COLUMN: Log on and live
As predicted by Bill Gates and all the other cyber-intellectuals, the Internet really has brought us closer together. This is not a good thing because it has only confirmed Billy Graham and other evangelists-intellectuals’ fears that we really are a twisted lot in need of another good flood.
I know that the Internet is important because spell checker on the Bill Gates’ generated program I am using to write this demands that the “Internet” be capitalized even though it allows “god” to remain lowercase.
What I like about the Internet is that it is a very personal medium. Everybody out there is looking out for my health, happiness and well-being. People who hardly know me are constantly sending me limited time offers to make me look younger and to increase or decrease the size of this and that. People who have never met me are willing to have sex with me or at the very least let me watch them do all manner of unclothed gymnastic activities.
People will lend me money, refinance my house, deposit my money in foreign banks all with nary a background check. And, if I give them my credit card number – whoa! I can’t begin to describe what they will do.
For instance, this recently arrived in my personal inbox:
As seen on NBC, CBS, CNN and Oprah!, Human Growth Hormone (HGH), the health discovery, actually reverses aging while burning fat, without dieting or exercise! This proven discovery has been reported on by the New England Journal of Medicine. Forget aging and dieting forever! And it’s guaranteed! Look 10 Years Younger in three weeks.
I’m glad to see Oprah holds the same status as the New England Journal of Medicine and, if I read this correctly, I can forget aging forever and thus become immortal.
That part must be a misprint.
I was wondering, though, if I tripled the dosage, could I actually go back in time. OK, that would be silly, you can’t be younger than zero except in some religions that I don’t ascribe to. However, I was thinking of what fun it would be if I could look like I was 5 years old again and still have 46 years worth of size and experience. I could kick a– academically in grade school the second time around, plus at 5’11” I could put some serious hurt on the little league baseball and basketball records. They wouldn’t have to know I was going to be 5’11” forever.
Of course, the down side would be I would have to surrender my driver’s license and not be able to vote or buy a drink.
The other diet supplement offer I got sent sites a little lower guaranteeing only that I could “have the body of a 20-year-old.” Although I have often wanted the body of a 20-year-old, decorum and federal statutes have kept me from acting on this impulse.
Thank you Bill Gates for bringing us closer together. Can you turn it off now?
Dennis Hinkamp’s column appears every Friday in The Statesman. Comments can be sent to him at slightlyoffcenter @attbi.com