Topic: Satire
THE REMOTE AKA THE COCKPIT This attitude came from listening to Andy Rooney for so long. He could pull it off very well. The attitude comes with achieving a contented old age.by Mavis Mathews
(conservative libertarian)
Saturday, August 16, 2008
THE REMOTE AKA THE COCKPIT
Mavis Mathews
After struggling with a new DVD player for about a year now, I have replaced it with an older playera combination VCR/DVD player. I was determined to regain some control when watching movies on my own television set.
The new machine was on sale which probably means that combination machines are becoming a thing of the past already. A VCR player allows the viewer to easily pause, back up the tape and replay something you missed. You can do this in the dark. You just push the rewind button for a second or two and then let it go, and there you are, getting a second change to hear what you missed the first time.
My other DVD player with remote controls as complicated as a Boeing 747 cockpit was driving me up the wall. I don't think that "so you don't have to rewind" was a very good reason for disposing of our perfectly good VCR collections to invest a fortune in outlandishly priced DVD's. I don't think that's any reason at all. To push a "rewind" button and wait a minute or two was perfectly OK with me. Rarely do I not have a minute or two.
Why did we need DVD's in the first place? Digital music is so exquisitely mechanized that there's a shrill, other-worldly, whistling sound that sets my teeth on edge. I think what we are doing is settling for less and calling it progress. Settling for inferior quality in favor of speed and more quantity is happening all around us. Is it the competitive spirit that has made saving a minute or two so paramount in a human life? Is time actually going by faster? Or have we simply lost out taste for good taste?
DVD's are only one of many things that we're "settling for" in the twenty-first century, in spite of their inferior quality. How about genetically altered foods? Fast foods? Cell phones? Microsoft Word? The junk at Walmart? Getting away with murder? The drug epidemic that's legal if you have a prescription? Politicians trampling on our constitution? Money becoming God?
Oh, yeah, I forgot. I'm old and out of touch. Maybe only those of my generation will remember how to look for and appreciate quality--and you can't miss what you've never had.
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The views expressed in this
article are those of Mavis Mathews only and do not represent
the views of Nolan Chart, LLC or its affiliates. Mavis Mathews is
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