morgankelsey.com

I found myself in a prominent computer box-store today. I was perusing the laptop selection looking for something suitable for my wife when I heard, "My spidey sense is tingling, it's tingling, I think you need help!"

I turned and saw.....Salesguy. 

Things started happening quickly now, because I was about to be "helped". Before we get going though,  I want to note that I was looking at a brand that is made by cows and comes in a cow box. I believe this is what triggered Salesguy's "spidey sense". So first, I was steered toward the brand that has four letters and starts with "S".

"Who are we shopping for today?" he asked.
"My wife," I answered.
"And what will she be doing with this computer?" came next.
"Not a whole lot," I replied.

Salesguy pursed his lips and furrowed his brow into a knowing look of concern."Yeah," he said, "that's how it starts, isn't it? But here's what's actually going to happen."

He clicks the Start Menu and says, "You see, one morning when she has some free time, " -- his back was turned so he didn't see my eyebrows raise -- "she's going to wonder what these menus do," he said as he hovered over some Vista swag. "She'll find this picture organizer, and once she realizes how easy it is to organize everything, she'll probably remember she forgot to send some vacation pictures to her friends. But that's hard to do, so she might click around, and find this movie maker, and before you know it, she's making movies."

I was shocked on many levels at this point. I imagined the tech support nightmare headed my way if my wife decided she wanted to make movies.

But I couldn't resist the bait. I said, "So let me get this straight, it's hard to email a bunch of pictures, but easy to make a movie?" 

Salesguy nodded with a smile.

"Wow," I said, "what else can it do?"

I wish I could tell you what he said next, but I really can't recall any of it. I think I now know what alien abductees are talking about. You know something happened, but you can't bring up any of the details because your brain has simply shut itself off.

When I came to, I heard my mouth saying, "Listen buddy, my wife is a 1337 h4x0r with mad skillz. She was rocking the b-board at baud rate on a VIC20 while you were still in boot mode. If she needs to send her peeps some pics she'll be tunnelling a tarball  right to their box. When I say she won't be doing much with this computer, I mean this baby will be devistafied by dinnertime, with the latest ubuntu build rocking the chips."

None of which is true of course, but he lied to me too.

Now -- for the record -- I have a deep fear that someday I'll be Salesguy in one of these stores. So I really try to behave myself when these guys treat me like a moron.

The problem, of course, is that computers are not easy to use. This leaves the box store Salesguy in the ridiculous position of formulating demonstrations that show how easy this stuff is, if only people had all day to swim around the start menu. Unfortunately, clicking on the blue E to get to the interwebthing just doesn't make for a good demo, even if it's the only thing the laptop I'm currently shopping for will ever do. Less than 49% of the population can read a map, but a solid 51% can use a GPS. Each one of my children were capable of planning a painful assault on a sibling involving timing, precision, and complex falsehoods long before they could crap in the porcelain chair. 

I didn't buy a laptop. I came home with Super Smash Bros. for the Wii. Guess what...everyone in my house knows how to use the Wii. Even the guy who is still afraid of the toilet.