Kiet and I were having one of our “Ladies who Lunch” afternoons. Kiet is an award-winning journalist, and a fabulous blonde, and when we walk into a restaurant we usually make an enviable entrance. Waiters rush towards us vying for our attention in order to seat us at their stations. Male patrons stop conversations in mid-sentence to ogle us and female patrons jealously want to be us.
Once seated, our conversation went something like this:
KIET (frantic)
Sorry I’m late! The traffic is terrible and there are road works everywhere. The meeting was hectic and my phone keeps ringing… I need a prawn salad!
BOEFIE
Don’t worry, I only just got here too. I couldn’t get my false eyelashes on straight without my glasses on.
KIET (takes her glasses out of her handbag, puts them on)
They’re straight. We need lip-gloss.
KIET BOEFIE
I can’t cope… Saw myself on video…
…with all these… …yesterday…
…deadlines… …and nearly died…
…and then I have all these… …I did not even…
…functions… …recognise myself…
…it’s just eat and drink… …my roots are…
…all the time… …grey…
…not good for my… …have to go to…
…ulcer and… …the hairdresser…
…figure… …before I do…
…and I have no… …the shoot…
…time to finish my article for… …for a TV series…
…next week. Hectic! …next week. Hectic!
And then, taking a breath while sipping elegantly on a glass of chardonnay, she asked me: “Boefie, how do you cope with stress?” To which my obvious answer was: “I live on Planet Gorgeous, darling.”
On my way home, feeling totally stress free after our lunch, stuck in the five o’clock traffic, I started to think about it.
STRESS.
Is stress a serious condition? Is it critical? Why do so many people suffer from this? Is it a disease? Is it medical? Is it social? Do we create our own symptoms or do other people cause it? Is it inevitable or do we have a choice in the matter? Is it the champagne talking or am I suffering from a chemical reaction caused by the layers of make-up I have on?
I started to review my week in order to analyse the situation and gauge the stress levels in my life. Stress on Planet Gorgeous? Mmm…let’s see….
To be continued…
END OF PART 1
Monday, November 30, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
Hello?
Remember when you actually had to dial a number on your telephone? You know, put your finger in a little round hole, move it until it couldn’t go any further, break a nail, and then wait patiently for the rotary to return to its original position before you can dial the next digit? It took time. It was an event. The question “Where are you now?” did not exist, because you could assume that the person you were calling was at home. Because that is where they kept the phone. Singular.
In the eighties, the era of Betamax and banana clips, touchtone phones and answering machines with cute, miniature tapes appeared. At last you could go out, because you knew that the little red light would be flashing when you came home, and you wouldn’t have missed anything.
In the nineties I bought a fax machine, a cellular phone and I got an email address. The new technology was exciting and overwhelming. I had to buy a bigger handbag in order to transport my fancy, new, 3kg cell phone, which I kept having to replace because it kept getting stolen. And the numbers of the five people I knew who also had cell phones at that time were gone forever and I had to go back to my little black book next to my touchtone telephone and leave messages on their answering machines because they were also out replacing their stolen cell phones. Locating the damn thing in my new giant handbag was just as big of a problem, and I kept having to call it from my landline in order to find it.
Now, ten years later, I have a small, sexy, touch screen cell phone and a smaller handbag. My technologically advanced communication device makes me look modern and hip, but I am completely baffled by it. First of all, I do not understand half the messages I receive. Oh, and all the new techno-speak and acronyms I had to learn to be able to operate it was like learning a foreign language. SIM card (SIMple SIMilar SIMultaneous SIMper SIMmer)? Flight mode. (What?) PIN (Punch In Number Put In Neutral PINion PINnacle)? Bluetooth? (I had mine pulled years ago.) Setup Wizard? (Harry Potter? Abracadabra!)
I only recently realised that a written message on my phone is not an S&M, but an SMS. Either way I have no idea what to do. (Gr8 2 c u. r u. Plz ph asap 4 2morrow’s d8 tx). Do I add up the numbers because I just received a math equation to solve? Are vowels now as obsolete as VCRs?
Another thing that blows my mind is that I can actually take pictures with my phone… and then email them to myself… from the same device…so that I can see what I photographed because the screen is so small that I cannot for the love of St. Isidore of Seville identify the people in the picture without my reading glasses. Amazing. I have no use for my digital camera, my alarm clock, my diary, my calendar, my CD player, my computer or my television, because I have a cell phone. My index finger has become useless while my thumb has the same muscle strength as one of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s biceps.
Also, the touch screen is freaking me out, because every time I answer my phone my earrings seem to spontaneously connect me to the Internet.
Everyone has a cell phone and everyone seems to be using it incessantly. Socialising with friends has become a short-term memory exercise, because someone’s Amy Winehouse ringtone keeps interrupting the conversation. The witty anecdote I’ve been waiting to share all night is drowned out by the cacophony of modern technology. “Excuse me while I take this…” has become the catchphrase of the era.
The strange thing is that I am getting used to it…and now I want more. Is it too much to ask for a machine that can connect me to my beautician/hairdresser/plastic surgeon as soon as I am having the initial thought that I might need my roots done/a facial /a tuck?
I want a device consisting of a lightproof enclosure having an aperture with a shuttered lens through which the image of an object is focused and recorded onto film, so that I can experience the thrill and anticipation of waiting for my prints. I need a sound-reproduction system that uses two or more separate channels to give a more natural distribution of sound, so that I can identify the horn section in a musical arrangement. I want to watch a sequence of rapidly projected photographs creating the illusion of motion and continuity on a large, distant screen that emits a series of transient visible images so that I can lounge on my comfortable couch while drinking champagne.
Is it too much to ask?????
Oh.
Wait.
I think I already have all those things.
I better call someone to tell them about it before I forget.
In the eighties, the era of Betamax and banana clips, touchtone phones and answering machines with cute, miniature tapes appeared. At last you could go out, because you knew that the little red light would be flashing when you came home, and you wouldn’t have missed anything.
In the nineties I bought a fax machine, a cellular phone and I got an email address. The new technology was exciting and overwhelming. I had to buy a bigger handbag in order to transport my fancy, new, 3kg cell phone, which I kept having to replace because it kept getting stolen. And the numbers of the five people I knew who also had cell phones at that time were gone forever and I had to go back to my little black book next to my touchtone telephone and leave messages on their answering machines because they were also out replacing their stolen cell phones. Locating the damn thing in my new giant handbag was just as big of a problem, and I kept having to call it from my landline in order to find it.
Now, ten years later, I have a small, sexy, touch screen cell phone and a smaller handbag. My technologically advanced communication device makes me look modern and hip, but I am completely baffled by it. First of all, I do not understand half the messages I receive. Oh, and all the new techno-speak and acronyms I had to learn to be able to operate it was like learning a foreign language. SIM card (SIMple SIMilar SIMultaneous SIMper SIMmer)? Flight mode. (What?) PIN (Punch In Number Put In Neutral PINion PINnacle)? Bluetooth? (I had mine pulled years ago.) Setup Wizard? (Harry Potter? Abracadabra!)
I only recently realised that a written message on my phone is not an S&M, but an SMS. Either way I have no idea what to do. (Gr8 2 c u. r u. Plz ph asap 4 2morrow’s d8 tx). Do I add up the numbers because I just received a math equation to solve? Are vowels now as obsolete as VCRs?
Another thing that blows my mind is that I can actually take pictures with my phone… and then email them to myself… from the same device…so that I can see what I photographed because the screen is so small that I cannot for the love of St. Isidore of Seville identify the people in the picture without my reading glasses. Amazing. I have no use for my digital camera, my alarm clock, my diary, my calendar, my CD player, my computer or my television, because I have a cell phone. My index finger has become useless while my thumb has the same muscle strength as one of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s biceps.
Also, the touch screen is freaking me out, because every time I answer my phone my earrings seem to spontaneously connect me to the Internet.
Everyone has a cell phone and everyone seems to be using it incessantly. Socialising with friends has become a short-term memory exercise, because someone’s Amy Winehouse ringtone keeps interrupting the conversation. The witty anecdote I’ve been waiting to share all night is drowned out by the cacophony of modern technology. “Excuse me while I take this…” has become the catchphrase of the era.
The strange thing is that I am getting used to it…and now I want more. Is it too much to ask for a machine that can connect me to my beautician/hairdresser/plastic surgeon as soon as I am having the initial thought that I might need my roots done/a facial /a tuck?
I want a device consisting of a lightproof enclosure having an aperture with a shuttered lens through which the image of an object is focused and recorded onto film, so that I can experience the thrill and anticipation of waiting for my prints. I need a sound-reproduction system that uses two or more separate channels to give a more natural distribution of sound, so that I can identify the horn section in a musical arrangement. I want to watch a sequence of rapidly projected photographs creating the illusion of motion and continuity on a large, distant screen that emits a series of transient visible images so that I can lounge on my comfortable couch while drinking champagne.
Is it too much to ask?????
Oh.
Wait.
I think I already have all those things.
I better call someone to tell them about it before I forget.
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