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Some of the greatest advances of the last century have been in the arena of personal computers. So much can be done now and so much of what you need can be bought at Best Buy or even Walmart for a fistful of dollars. You can easily go broke buying relatively inexpensive computer upgrades. And you can easily go insane installing them and trying to make them work hitch-free.

A tech savvy friend of mine spent seven hours this last week installing a new mic so that he could speak online. Nevermind that he could already do this – he had a workable mic – but since he speaks via internet for a living he thought it would be a good idea to have a better one. Though he was able to plug the mic in and immediately use it, as advertised, it warbled like bird in springtime. I congratulated him on eventually getting this fixed, to which he just sighed and said he’d gone back to the old mic.

This may be a PC issue. My Mac lovin’ friends say their computers just don’t have these troubles. But I was raised by a father who loved me pretty darned unconditionally. He worked in a government think tank and he built PCs. In my house, us kids knew it didn’t matter at all if you were gay. If you were a serial killer, you’d have to serve your time, but Dad would still love you. But if you brought home a Mac, things would get seriously dicey on the home front. So I never dared. Dad has since come around to Macs – not that he actually owns any. My sister – far braver than I – married a Mac-Man and even recently bought one. This means she now has a Mac and a PC and has to work on both simultaneously a lot of the time, so I’m not sure what this has saved her.

Keep in mind, too, that this sister and brother-in-law also both work from home and on their computers all day. Sometimes I don’t think they venture into the outer world at all (even the dogs have their own door and don’t require the humans to set foot outside). The two of them are capable of living without other human contact to the extent that some days I’m afraid they are vampires avoiding sunlight. I have become concerned that I’ll go over to their house one day to visit and I’ll pull back a curtain only to have the two of them throw up their hands and scream “The light! The light! It burns!”

Another thing keeping me from crossing over into MacWorld is a fantastic video clip online from “the Onion” about the ‘Macbook Wheel’ and the ridiculous glory of a laptop with only one big button. What could be easier? So, though my family members have come around, you won’t see me running out and buying a Mac anytime soon.

I have a hard time believing that there’s one kind of computer that doesn’t need the ‘pray’ step after plug and play. My Blackberry has some of the funniest issues. Well, they are funny now. They were a lot less funny when I just wanted to order some pizza and I couldn’t use the phone. I was contemplating throwing the thing against the wall and claiming the insurance.

Yes, my Blackberry, second cousin to the Apple iPhone, has no actual numbers, just a touch screen. So when I wanted pizza, it wasn’t just that it wouldn’t work, it actually gave me no numbers. A phone with no numbers is the most pointless thing in the universe! But no worries! Three phone calls, an hour of hold time and two downloads later and it was working peachy again. Nevermind that I wasn’t. By then I was grateful, but in sorry need of a tranquilizer and a long nap.

Another friend of mine said our generation is finally starting to look around and ask the big question, “Where are our flying cars?” and he’s totally right. Where are they? We are also shy some personal jet packs and truly recyclable packaging.

We may step back and say, well at least we have hand held TVs and phones in our pockets. If you’ve watched an old eighties TV show lately, you too can be appalled at the monstrous “cordless phones” the rich were sporting. Remember when they came in their own briefcases and cost far more per month than most of us are paying now? Remember the car phone that was actually wired into your car and required a crazy antenna on the back that made it impossible to use most parking structures? As much as we may revel in the new and be excited about the technological advances, at least those suckers worked!

Instead I find myself with a new religion. I have a medallion around my neck of Saint Hal, patron saint of downloads. On full moons I take my laptop out to the tree stump in the woods. By the combined glow of a celestial orb and the blue welcome screen, I dance three circles counterclockwise and ask for a good month. I leave an old hard drive as token to the gods.

I have to go. It’s 2pm. Time to face silicon valley and hit my knees. I will be thankful for all my working programs and say fifteen, “Please, God, let it work”s.

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