I have gone off technology.
I am astounded by the level to which it appears to want to interfere in things that are absolutely none of its business.
This week I have been obliged to surrender my old, not very smart telephone. This was because Mark dropped his. His was not only not very smart, it was actually thick as a plank. It was far too dim to have opinions of its own. It managed phone calls and text messages, and grumbled about being asked to take photographs, because it said that it was already full.
I do not know if they all leaked out when he dropped it and the screen broke, but it refused to co-operate after that, and after some discussion, I gave him my nice-but-dim telephone. In its stead, I adopted one which used to belong to one of the Peppers, and which is very much like the nuisance at the back of the class who is too irritatingly smart for their own good.
In many ways it is quite a nice telephone. It is large, and you can make the buttons and letters an appropriate size for failing eyesight and fat stubby fingers, but in other ways it is dreadful.
I do not want any telephone that is going to ring the Government every five minutes, and tell them, sneakily, where I have been, who I have been talking to, what we said, and whether or not anybody coughed, or said: Goodness me, how unwell I have been feeling today. Nevertheless, mine has got a little red button on it which threatens to do just that.
Any such telephone can jolly well get lost, in my opinion, except it can’t get lost, because if you do lose it you can ask one of its family to look for it, and it will tell you, disloyally, where its cousin has hidden itself.
I was using it today to read the Audible story book to me whilst I was painting. You can do this with a brainy telephone. It listens to a story on the mighty Internet and then transmits it psychically to a little speaker, which then reads the story back to me.
Today’s story was a Jilly Cooper, and was so rude that I was glad I was in the house by myself. That is unless you count the telephone, who of course was listening in as well.
After we had been listening for a while, it turned itself off.
The story stopped.
I wondered if my telephone had just got too embarrassed to carry on, and picked it up to see what had gone wrong.
There was a little message on the screen. It said something along the lines of: You have been listening to this story on full volume for several days now, on and off, and for the sake of your hearing, you have got to stop. It is too loud, and not good for your ears. Therefore, for your own benefit, the story ends here. Sorry about that, love from your telephone.
I was absolutely incandescent with rage, how dare my bloody telephone interfere like that.
It interferes in my life quite enough anyway. There have been quite a few times when we have been talking about things that we need, and then come to the computer to find it filled with advertisements for these very things. This week it has been How To Release The Equity In Your House, because my interfering bloody telephone has been eavesdropping when we have been discussing fundraising with Lucy, and telling all of its friends who sell things online.
I do not mind advertisements for things that I need. That seems to me to be a significant saving of time and energy, but I do not need lectures about how loud to listen to my story.
We had a similar experience last night with the new television, which turned out to be listening, actually listening even though it was switched off, to our conversation.
It was earwigging like billy-oh. We did not realise this, until after a little while, when after a drink or two, the thing actually joined in with the things we were saying.
Every time somebody mentioned Google, it interrupted us with a long rant about how we ought to download a thing from Google online.
I was astounded. First, it was muscling in on our conversation in the first place, and second, it had the jolly cheek to be telling us what we ought to do.
It was one step away from shouting: Winston Smith No Hands In Pockets In The Cells.
I do not like this Brave New World.
I do not like it at all.
LATER NOTE: Just a footnote unconcerned with technology.
Mark was allowed today, for the very first time, to go out in his newly pristine, beautifully clean taxi. He has been using the rural broadband van and my taxi until today.
I was reluctant to allow it but I wanted my own taxi back.
He and Lucy used it to go to Barrow. They had got halfway home when the fire extinguisher, which somehow had come loose and was rolling about in the back, jammed up against something and went off.
The entire car was filled. Mark and Lucy came home looking like out-of-season snowmen. The car is utterly and completely coated in a thick layer of white dust. It is everywhere, in all of the crevices and all over all the surfaces and seats and carpets.
Fortunately, words failed me.
Have a picture of the Lake District.
