I never do when backed into a corner.
As I stood to leave, I noticed the people in the front rows, bent over their forms, eagerly filling in the demanded information. I turned; most of those seated behind me, hair just a bit more grey than mine, had their arms stubbornly crossed in front of them, no pens in hand, no credit card info entered on their forms, they were ready for a fight. They wanted their “free” MP3 player and lunch.
It was nearing 2PM and I was hungry and extremely perturbed. I had not ‘gleaned’ a single useful fact.
Including drive time, I had invested four hours. I figured the lunch and MP3 player were at least half hour away, possibly longer, depending on how the standoff between the grey-hairs and the ‘friendly’ staff ended.
I cut my losses and walked out the door. Half an hour later after a nice lunch for which I gladly paid, I savored coffee and something I remembered.
There is no such thing as a free lunch.
I’m not sure about free MP3 players.
Comments: changinglanesterry@gmail.com
Or http://changinglanesterry.blogspot.com/
Friday, May 7, 2010
Blackberry Blues
I’ve always wondered what a Blackberry was and why President Obama was having such a hard time parting with his. I’ve had one for a while now. I have a slight headache, a stiff neck and sore thumbs from operating the clever little device. I’ve become very attached to it.
There was a time I kept every phone number of acquaintances, my employers and most addresses I considered necessary, in my head. I could also remember the list of a half dozen items I needed to get when I walked the aisles of my local super market. Back then, if I ambled to the living room from the kitchen with a purpose, I could recall what that purpose was. Now I wait for it to come to me or walk back empty handed. Somewhere along the line, my brain has turned to oatmeal.
Several years ago, I purchased a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) smart-phone. A long time before that, it had been cutting-edge technology, ridiculously overpriced. After years of production, (read ‘after it became much cheaper’) I bought one.
The smart-phone performed a plethora of important functions. It stored my appointments, my calendar, and address book. It contained my ‘to-do’ and grocery lists. Once a week I attached it to my computer with a cable and ‘synced’ all of the above. If I changed or added something on either the PDA or the computer, the two would talk it over during ‘sync-time’ and exchange the information. It even was a good calculator.
I loved the touch screen at first, but became less fond of that later. The PDA did many things wonderfully, but it wasn’t a good cell phone. It was a step backward in that area. When talking to someone, it felt as though I was holding a brick to the side of my head. Not a regular brick either. It was more like one of those heavy, dense Olean paving bricks. Some part of my face would hit the touch screen and end the call early or start a conference call, or play loud music. During the call, my ear would sometimes touch the screen in an inappropriate place and it would activate an unwanted application.
The volume settings were unruly, refusing to adjust the way I wanted. It would inexplicably convert to speakerphone between calls. After leaving scar tissue on my eardrums a few times, I knew to answer the phone carefully.
My two-year contract with Verizon wireless ended a year or so ago. Because I didn’t attempt to sign up for another service contract or get a new phone, Verizon began pestering me, sending me special “deals”, almost on a weekly basis. The longer I did not sign, the phones offered for “free”, got better and more elaborate. Competition in the wireless market is fierce and I was one guppy they didn’t want to lose. Verizon seemed frantic to win me back.
Following my brain’s example, my PDA smart-phones’ thinking became cloudy. When I entered information on the touch-screen, the wrong numbers and letters came up, I would hit a “t” on the virtual keyboard and an “r” would register on the screen. I had to ‘realign’ on a daily basis.
I finally accepted one of Verizon’s offers. My new Blackberry does all the things my old smart phone did, only faster and without prompting. I don’t turn on my computer many days because email comes to the Blackberry. I can get CNN news, the weather, and Google anything, anywhere, anytime. It reminds me to take my medications and to take out the garbage. I can download audio books from the library or listen to music from any number of sources and, it’s a great calculator.
Technology has come a long way. As evidence, when used as a phone, the Blackberry feels like a much smaller brick than the old PDA did. Oh well, you can’t have everything.
Comments? Changinglanesterry@gmail.com or
http://changinglanesterry.blogspot.com/
There was a time I kept every phone number of acquaintances, my employers and most addresses I considered necessary, in my head. I could also remember the list of a half dozen items I needed to get when I walked the aisles of my local super market. Back then, if I ambled to the living room from the kitchen with a purpose, I could recall what that purpose was. Now I wait for it to come to me or walk back empty handed. Somewhere along the line, my brain has turned to oatmeal.
Several years ago, I purchased a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) smart-phone. A long time before that, it had been cutting-edge technology, ridiculously overpriced. After years of production, (read ‘after it became much cheaper’) I bought one.
The smart-phone performed a plethora of important functions. It stored my appointments, my calendar, and address book. It contained my ‘to-do’ and grocery lists. Once a week I attached it to my computer with a cable and ‘synced’ all of the above. If I changed or added something on either the PDA or the computer, the two would talk it over during ‘sync-time’ and exchange the information. It even was a good calculator.
I loved the touch screen at first, but became less fond of that later. The PDA did many things wonderfully, but it wasn’t a good cell phone. It was a step backward in that area. When talking to someone, it felt as though I was holding a brick to the side of my head. Not a regular brick either. It was more like one of those heavy, dense Olean paving bricks. Some part of my face would hit the touch screen and end the call early or start a conference call, or play loud music. During the call, my ear would sometimes touch the screen in an inappropriate place and it would activate an unwanted application.
The volume settings were unruly, refusing to adjust the way I wanted. It would inexplicably convert to speakerphone between calls. After leaving scar tissue on my eardrums a few times, I knew to answer the phone carefully.
My two-year contract with Verizon wireless ended a year or so ago. Because I didn’t attempt to sign up for another service contract or get a new phone, Verizon began pestering me, sending me special “deals”, almost on a weekly basis. The longer I did not sign, the phones offered for “free”, got better and more elaborate. Competition in the wireless market is fierce and I was one guppy they didn’t want to lose. Verizon seemed frantic to win me back.
Following my brain’s example, my PDA smart-phones’ thinking became cloudy. When I entered information on the touch-screen, the wrong numbers and letters came up, I would hit a “t” on the virtual keyboard and an “r” would register on the screen. I had to ‘realign’ on a daily basis.
I finally accepted one of Verizon’s offers. My new Blackberry does all the things my old smart phone did, only faster and without prompting. I don’t turn on my computer many days because email comes to the Blackberry. I can get CNN news, the weather, and Google anything, anywhere, anytime. It reminds me to take my medications and to take out the garbage. I can download audio books from the library or listen to music from any number of sources and, it’s a great calculator.
Technology has come a long way. As evidence, when used as a phone, the Blackberry feels like a much smaller brick than the old PDA did. Oh well, you can’t have everything.
Comments? Changinglanesterry@gmail.com or
http://changinglanesterry.blogspot.com/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
