495 Man Without a Blackberry

495 Man Without a Blackberry

Is there anyone else out there without a Blackberry?  Seems everyone from Barack Obama on down has one and is constantly using it to accomplish all the world's important business.  People say they live and die on the thing and they love it.  They've trained their thumbs, fat and skinny, to operate that teeeny tiiiiiny keyboard.  And they spend all day every day writing solutions to the world's problems, making laundry lists, to-do lists, reading e-mail, cruising the internet and Facebook and My Space and You Tube and all that other critical material.

Makes a fella feel left out.

Half the time, the Blackberriers are faking it, of course.  There are tens of thousands of people with nothing to say and no reason to say it, and these are the pretenders.  They've set the device to ring all by itself periodically so they can pull it off their belt or out of their briefcase or purse and stare at it in wide-eyed wonderment and thumb furiously in response to something that isn't there.  A real self-esteem builder, this machine.  Makes you feel wanted, needed, appreciated and busy.  Makes others think you're oh so important.

A neighbor pretends to be a commodities trader and he's always pacing around outside, cigarette in hand, drawling at the top of his lungs for all to hear.  Is there anyone on the other end of the phone?  Probably not.  But he's designated himself as Mister Importante.  And in a way he IS.   He's a pioneer.  He's among the first to fake electronic communication.  Without Importante, people wouldn't yet be faking messages on their Blackberrys (or is it Blackberries or Blacksberry?)

Here's another pioneer, a woman, a stranger.  We are pedestrians waiting for the red light to change.  I am talking to myself.  She is on a cell phone.  She takes it from her ear and asks me "do you have a cell phone?"  I say "yes."  She says "if you turn it off and put it to your ear you can talk to yourself without looking like you're nuts.  That's what I'm doing."

Lesson learned.  Lesson spread.  Stranger woman had the concept.  Mister Importante raised the art to a new level.  Blackberry fakers have taken this art to its highest form.

Is this an important tool?  Or is it merely another way the phone company can squeeze another few bucks from you?

Shrapnel:

--All those marketing calls have stopped, at last.  Or most of them.  They were infuriating, but now it's lonely without them.

--Calendars don't record appointments, they produce them.  Think about it.  Now that you have your 09 PDA or appointment book set up, you put in stuff you never would have written down otherwise and don't need to.

--If a cough drop prevents or cures coughing, why doesn't a gum drop prevent or cure gum disease?  Maybe some day they will.  But this is like waiting for the other shoe to drop.

I'm Wes Richards.  My opinions are my own, but you're welcome to them.®

©WJR 2009