Rants!

I thought of a neat little device for a cell phone. I call it the “People Scanner”. It works like this: it will be a built in device that will detect if there is more than one person around the cell phone. And in the event that the reading comes out positive, the phone will not ring for an incoming call, but instead direct the caller immediately to a voicemail.

I think this device would be really great. I also think I’m really great for coming up with it.

Cell phones have become a problem. It wasn’t so bad during the Zack Morris day of those large gray dumbbell-size phones. Back then, air charges were like 20$ a minute so your were limited to just using it for an emergency. But now, minutes are practically free, they number in the thousands, and they rollover and play dead, and do all sorts of stupid little tricks.

But we can’t just get rid of the phones. Nope. That would be impossible. Ever try to forcibly take back a toy you gave to a little toddler? It’s not a pretty site.

So cell phones can’t be removed, per se; we have to stick to other options. This may be one of those times when we have to just fight technology with technology. The Russians got a bow and arrow, someone please roll out that cannon. They upgrade to the Gattling gun, our engineers come out with air-to-ground laser guided missiles. They counter with the nuclear warhead, we tap our brightest researchers to come out with some good ol’ Ebola and some Super-Tiny Pox.

So for the Cell-phone problem, we may need to fight it with technology. But don’t turn those keys just yet, there may be a less nuclear solution. If the People Scanners are impractical, what about stationary jamming signals set up in those tight public spots were the true misanthropes of society lurk and bring their insipid conversations. The train-cars, the busses, the waiting rooms, the grocery stores, the classrooms, the ballgames, the MOVIE THEATERS, the outside, the inside, everywhere! should have installed Jamming signals, or EMP pulses– so what if your heart defibrillator stops working, at least you’ll die NOT knowing where the idiot next to you is meeting his friends for dinner.

Sometimes when I’m bored at church, I start perusing the only book I have available at the time, the Bible. But at these moments of boredom in church, I am not looking for spiritual insight, or a revelation of some kind; I am just looking for a story, something to pass the time. So as can be imagined, I don’t turn to something cryptic like Psalms, or the longwinded soap-opera in Esther, or the oh-so-aphorismic Proverbs, or the tad too sanctimonious Gospels. No, my storybook predilections are satisfied elsewhere. My favorite: Genesis and the Creation Story.

I know in keeping with political correctness, it’s often wise to tip-toe through word-choice when talking about the Bible. Some may take offence by my referring to early Genesis as a ‘Story’—it has a somewhat fictional connation. But words are so limiting. I’m not intimating that the events that occurred during the Creation Story are apocryphal–but they do contain a haze of storybook technique that can make it, how can I say, open to interpretation. Where do we draw the line between allegory and the literal?

The Creation Story is full of symbols, contrasts, poetry … antistrophe. Where some items are taken at face value, others are taken to be more than what they seem. The serpent beguiling Eve is almost always interpreted as more than just a reptile, but a symbol for the Devil. Some say the “days” referred to in the intervals of creation are actually the equivalent of 1000 of our years. The nakedness of man, as the purity of existence–a time without sin.

And If we do contend that the story is an allegory, and that the serpent’s curse of being forced to slither without feet is the Devil’s expatriation to hell, and that this speaks of that, and that speaks of this, couldn’t it also be considered that none of it should be taken literally? Man is not really man, the garden is not really a garden. That the forming of heaven and earth out of the void are all in fact symbols to something else. Are we even allowed to venture forth and explore our own interpretation?

The thing with symbolism and allegory, is that: you may be adamant, but you can never be certain. The Wizard of Oz may fall neatly as an allegory of the Guided Age, but it doesn’t have to be. In fact, even if Garland insists–once written–I think it’s beyond the author’s purview to confirm or deny one’s interpretation.

Story for some; history for others–take it for all in all.

You know that daily commute home? The one you’ve taken every day for many years, where you have every detail memorized, every pot hole, every street light, to the point where you really don’t need to pay attention anymore, you kind of just make it home without thinking too much. Well, today for the first time in years, I started to think about a particular street sign. It’s one that I’ve must of crossed maybe a thousand times and I’ve become so used to this sign that I apply the same predicable reactions in resonse; I slow down, turn my head from left to right, over and over, and examine the sidewalks till I get to the end of the road.

No, the sign isn’t a silhouette of a deer or a moose, or of a man on a horse (which I ran into once near Charleston). In fact, those probably wouldn’t apply on a street with a sidewalk. It’s a simple sign with the words “Deaf Child” on it.

What struck me as odd for the first time was that I have seen this sign on this road all my life–well at least since my family first moved to East Providence 14 years ago. So if it was there at LEAST 14 years ago, God knows how far it really goes back. 20 years? 25 years? In all probability this “child” the sign refers to is probably not really a child anymore, and in fact, he probably doesn’t even live on the same street anymore. Do they ever retire these signs? And how does a sign like this go up in the first place?

Talk about minutiae …