COLUMN: Want more time? Fake call waiting
I saw a guy driving down the highway the other day talking on his cell phone, drinking a cup of coffee and eating a doughnut all at the same time. I have no idea how he was steering.
Ever notice on those morning traffic reports usually just say, “There’s an accident that’ll cause about a 20-minute delay …” Nevermind that somebody was crushed, mangled or burned to death. It’s that 20 minute delay we need to know about.
Did you ever buy a time-saving device that actually did save time? I have at least a half dozen such devices in my home that drive me absolutely crazy when they don’t work. The time it took me to learn to program TiVO is just about equal to the amount of time I’ve actually used it. I have a food processor that does a speedy job of making slaw, but I usually end up clogging the drain with all the leftover mess from cleaning it up.
When was the last time you had a conversation with anyone that ended when you both had talked enough? It usually ends with I gotta go do (blank) or I’ve got another appointment, the chicken is burning in the oven, my favorite show is on, the kids are probably burning down the house by now … or the dreaded call waiting. It’s the electronic version of “buzz off.”
We have so little time for conversation that they actually sell a device that simulates the sound of call waiting on your phone so you can use it as an excuse to get off.
The shortest recorded time segment recognized by the Guiness Book of World Records is that instant between “How are you?” and “That’s good. See ya later.” If you really want to see people leave skid marks, all you need to do is really tell them how you feel. You can actually get people to jaywalk across a busy street at rush hour when they see you coming by telling them you have marital/relationship problems.
Nobody has time to talk. That’s why the therapy industry can thrive even though they charge upwards of $60 an hour to talk.
It’s getting a little creepy out there when dating services are advertised as time saving services. “Yes, avoid all that tedious dating and just cut to the chase. Why not really cut to the chase and just get divorced before you get married. Maybe if people could simulate a nasty divorce, they’d be more cautious about getting married in the first place.
I read a computer advertisement that boasts how much faster it is than the cheaper generic models. Its memory has an access time of 19 milliseconds instead of the tortoise-like 26 milliseconds those cheap, wood-burning computers take. Gee, think of all the extra work I can get done with those extra seven millionths of a second. Maybe I’ll have time to eat a doughnut at home instead of in my car.
Didn’t I read somewhere that in the near future we would be burdened with too much leisure time?
I was looking forward to that George Jetson existence where I could fly to work and talk to my microwave oven. By now I’d have thought they’d at least have invented a lawn grass that required as little care as dandelions and stopped growing at 1.5 inches.
Where’s the leisure they promised us when we were watching those ’60s science class movies? I want aluminum cans that biodegrade at least as fast as a ’72 Vega.
Waste some time today; slouch, ramble, dawdle – whatever it takes to slow down.
Dennis Hinkamp’s column appears every Friday. Comments can be sent to dhinkamp@msn.com.