Gen Net

Techonology is wonderful. Being a part of the first generation to grow up with the Internet means I have the world at my fingertips. Google, Amazon, IMDb, Retrosheet, Wikipedia, I can find any inforamtion I desire on any subject in just a few mouse clicks. It's an On Demand society.

Generation Net (my own definition of anyone born after 1980) can watch any television show they desire at any time thanks to TiVo. With cell phones we can be in contast contact. Blogs, such as this one, allows us to self publish our opinions. iTunes gives us any song for $.99. Stupid yet entertaining videos can be watched at YouTube. The list goes on and on.

Take away our technology and we feel naked. Spend a few days away from a computer and it is as if life is passing us by at 100 miles an hour. Frustration sets in if we can't use our cell phones because of a dead zone. What do you mean I have to use cash and not swipe my debit/credit card?

A downside to living in a foothill community is that often technology is slow to arrive. If visiting Sonora, don't even think about using a cell unless you have Cingular. Believe it or not only half of the county has access to DSL.

I live within the city limits of the county seat and I was offered high speed internet just this week! Being forced to use dial up led to many upset sessions of web surfing over the past two years. I could not browse certain websites at home because my connection would time out before the site would load.

As technology becomes more intregrated with our lives we become more demanding. Sometimes I wonder if I could ever live 200, 300, 400 years in the past. But then my phone will beep with an incoming text message and I will quickly move on to my next technological dependent task.

More Random Thoughts

I can only hope that this rumor is true (link via Dodger Thoughts). Even though I will not order Showtime just for Arrested Development the thought of new episodes being created gets me excited.

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It continues to snow as I write this post. I will spare you the pictures but just imagine another foot of snow on top of the few inches from my previous posts.

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Once a month I have to go to Sacramento for meetings. The meetings are designed as a place for the 58 counties to get together and discuss any hot topics. They are very informative and a great chance to network with my counter parts in other counties.

It never ceases to amaze me the lack of respect that people have when it comes to cell phones. Every single meeting there are at least five different times that cell phones go off. What aggravates me even more is when the person decides to answer the phone but refuses to leave the crowded room, letting 50-75 people hear their conversation. I can forgive you if you forgot to turn your cell phone on silent but to think that your call is more important than this meeting is just disrespectful to everyone in the room.

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You can easily read anywhere on the internet that Saturday Night Live has lost its edge and is no longer funny but I really enjoyed the Sports Guy's take (about a quarter of the way down the page, or to be more exact the ninth question and answer) on the "Lazy Sunday" video.

Also, here is a good interview of the four new cast members.

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For those of you who have Hotmail, let me recommend that you sign up for Windows Live Mail. Let me warn you it is in beta so there are some random glitches but it is still a lot better than the regular Hotmail. It looks and responds a lot like Outlook which is a huge plus. My favorite upgrade is the viewing pane. This allows you to see the email without having to wait for another page to load. And since it is in beta you are given a chance to let Microsoft know what is and is not working.

Random Thoughts

Here are some miscellaneous thoughts for Wednesday:

Yesterday, I spent some time cleaning my desk at work. My keyboard was getting a little to grimey for my liking so I set out to clean it with canned air, a rag, and rubbing alcohol. In the middle of my scrubbing I kept thinking about that one scene in Gattaca where Ethan Hawke has to do that to his computer every day.

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Why is the thing that holds all of your movies at Netflix and Blockbuster.com spelled so funny? It sounds like a consonant but spelled with four vowels. I hate the English language.

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My protest of ESPN.com is now going on 7 months. The reason for the protest is because they have increased the number of articles that are behind the Insider subscription curtain. One of my favorite baseball writers, Rob Neyer, was the first to go. Then they started placing old Sports Guy's articles behind the curtain. The final straw was when they put Peter Gammons as an Insider. I find it difficult to pay for some information that I read for free one day (Sports Guy) or rumors that can be found elsewhere (Gammons). I also see Insider as a veiled attempt to sell the crappy ESPN the Mag.

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I recently bought a 1 lb. bag of Starbursts that had an amazing amount of reds in it. Unfortunately, pinks were at slim pickings. Somehow the ratio of reds and pinks got messed up. Why couldn't that have happened with the yellow? A public poll would find that yellow Starbursts are the least favorite.

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I am not a big fan of Joel Stein but here is a great opinion article about Grand Theft Auto and the hypocrisy of the recent bad press that Rockstar has received.

I believe that all the heat given to the GTA series from the media and politicians is proof of the ever growing generational gap. As the Nintendo generation has grown up so has the content of games. The generations above me still see video games as a corrupting waste of time. I think my great grandma summed it up best when she said, "Kids these days have big thumbs and small brains." Of course she has no idea of games like this.

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Every time that I go to my parents' house I am always surprised at the amount of growth to Shafter and Bakersfield. This article actually shows some long-term hope for the Central Valley. If Bakersfield, Fresno, etc are considered "Third California" then that must put Sonora as "Fourth California".