Love-hate relationship

I was terribly excited yesterday when I arrived home to find a box waiting for me. Well, I knew (or at least hoped) it would be there, so it wasn't a complete surprise. But I still was excited to tear it open and find my long-awaited present lying in a nest of peanuts. I had the evening free and was ready to spend the whole night downloading my entire CD collection to my shiny new iPod in a night of music-induced euphoria.

That, however, was not to be. Frustrations started almost immediately.

"What! No power hookup? That's just ridiculous. It didn't say anything about buying one separately when I purchased it."

After calming down a tad I actually read the instructions and realized that, wait a second, the USB cord also charges the battery. So Apple didn't totally screw me over, but they also assured that I will probably end up buying a battery charger since it's such an inconvenient way to do things. Steve Jobs really knows what he's doing.

Then the downloading started. First the software to get the music and then the music itself. This all went fairly smoothly until I actually started listening to the music on my iPod. Every few seconds there would be a little blip on the song, almost like a scratching noise that nearly drove me insane after a few minutes of it. The other albums were the same. Each had the annoying skipping sound, though some had it more than others.

So I started listening to the CDs on the computer as they were downloading. They were all skipping terribly, even a brand-new CD I'd bought the week previous. I realized that after all my hard work, it had all come to nothing since I couldn't even download them properly -- the CD burner in my computer (which at 5 years old is a dinosaur by current standards) was completely useless.

The internal ranting started at that point. I deleted all the songs I'd just spent hours downloading and cursed silently. There are times when I hate technology with a passion, generally when it doesn't work properly or do what I want it to do. Earlier in the day my work had been severely hampered by a virus that was corrupting all the Word documents I was working on. I couldn't get a single thing done until the virus scan had been completed several hours later.

There are times I wish for a quieter time when people didn't have to bother with all the technology breaking down all the time. Life has gotten so busy and quick that there just isn't enough time in the day to mess with high-tech foul ups.

But then I remember that if we didn't have technology, my life would seem really empty. I don't know how I would function without the Internet. Even though my connection is slow and kicks me off frequently, how else would I do my banking but online. Go to a bank? Haven't done that in months. What about contacting other people? E-mail is a godsend in instantaneous communication. No more snail mail to keep up with friends who live around the world. No more need to wait. And my cell phone. What would I do if I were ever stuck on the side of the road? Wait for a good Samaritan to come along and hitch a ride somewhere? Heaven forbid.

No, I can see how the quality of life has improved with each technological advance. But with each improvement comes its own tailor-made set of headaches.

Am I willing to give it all up to live a quieter life, as some people have done? Not on your life. There are times when I can go without my gadgets for a while. But when my self-imposed celibacy ends, I'm one of the first to whip out my phone and check my e-mail -- just to make sure I haven't missed anything.

That leaves me with only one option. Now I have to buy a new CD burner, but this time I'll upgrade to play DVDs as well. And so the cycle continues.