A certain frenzied logic takes over five days before the Super Bowl: I presently have a 37" television screen. A 37" screen just will not do. Therefore, I need a bigger TV. Powerless to argue against such an ironclad line of reasoning, I bumbled into my preferred (read closest) home electronics retailer. By the way, I do literally bumble into stores selling anything more technologically advanced than a box of Cap'n Crunch (picture Cro-Magnon ...

I am one of technology's lackeys, as are you. Whether you want to acknowledge it or not we all squander great swaths of life jumping at the commands of inanimate objects. Don’t believe me? Two words: self-checkout. It’s called various things - U-Scan at my grocery store – but by any name self-checkout is the retail industry’s ubiquitous tool for getting more work out of those damned lazy customers of theirs. You’re familiar with the concep...

The following is the actual script – including stage direction in parentheses and italics – of a speech written for Ernest P. Blufous VI, President and CEO of Blufous International, manufacturers of agricultural equipment and direct marketers of aluminum siding, vacation rentals and burial insurance. The speech was given at a banquet honoring the finalists for the company’s coveted “Mamie the Plow-Horse Award”. The award recognizes Blufous’ to...

Calling upon dwindling reserves of benevolence, I try to convince myself that Chris Harrison has the good of mankind at heart. I try to believe that he honestly believes he's advancing the human condition, so much so that he will stand alongside Jonas Salk, Thomas Edison, the Wright Brothers, and George Crum (inventor of the honest-to-goodness randomly shaped, grease-fried potato chip, for those who slept through history class) in the pantheon of...

Even if it manages to avoid the humiliation of ending up next to the Sony Betamax in a rubbish pile, the best any technology can hope for – no matter how revolutionary and life-altering - is to one day be taken for granted. Don’t believe me? Insert yourself into a conversation at your next dinner party and start raving about the wheel. Despite reminding your audience that everything from Smokey and the Bandit (Parts I, II and III) to…well…civ...

Otherwise intelligent people sacrifice a day of finite lifetime - and vacation time - in pursuit of the bleeding edge. Despite the hype, I’d managed to avoid any concrete knowledge of the iOS 8 launch until the day before. It wasn't an active avoidance on my part, more a blissful ignorance borne from a profound lack of interest. As with Kim and Kanye’s anniversary, I couldn't have pinpointed this High Holy Day for iPhone cultists on a calendar...