Signs That Technology Has Taken Over Your Life

You have never sat through an entire movie without having at least one device on your body beep or buzz.

You think of the gadgets in your office as “friends,” but you forget to send your father a birthday card.

When you go into a computer store, you eavesdrop on a salesperson talking with customers — and you butt in to correct him and spend the next twenty minutes answering the customers’ questions, while the salesperson stands by silently, nodding his head.

You use the phrase “digital compression” in a conversation without thinking how strange your mouth feels when you say it.

You constantly find yourself in groups of people to whom you say the phrase “digital compression.” Everyone understands what you mean, and you are not surprised or disappointed that you don’t have to explain it.

You know Will Wheaton’s e-mail address, but you have to look up your own social security number.

You stop saying “phone number” and replace it with “voice number,” since we all know the majority of phone lines in any house are plugged into contraptions that talk to other contraptions.

You sign Christmas cards by putting :-) next to your signature.

Off the top of your head, you can think of nineteen keystroke symbols that are far more clever than :-)

You back up your data every day.

Your wife asks you to pick up some minipads for her at the store and you return with a rest for your mouse.

You think jokes about being unable to program a VCR are stupid.

On vacation, you are reading a computer manual and turning the pages faster than everyone else who is reading John Grisham novels.

The thought that CD could refer to investment finance or music rarely enters your mind.

You are able to argue persuasively that Ross Perot’s phrase “electronic town hall” makes more sense than the term “information superhighway,” but you don’t because, after all, the man still uses hand-drawn pie charts.

You go to computer trade shows and map out your path of the exhibit hall in advance. However, you cannot give someone directions to your house without looking up the street names in Yahoo! Maps.

You would rather get more dots per inch than miles per gallon.

You know without a doubt that disks come in five-and-a-quarter and three-and-a-half inch sizes.

Al Gore strikes you as “intriguing.”

You own a set of itty-bitty screwdrivers and you actually know where they are.

While contemporaries swap stories about their recent hernia surgeries, you compare mouse-induced index-finger strain with a nine-year-old.

You are so knowledgeable about technology that you feel secure enough to say “I don’t know” when someone asks you a technology question instead of feeling compelled to make something up.

You have a functioning home copier machine, but every toaster you own turns bread into charcoal.

You have ended friendships because of irreconcilably different opinions about which is better: the track ball or the track pad.

You email this to more-than-half of your friends. You’d never get around to showing it to them in person or reading it to them on the phone. In fact, you have probably never met most of these people face-to-face.

Things You Don’t Want To Hear From Technical Support

“Do you have a sledgehammer or a brick handy?”
“Hey, have you ever seen McGuyver?”
“So… what are you wearing?”
“Duuuuuude! Bummer!”
“Looks like you’re gonna need some new dilithium crystals, Cap’n.”
“Press 1 for Support. Press 2 if you’re with 60 Minutes. Press 3 if you’re with the FTC.”
“We can fix this, but you’re gonna need a butter knife, a roll of duct tape, and a car battery.”
“In layman’s terms, we call that the Hindenburg Effect.”
“Hold on a second… Mom! Timmy’s hitting me!”
“Okay, turn to page 523 in your copy of Dianetics.”
“Please hold for Mr. Gates’ attorney.”