Thanks, Shell, for prodding me (ew) to “announce” that—as you know if you know my blog—I’ve changed its look. I did this because, as much as I liked the other blog template, I was always dissatisfied with the physical look of its print on the screen: it was, to my eyes, too small and light. I like this bigger, darker, more newpapery font; I find it easier on the eyes. It looks more like print.

I also like the way it basically presents the last three blogs at once. That’s good for me, because I tend to run fairly radically different sorts of posts: I just ran a poem, fer cryinoutloud. So it’s good for me to be able to readily show new visitors that I have stability issues.

Anyway, if you’re inclined, lemme know what you think of this new look. I’ll pretend I care. (KIDDING!)

Just a quick note to my dedicated eight readers to let them know that as of late my Posting Mojo has been seriously compromised by the fact that, as it turns out, AT&T, my Internet Service Provider, has moved on, relative to networking hardware, past the modem they sent me when I first signed up with them, twelve years ago. It seems they can no longer support my trusty, ancient modem.

The result, alas, is that for two days now I’ve been truly  wireless.

I bought a fresh new modem today (the 2Wire 2701 HG-B, for $100 but who’s counting), which tomorrow I will attempt to make do my bidding. 

See? Did you think I was kidding when I said this would be the most boring post ever?

You guys know me. I never lie.

Thank you, as ever, for your patience and goodwill.

click once to enlarge. the device is about 16 tall x 16 inches wide x 7 in. deep

Related post (about another thing the purpose of which I couldn’t figure out): Anyone Know What This Thing Is?

As of today, it is illegal in California to drive while talking on your cell phone — unless you are talking on your phone via a hands-free device. This, when every study in the universe shows that people who are simultaneously driving and talking on their cell phones — hands-free or not — are exactly as dangerous as people who are driving drunk.

People can drive just fine with one hand. What they can’t do just fine is drive and talk on the phone at the same time. Everyone thinks they’re great at simultaneously driving and talking on the phone, but they’re wrong. Everyone’s terrible  at it. Our brains aren’t (yet?) wired to be any good at all at simultaneously driving, talking, listening, and responding.

Hence the difficult conclusion to avoid, which is that the only  thing this new California law does is dramatically boost the sales of Bluetooth-enabled hands-free cellphone devices.

This is just a wild guess, but I’m scoring it like this: Cell Phone Lobbyists: 1.  Sanity: 0.

Related post: I’m Green Like Kermit.

I just noticed that automatically attached to the bottom of every Yahoo email I get or send is this lovely message: “You rock. That’s why Blockbuster’s offering you one month of Blockbuster Total Access, No Cost.” With “one month of Blockbuster Total Access” being a link, of course.

Apparently, from now on, whenever I email someone, I’ll also be sending them an ad for Blockbuster Total Access.

I swear, every day becoming one of those guys with a shotgun who lives in a shack way out in the woods somewhere becomes an increasingly attractive lifestyle choice. 

As a person with no life who works at home and also doesn’t have a televison, I spend an inordinate amount of time online. And I have noticed that tops among internet topics is the iPhone. I don’t have an iPhone. I don’t want an iPhone. I know if I got one I’d never figure out how to use it — and it would embarrass me how rarely I’d have occasion to take advantage of its capabilities. No one ever calls me. Like, ever.

On the other hand, I am a complete e-mail freak. I check my email about 4,000 an hour. And I’m definitely keen on owning a phone-camera combo. I’m so techno-Amish that I’m still using the cell phone that ten years ago came free with my service contract. That thing couldn’t take a picture if you strapped it to a Leica.

Now that I think about it, I think my real problem with buying an iPhone (beyond the price, of course) is that I have issues with Apple-chic. Whenever I go into the vast, gleaming Apple store near our home, I feel like I’ve entered some kind of Geek Revenge Zone. It’s so self-consciously hip, it’s trying so hard to be Cooler Than You, that to me it just feels alienatingly vacuous. That whole “Welcome to the Future!” nonsense that corporations do in hopes of generating a “I must catch up!”  response in people drives me crazy. It’s so transparently manipulative, so aggressively nonchalant. And, of course, it invariably fails. “Corporate Execution” and “Look How Cool the Future Is!” go together like “Vote for Me!” and “I’ll never sell out!”

Maybe I’m just getting cranky. I am, after all, turning 50 this month: the classic crank age. I know growing older doesn’t help with the whole “Let’s Buy the Latest Techno-Innovation!” I’m still bitter about having to lose my VHS tapes. And my awesome collection of cassette tapes. And my amazing collection of LP’s. And all my 8-track tapes.

Okay, I never had any 8-track tapes. Even I could see those clunkers were on the short road to obscurity.

I think iPhones are mostly yet another way for people to avoid Actual Thinking. But now that I think about it, what has thinking really ever done for anyone? Besides, maybe, if at any moment, anywhere I am, I could receive an e-mail, listen to a song, surf the web, or snap a photo of something, I would finally have that rich, fulfilling life I’ve been meaning to acquire for … I don’t know … fifty years.