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30 Signs Technology Has Taken Over Your Life

Posted on 10/10/2002 6:38:23 PM PDT by Liz

1. Your stationery is more cluttered than Warren Beatty's address book. The letterhead lists a fax number, e-mail addresses for two on-line services, and your Internet address, which spreads across the breadth of the letterhead and continues to the back. In essence, you have conceded that the first page of any letter you write *is* letterhead.

2. You have never sat through an entire movie without having at least one device on your body beep or buzz.

3. You need to fill out a form that must be typewritten, but you can't becuse there isn't one typewriter in your house -- only computers with laser printers.

You think of the gadgets in your office as "friends," but you forget to send your father a birthday card.

5. You disdain people who use low baud rates. (lowlifes!)

6. When you go into a computer store, you eavesdrop on a salesperson talking with customers -- and you butt in to correct him and spend the next twenty minutes answering the customers' questions, while the salesperson stands by silently, nodding his head.

7. You use "digital compression" in conversations without thinking how strange your mouth feels when you say it.

8. You constantly find yourself in groups of people to whom you say the phrase "digital compression." Everyone understands what you mean, and you are not surprised or disappointed that you don't have to explain it.

9. You know Bill Gates' e-mail address, but you have to look up your own social security number.

10. You stop saying "phone number" and replace it with "voice number," since we all know the majority of phone lines in any house are plugged into contraptions that talk to other contraptions.

11. You sign Christmas cards by putting :-) next to your signature.

12. Off the top of your head, you can think of nineteen keystroke symbols that are far more clever than :-)

13. You back up your data every day.

14. Your wife asks you to pick up some minipads for her at the store and you return with a rest for your mouse.

15. You think jokes about being unable to program a VCR are stupid.

16. On vacation, you are reading a computer manual and turning the pages faster than everyone else who is reading John Grisham novels.

17. The thought that a CD could refer to finance or music rarely enters your mind.

18. You are able to argue persuasively the Ross Perot's phrase "electronic town hall" makes more sense than the term "information superhighway," but you don't because, after all, the man still uses hand-drawn pie charts. (hahahaha)

19. You go to computer trade shows and map out your path of the exhibit hall in advance. But you cannot give someone directions to your house without looking up the street names.

20. You would rather get more dots per inch than miles per gallon.

21. You become upset when a person calls you on the phone to sell you something, but you think it's okay for a computer to call and demand that you start pushing buttons on your telephone to receive more information about the product it is selling.

22. You know without a doubt that disks come in five-and-a- quarter-and three-and-a-half-inch sizes.

23. Al Gore strikes you as an "intriguing" fellow.

24. You own a set of itty-bitty screw-drivers and you actually know where they are.

25. While contemporaries swap stories about their recent hernia surgeries, you compare mouse-induced index-finger strain with a nine year-old.

26. You are so knowledgeable about technology that you feel secure enough to say "I don't know" when someone asks you a technology question instead of feeling compelled to make something up.

27. You rotate your screen savers more frequently than your automobile tires.

28. You have a functioning home copier machine, but every toaster you own turns bread into charcoal.

29. You have ended friendships because of irreconcilably different opinions about which is better -- the track ball or the track *pad*.

30. You understand all the jokes in this message.

If so, technology has taken over your life. For your own good, go lie under a tree and write a haiku. And don't use a laptop.


TOPICS: Announcements; Free Republic; Political Humor/Cartoons
KEYWORDS:

1 posted on 10/10/2002 6:38:23 PM PDT by Liz
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To: Liz
I think I got them all but this one. Yeah, a CD could have finance software (e.g. Quicken) on it, or music. So ??
2 posted on 10/10/2002 6:43:43 PM PDT by ThePythonicCow
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To: ThePythonicCow
Certificate of Deposit
3 posted on 10/10/2002 6:47:13 PM PDT by Looking for Diogenes
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To: Liz
1. Your stationery is more cluttered than Warren Beatty's address book. The letterhead lists a fax number, e-mail addresses for two on-line services, and your Internet address, which spreads across the breadth of the letterhead and continues to the back. In essence, you have conceded that the first page of any letter you write *is* letterhead.

What stationary? Who still sends personal correspondence by snail mail?

4 posted on 10/10/2002 6:48:25 PM PDT by Paleo Conservative
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To: ThePythonicCow
Certificate of Deposit The original CD

You own a set of itty-bitty screw-drivers and you actually know where they are.

guilty! ~grin

a.cricket

5 posted on 10/10/2002 6:48:39 PM PDT by another cricket
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To: Liz
23. Al Gore strikes you as an "intriguing" fellow.

Will never happen, my friend.

6 posted on 10/10/2002 7:04:40 PM PDT by martin_fierro
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To: Liz
Instead of laughing at a joke, you answer "LOL"

(and boy did I get strange look from my mom.)
7 posted on 10/10/2002 8:30:08 PM PDT by lizma
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To: lizma
How about, you live in a small studio apartment with one room and five different remotes... and will spend 10 minutes searching under dirty clothes trying to find the right remote rather than walk 5 feet and push an actual button on any given device.
8 posted on 10/10/2002 9:30:24 PM PDT by Ronin
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To: Liz
6. When you go into a computer store, you eavesdrop on a salesperson talking with customers -- and you butt in to correct him and spend the next twenty minutes answering the customers' questions, while the salesperson stands by silently, nodding his head.

Guilty as charged

9 posted on 10/11/2002 3:27:36 PM PDT by rb22982
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To: rb22982
If so, technology has taken over your life. For your own good, go lie under a tree and write a haiku. And don't use a laptop.

Yeah, okay, I could compose a haiku, but pen and paper? Word processing was invented by men, for men, because we have such atrocious handwriting.

10 posted on 10/11/2002 9:17:42 PM PDT by stylin_geek
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To: rb22982
Been there, done that.
11 posted on 10/11/2002 10:16:32 PM PDT by Liz
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To: Liz
Hi Liz,

Even after 32 years, every Friday night is date night for me and my honey. One summer night after dinner we were walking out on the pier in Santa Cruz watching the moon rise over the ocean. After standing there holding each other in silence for a few minutes I turned to her and said: "You know honey, if we did a Fourier analysis of the time and position of those speckles of moon light reflecting off the water the results would astound you". She looked at me as if I were a complete idiot, shook her head and walked back to the car. Didn't talk to me all the way home. I guess some woman are just not very romantic.

Regards,

Boot Hill

12 posted on 10/12/2002 12:32:19 AM PDT by Boot Hill
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To: Boot Hill
Even after 32 years, every Friday night is date night for me and my honey. One summer night after dinner we were walking out on the pier in Santa Cruz watching the moon rise over the ocean. After standing there holding each other in silence for a few minutes I turned to her and said: "You know honey, if we did a Fourier analysis of the time and position of those speckles of moon light reflecting off the water the results would astound you". She looked at me as if I were a complete idiot, shook her head and walked back to the car. Didn't talk to me all the way home. I guess some woman are just not very romantic.

Regards,

Boot Hill

==================================

LOL, yeah, well...us women are funny like that, I guess.

13 posted on 10/12/2002 7:27:53 AM PDT by yankeedame
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To: Boot Hill
OK, you either went to school at Caltech or Harvey Mudd.
Nerds rule!
14 posted on 10/12/2002 3:57:25 PM PDT by Knute
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To: Liz
. You go to computer trade shows and map out your path of the exhibit hall in advance. But you cannot give someone directions to your house without looking up the street names.

All too true...however I usually refer incoming guests to Mapquest. That way I usually have at least another hour to prepare for their visit.

15 posted on 10/12/2002 9:21:28 PM PDT by Focault's Pendulum
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To: Focault's Pendulum
Heheheh. Good one.
16 posted on 10/13/2002 5:02:13 AM PDT by Liz
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To: martin_fierro
23. Al Gore strikes you as an "intriguing" fellow.

I always had a feeling that Al as techno-dude was just another of the fake Al personas. I always wondered if he could really use the Palm and Blackberries he hauled around, or if they were just more non-earthtone props.

17 posted on 10/13/2002 5:27:17 AM PDT by TC Rider
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To: Liz
>>22. You know without a doubt that disks come in five-and-a- quarter-and three-and-a-half-inch sizes.<<

Not any more, they don't. Nobody with a real computer uses 5.25 floppies.
18 posted on 10/13/2002 10:58:55 AM PDT by CobaltBlue
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To: Liz
15. You think jokes about being unable to program a VCR are stupid.

Or: You think lists about how you feel about technology are stupid.

Nothing personal Liz, but this list is clearly several years old. The 5 1/4" disk wasn't the only givaway.

19 posted on 10/13/2002 11:09:44 AM PDT by Semper911
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To: Ronin
How about, you live in a small studio apartment with one room and five different remotes... and will spend 10 minutes searching under dirty clothes trying to find the right remote rather than walk 5 feet and push an actual button on any given device.

I stopped watching TV completely when I lost the remote control.

20 posted on 10/13/2002 11:19:32 AM PDT by muggs
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