Calise Hawkins is a New York based stand up comedian. She has appeared Comedy Central’s Russell Simmon’s Presents… and was featured on NBC’s Last Comic Standing. She frequently travels by train from Jersey City to all five boroughs of New York City. To pass the time, she writes funny, stream of consciousness tangents about her commute, directly from her 2009 Sidekick LX while in transit. This is…Tangents in Transit.
I can’t stop reading over this guy’s shoulder. He has an Amazon Kindle and it’s clear as day. It’s not like when someone’s reading a book and the page is all bendy so you can’t quite see everything unless it’s bent towards your eyes. The Kindle is flat and the lettering is crisp. It looks like a highly advanced adult Etch-a-Sketch.
Computers never freaked me out but this alien technology is confusing for me. I can Google it and try to understand how it works, but just looking at it is baffling. It looks like the lettering is permanent, then it changes like magic. How do people think of these things and find someone to execute them?
I have invented so many things… in my head. All I need is someone to finance me and I could be making that Kindle money.
I invented 3D contact lenses.
Now you don’t have to wear those annoyingly bulky 3D glasses that the theaters currently carry. Those things always irritate my nose. The contacts would come with instructions on how to put them on for the people who have never worn contacts. For the people who do wear contacts, a prescription will have to be ordered from their eye doctor. Sorry, it is not part of your healthcare because it’s for entertainment use, like teeth whitening. The money will come out of your pocket and go directly into mine.
I invented popsicle lip gloss for the summertime.
It will have staining properties that, when sucked upon, leave your lips a sweet raspberry color. This invention also comes in condoms….for the winter time.
I also invented refrigerated garbage.
Ok, not refrigerated garbage per se, but a fridge for the garbage nevertheless. I came up with this concept when I realized I was doing it already. We all leave our leftovers in the fridge for a bit longer so we can take them out on garbage day without stinking up the apartment. Why not have a refrigerated unit that is specifically for that? Instead of keeping our kinetically decaying food with our fresh food? This won’t be a popular idea for the going green movement, but what are they gonna do to me? Throw grass on me? Besides, I was so excited about this idea that I looked it up. Someone already patented it.
I wonder how many people think they invented the Kindle and are kicking themselves for not acting on their idea? We invent stuff every second, we just don’t believe in ourselves. I’m sure everyone has stared at a computer till their eyes felt dry and strained, and when you blinked you could still faintly see the letters imprinted on the inside of your eyes from the computer light. I’m sure we have all thought, “Ugh, why do I have to stare at a light-bulb for info?” Then most of us just took a cigarette break to get away from it all. Lung cancer is the leading cause of relaxation.
But while we were on break, someone else was inside saying, “Enough!” And they went on to invent a computer with no painful lighting. It almost looks like computerized paper, or like I said, magic. I’ve always believed scientists are the new witches. Albert Einstein was a warlock. Look at his hair-do.
Still on the train and now this guy is clicking through the electronic pages so fast I can’t follow along. I don’t know if he’s looking for something or if he just reads that quickly. Maybe he’s a robot. Maybe robots invented Kindles so they could read on the train.
It’s interesting to me that in movies, we always depict the robots who become self aware to be human shaped, like in AI, or I-Robot or Terminator. Or they at least have to have a human voice, like that robot bitch in Eagle Eye. But almost everything electronic these days would fall under the parameters of robotic. Cell phones, iPods, even alarm clocks, are essentially robots. Maybe while we read our Kindle it’s looking back out at us, enjoying the story of a man reading a book while a nosy lady looks over his arm.
Traditionally our human ego only allows us to visualize a self aware robot in human form. But at the same time we would find it perfectly reasonable to have a robot using a cell phone or typing on a laptop. For example, me thinking that a robot man would read a robot Kindle book. We think it’s normal for a robot to use another robot as a tool. What would life be like if we didn’t have highly advanced machines, instead we just used other humans? Instead of storing information we had a guy who could remember everything for us. Instead of driving, we ride around on a few guys’ backs. Instead of….oh, I guess I just reinvented slavery.
This is how a tangent works. Basically I’m sitting here, pondering about this man’s Kindle. Then through a series of unfortunate dumb thoughts, I have come to the popular movie conclusion, that robots are the new niggers.
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