Relative Something

I do not have a smart phone. I have an antique, by today’s cell phone standards. It’s a couple of years old. I admit I am straggling in the slow lane of the cell phone superhighway. There are people in this country who have never even had one cell phone. I’ve had two. Three, if I count the replacement for the one that was lost when a thief stole my briefcase.

I’m pretty sure that kids today would consider it unthinkable to live without a cell phone. That shouldn’t be a surprise. They have grown up with cell phones. Their parents can remember when such a device was the science fiction of television’s Star Trek. It is a lot easier to live without a cell phone when you have already lived the most impressionable years of your life without one.

I wonder how quickly today’s kids, after they’ve grown past middle age, will adapt to the personal, hand-held ion-neutralizing scanning photon nebulizer anti-radiation healing beam devices with built-in satellite repositioning capabilities that will be all the rage. I’m sure they will have, long before that, stepped up to have their communication devices implanted inside their heads for the truly hands-free texting telepathy that will have become commonplace.

Have you seen the Lance Armstrong commercial for Radio Shack about leaving phone messages?

How often have you called me and left a message? Uh huh, just as I thought.  I don’t check the messages. They are almost never meant for me. I think it’s funny how that creates something of an inconvenient dilemma out of the brilliant technology of voicemail. As logically helpful as the answering machine is, if it is rarely used, it becomes easy to neglect, which leads to the potential for missed messages. Pretty much defeats the whole purpose for having it.

I realize we could just update our setup to allow callers to indicate who they are leaving a message for and then have it signal me when appropriate. Otherwise, I’m wading through charity organizations, political fundraisers, telemarketers or someone wanting Cyndie.

In the mean time, you could always text me. Or email. Or comment here.

Don’t make me get off the bike.

It doesn’t feel any different to me today. But it is Spring and they passed the Health Care bill. I won’t fret either of them for a while. Spring will taunt with warm days and then dump snow on us. The new Health Care laws will offer solutions to some, opportunities for others and provide plenty of angst for those who are in opposition of anything related to it. Mostly, I think it angers people who did not want to see the current President succeed at anything. In all things, there is both good and bad. For every rule, there will be an exception.

Just yesterday, my lovely wife was more than happy to point out one of my socks she found in the laundry that was rolled up in a ball. This being not long after I had clued her in that I was able to tell when she was stealing my socks for her own use because they turned up in the laundry all rolled up in a ball after she took them off. I don’t do that. I pull them off by the toe so they get a decent washing and drying. If there are rolled socks in the clean laundry, she has been wearing them. And how clean can they actually be at that point, anyway?

No sooner do I point out to her that I don’t do something a certain way, there appears evidence to the contrary. Maybe I should tell her that I don’t ever play hooky from work. It would be for the good of science, to test a theory. Of course, it might be best to wait until a time when I’m not about to take an entire week off for vacation. It will be best that I get an entire 5-days of work in since next week Cyndie and I will be in sunny (I hope) Florida to visit her parents. I’m sure we’ll find plenty of opportunities there to test my theory that for everything I can claim, there will quickly appear exceptions to humble me.

Just like opposites that attract, the more I learn, the less I know. You know?

Happy healthy Spring!

With the day job claiming so much of my time and attention lately, it is only logical that it becomes more a part of what I write about here. Yesterday was exciting in a little different way than normal and is worthy the effort to describe. First, I need to set the scene with some backstory.

The company I am with evolved from a larger company over 9 years ago. At that time, some of the equipment from the previous business, like hand tools that crimp contacts onto wires, was acquired to use for the new company, so we started with already used equipment. One particular style of crimp tool is in demand so often that we eventually ended up with 4 of them to minimize waiting. These tools eventually break down. When I tried to order a replacement years ago, we learned that the original old favorite style had become obsolete and wasn’t available anymore. We received the new version.

The staff did not like the new one. People would wait for the favorite one instead of using the new one. Then another of the old favorites broke down. At the time, business was slowing dramatically, so there was little need for the extra tools. I held off buying another new version since it was unpopular anyway.

Now that we are busy again, there have been many requests for additional tools to meet the demand. I have looked on ebay for the old tool, but have never been there at the right time to get one. The last one there sold on November of 2009. I learned the other day how desperate my staff are getting when one of them reported that in the searches they do at night on the internet to find the tool they want, they found evidence that the obsolete tool is still available in the UK. They emailed the site to inquire and were asked to supply complete company information. That’s where I stepped in.

I wrote an ‘official’ request to a representative for the manufacturer in Europe for verification they actually had some of the obsolete tools to which my staff are so strongly attached. The first reply I received was a copy of my message being forwarded to a different department with a note saying my request was something another person should address. Then I received an email from a third person, located in the US, in Illinois, informing me that the obsolete tool is not available. Seems I have come full circle. I already knew it wasn’t available here. I just wanted to check if it was possibly still on hand somewhere in Europe.

Then I got a phone call from a representative of the manufacturer. They seemed a bit riled that I was seeking an obsolete tool. Later, I received another call, from a different person, who politely informed me that my request had gotten attention around the world and I could expect additional calls from others wanting to know why I was requesting obsolete tooling and probably another email with technical details clarifying the tool I should be ordering. The good news it that the newer version that we already have, that the staff don’t like to use, is now also obsolete and replaced by an even newer design. They want us to give that one a try.

It’s nice to see that I got some attention on this issue, but it’s a little embarrassing to be identified around the world as the guy trying to buy a tool that was declared obsolete over a decade ago.