So, not that kind. (I also don't play paintball.) Just a small one, the size of 'Terms and conditions' text, which you need glasses to read even if you have 20:20 vision. Not even a statement really, an observation. Hey, come back! I didn't mean it! (stage whisper I did, but in for a penny, in for a pound. And penny wise, pound foolish. Finder's keepers, too.)
Progress is inevitable, here and now - not necessary, but that's another discussion. Nietzsche has been foretelling the death of print for years (did you know that we use more paper now that we have computers? Think about it) and now we're told that print will survive in niche markets, but isn't creating communities one of the characteristics of the Internet, and why oh why are people sending this junk to me in daily newsletters?
Go do something, people. Go start a print business or an internet business or feed starving children. (Not you, them; although the latter would of course be very constructive.) I mean, really, things die every day. And sometimes they just change.
But really (and even though I still read and buy hardcopy books - I swear my books are staring at me), I like my Kindle. It's a bookshop I can carry around with me. Granted, sometimes the formatting is off and so is the editing, the bookmark function is not what you'd think, and I miss page numbers. But this bookshop is huge and it contains editions you can't find elsewhere and it's more affordable than hardcopy books. (Collusion of the ethical people who cut down trees at the pace of 50 football fields a day.)
There's just one leetle thing. I was sitting at an airport in a town (that I still have never found, meaning where are the buildings?!), on a work trip (remember I'm in publishing, so I read a lot of stuff), three hours early for my flight because Customs closes at 15.00. (I expected sniffer dogs and all they did was try to trick me so they could tell that my passport is real. So what do they do until 17.00? Do they have to refill the stamps? Recite the passport details from memory? Feed the dogs? Study how to be as miserable as possible?!)
Oh, and my laptop battery was dead. The last thing I wanted to do was read anything serious. As you can imagine, my Kindle library is very serious. Snort. No. The serious stuff is mostly the stuff I should read and mean to read but cringe from because I do not possess that kind of vocabulary and I'm embarrassed to tell Kindle that I need to look up a word. I have some very frivolous material in my library, but I wanted something short and about 3 steps on the trashy scale (the Kardashians being a 10).
Kindle Singles are the other wonderful thing about a Kindle. They are novellas, longer than a short story but short enough to read in one sitting. Perfect for my one sitting. My favourites are the serials: Positron and Wool. Not trashy enough. Some stuff on Obama, obesity, blah. Then 3rd-rung trashy, possibly 5th. I'm too embarrassed to tell you.
But to not tell you would really annoy you and then you'd leave and then I couldn't stage an Occupy with you smelly people, if I wanted to.
Ok... It's a single about a guy's experiences with dating, specifically online dating. I want to salvage my pride by saying I have never tried online dating, but honestly I think it takes guts. And perhaps some trusty friends on automatic dial who are very good at faking situations like a python in the lounge wrestling a cushion or a plague of chicken pox or burst water pipes or geysers or sewers.
He talks about some of the dates he's been on, which is amusing and which was all I was really there for. Trashy is code for wanting to laugh at or disdain or just judge other people. I just wanted to hear about his worst dates. He describes about five. He also talks you through creating an online profile. Aaaaaand I think that was it.
Remember when I said there was 'a leetle thing' (you should remember because I spelt it funny)? Normally I would not have read, nevermind paid for, a book or magazine or pamphlet like this. I was looking for something to soothe my tired eyes and brain. This single was amusing for roughly half an hour. But it wasn't soothing and then it was just annoying and I drank some coffee and worked using pen and paper and boarded the plane and slept and looked out of the window and wished I were home already.
(FYI people around this continent drink very bad coffee, including this town that I can't find, though I found the airport... 3 hours early. Very bad.)
Anyway, take me as a case in point. Here I sit, happily typing away, anything just anything that comes to mind, and then I post it and tweet the URL and people read it. Hopefully. (Can spambots read? Like AI-style?) No gatekeepers except the volatility of my laptop and internet connection. As an editor, I appreciate the need for mediators. As writer, I do not see why mediation is necessary. As a reader, I think I want buying trash to be a little bit more difficult, so that I come to my senses (however ragged) before I press 'Buy'.
PS. Here's the link. I judge myself more than you ever can.
