I am an unabashed gadget lover.
I’m not sure why, but silly little inventions that are supposed to make common household tasks easier are attention-grabbers, and I will always take a stroll through the aisle of any store with a section labeled “As seen on TV.”
Maybe I come by this because as a lifelong night worker, back in the days before the internet, there were only late-night infomercials. When you were too tired to watch a show you taped earlier, and just wanted a little something to watch while you wound down from a 10-hour shift, the late-night hawkers of miracle mops (like I’m going to send away for a mop that won’t show up for 6-8 weeks), cookware guaranteed never to have your burned food stick to it, shamwows, that super-absorbent cloth that apparently people use when they can’t find a car wash, all beckoned you.
I rarely actually sent away for any of these things, realizing when they started looking like sound ways to invest my limited earnings, that meant it was time for me to go to bed.
However, I did buy that can opener that slices the entire lid off the can — it worked really well, until it stopped working after a few short weeks — and a spatula that is supposed to make it easier to flip a fried egg so that the yolk doesn’t break (hint, it doesn’t).
I have eschewed the workout ropes, pulleys, cycling mechanisms that supposedly work miracles in a few short weeks, with incredibly little effort. But that’s only after getting that silly rolling metal contraption that was supposed to make my ab workouts easier, and the thighmaster, which really is a good workout, if you bother to use it more than three times before you feel sore and ridiculous.
And for someone as vulnerable (read: gullible) as I am, it’s really quite unfair when I get unsolicited gadgets in the mail.
For one thing, the part of my brain that knows I’m silly, realizes that most gadgets just are unnecessary. Power screwdrivers and drills yes. They make life easier when you have small household projects, like hanging curtains and fixing cabinets. But lately, everything that comes into this house comes with a rechargeable USB cord. Case in point: My new Sonic rechargeable pulsing toothbrush. What?
This appeared unsolicited, sent from Delta Dental, although I suspect my dentist. He’s the one who convinced me that a Water-pik is better than flossing, even though the vibrations make my tongue itch and my eyes water.
And so does this pulsing toothbrush. Imagine hearing the dentist’s drill at a slightly lower pitch, pulsating as you brush, making your teeth and tongue tickle and itch in a way that will eventually drive you quite batty. And as you’re debating whether to keep using this or chuck it you’re thinking, “it’s a toothbrush. Why does this need to be high tech?”
This is where we are now. The simplest task requires a battery or a plug.
This pandemic has reintroduced some of us to the simpler pleasures in life, like taking a walk, reading a book, or riding a bike. It’s also shown us how dependent we are on being plugged in, online and on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
We’re bouncing between the extremes these days. How many of us will go back home for our phones, even if we’re only taking a short walk or drive up to the store? Remember when we could go to the store holding only a list? Now we’ve decided that something desperate might occur in the 10 minutes we’re unreachable.
I’m not longing for the good old days by any means. Depending on your station in life, they were neither good nor old.
But sometimes it might be nice to be able to get through a day without your phone blowing up with notifications of the latest bad news, your tongue itching from a pulsating toothbrush — or your adductors killing you from a thighmaster.
Where did I put that damn thing, anyway?
