SeEthernet Connection

2012 is a pretty technologically advanced era. We may not be where the Back to the Future movies predicted we’d be…but we’re still doing pretty well for ourselves. The fact that I can pay for actual tangible stuff in a store using my phone blows my mind. And just think of how far websites have come in less than a decade. (This 1 page blog that doesn’t stray from the most standard template offered is a really bad example, of course, but you know what I mean.)

Despite how far we’ve come in recent years, there are still some things that I can’t help but think should be way better given all the other technology we have around us.

Cars can do so much unnecessary crap these days. I really don’t need a cooler in my center console. I also don’t need to seat 17 passengers. But, I would like to not have to stand at the gas pump for 5 full minutes, staring off into space like an idiot, trying not to make eye contact with the person on the other side of the pump. You’re not supposed to use your cell phone (is that a myth?), the pump is germ-infested, and I only ever seem to need gas in extremely inclement weather. And as a rule of thumb, for 2012, I don’t think I should ever be doing something that Norman Rockwell painted people doing.

Since Hurricane Sandy is fresh in my mind, I’ll move on to power outages. It is 2012. Why does a gust of wind still bring us back to 1879? (I just had to Google when electricity was invented.) It’s such a far leap! Normal, non-professional people can set up 10-minute long, elaborate light shows at Christmastime synced to music from the Trans-Siberian Orchestra with flashing, colored LED lights, but we can’t get experts to figure out how to maintain electricity when it’s windy outside?

Ok, I’ll lay off electricians and move onto…cablicians...cable companies. Look, I know I’m not the first person to ever complain about a cable company, so I’ll spare you the spiel that I really want to dive into, and I’ll keep it simple. Comcast, why the hell do you come to my apartment to install internet and act as if there is any chance in the world that all I want is an Ethernet connection? You know that’s not what I want. I repeat what I said above…it is 2012. It is literally an insult to my entire being that you even pretend that I’m going to sit in my room with my way-too-expensive, don’t-know-80%-of-what-it-does, beautiful, light-weight MacBook Pro, rooted down by some giant blue Ethernet cord. And then when I say, “Oh I actually want wireless internet…” you A.) Act surprised. And B.) Need to go all the way back to your truck to get a WHOLE new set of equipment. “Woah woah woah, m’am…that’s going to take another 3 hours and it will be an $80 service fee…I’ll be back in 20 minutes, I need to go get my magic kit.” Please stop pretending that your company just invented wireless internet 20 minutes ago in a magic laboratory and you need unicorns and leprechauns to deliver it directly to my apartment. Panera doesn’t even know how to put 2 pieces of bread on top of one-another and even they have wireless internet.

I’m typically not one that demands that everything be instant. I don’t need my phone to talk to me. I don’t need my car to parallel park for me (although I actually probably do). But if I’m going to be offered all of those ridiculous features, and still have to stand at a gas pump, or sit around in a pitch-black house, or wait for the Comcast Wizards to grant me wireless internet in exchange for my first-born child, don’t expect me to not complain about it!


“I'm sure that in 1985, plutonium is available in every corner drugstore, but in 1955, it's a little hard to come by!”
-Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd), Back to the Future