I haven’t been as geeky as I like to be lately. Being busy with school and other stuff, I just haven’t been able to keep up with the world of video games, movies, TV, etc. A nice example of this is when I was at the gym (a decidedly ungeeky place to be), and saw a promo for a new episode of Lost on the TVs there. I thought to myself, “hey self, look at that, Lost is coming back. Must be in a few weeks, because self, you’re a geek and would have heard about it if it was any time soon.” But then the promo ended with the words “RIGHT NOW.”
I immediately questioned my loyalty to the geek race. I got off that mind-warping elliptical trainer and scurried home just as fast as I could. How dare my commitment to health and beauty outweigh my commitment to science fiction?
Luckily my DVR remembered to tape (*) it. And even though I was so tired I could pass out if I blinked, I watched that damn episode, and it was fucking awesome. Seriously, this show was slowing down for a while last season, but it’s really better than ever now. I think Michael Emerson (as Ben) is one of the best actors on TV these days. He can take lines that would otherwise be bland and fill them with creepy ambiguity. I was almost going to put a picture of him here, but sorry, Kate is hotter.
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(*) Tape? I guess it’s not taping any more, without, you know, a tape. I bet we’re at a point where kids don’t even know what the hell VCRs or tapes (either audio or video) are any more. They’ll never know the frustrations of setting up a tape and VCR every single week so they don’t miss their favourite show. Or the joy of carefully planning a mix tape with just the right songs, in just the right order, ending up at just the right length, then finding just the right spot on the source tape to get a song off it (or waiting for it to come on the radio, even), listening all the way through each song as it records, while printing up the track listing on the cassette case, and writing up a hand-written note to go along with it, hoping that just maybe that special someone will be impressed. Now a mix of songs only requires typing their names in iTunes, clicking the boxes beside them, and clicking “burn” or “save.” More convenient I guess, but there was something magical about the amount of effort required before.
I feel old now, but at least I’m geeky again.
Phronk.com 
Comments
12 responses to “Lost Tapes”
Had a discussion about this a while back. A lot of the terms that have become commonplace, like “tape”, have obvious meanings to us older generation folks, but have nearly no meaning to kids. One such instance is “dial” a phone. There’s no dial anymore. However, we still ‘dial’ our cell phones.My parents still call their iPods — “that tape thing”
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Had a discussion about this a while back. A lot of the terms that have become commonplace, like “tape”, have obvious meanings to us older generation folks, but have nearly no meaning to kids. One such instance is “dial” a phone. There’s no dial anymore. However, we still ‘dial’ our cell phones.My parents still call their iPods — “that tape thing”
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Yeah, but when they aren’t impressed, all that work is for naught, and you cry. Next time, I’ll just toss a CD at your head.😛
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Yeah, but when they aren’t impressed, all that work is for naught, and you cry. Next time, I’ll just toss a CD at your head.:P
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“Tape it” will probably become a generational marker. Record it still works.
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“Tape it” will probably become a generational marker. Record it still works.
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Aw Jen, I was completely impressed. I was thinking of that tape when I wrote that stuff, and I still remember most of the songs on it. Still, I do deserve a CD to the head.Sachz: Yeah I never even thought that “dial” was no longer literal. And I remember explaining early mp3 players (that could hold like 10 songs at a time) as “sorta like a Walkman, but you put music on it from a computer”.Tornwordo: True. I bet even “record” will go obsolete as the idea of media occurring at a certain time goes away, so that saving it for later will have no meaning. You’ll just download it whenever you want, and that’s when it was meant to be downloaded.
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Aw Jen, I was completely impressed. I was thinking of that tape when I wrote that stuff, and I still remember most of the songs on it. Still, I do deserve a CD to the head.Sachz: Yeah I never even thought that “dial” was no longer literal. And I remember explaining early mp3 players (that could hold like 10 songs at a time) as “sorta like a Walkman, but you put music on it from a computer”.Tornwordo: True. I bet even “record” will go obsolete as the idea of media occurring at a certain time goes away, so that saving it for later will have no meaning. You’ll just download it whenever you want, and that’s when it was meant to be downloaded.
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Don’t kid yourself for a second that you have ever stopped being geeky. 🙂
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Don’t kid yourself for a second that you have ever stopped being geeky. 🙂
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Is “album” still acceptable?
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Is “album” still acceptable?
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