[MacSpirit] And now a word from...

by Rodney O. Lain

5/30/01

Awakening was hard, as always. The ultimate disappointment.

Octavia E. Butler, Dawn: Xenogenesis Book 1

There are many people reading this column who live in my back yard -- the Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, that is. You can imagine that that’s a whole lotta people who get a chance to scream “You suck!” in my face.

Surprisingly, there are one or two readers who are not related to me and actually look forward to reading my disjointed ramblings. I met one of them today. He wanted to know what happened to my column that appears on this and a couple of other “Mac web” sites.

“Hey, it’s summer. It’s Minnesota,” I chuckled. “Do you REALLY think I’m going to be stuck behind my keyboard every day, now that it’s above 20 degrees outside (those who’ve experienced -30 degree wind chill -- and live to brag about it -- will get that inside joke)?”

I suggested that he pick one of the sites I write for and go look at the archives, paying specialattention to the dates of the articles. During the winter months -- winter lasts six months in Minnesota; I’m not kidding -- I told him to notice that I am more prolific when it’s cold outside. On the days where we were snowed in, I was a writin’ fool, as they would say. As it got warmer, my writing became less frequent. It had nothing to do with losing sight of my Muse, unless you allow me to count Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). It had more to do with sun worship. Golfing. Jogging. Working in the yard. Writing that damned novel.

Having a life.

From time to time I get a wild hair and decide to push myself away from my Mac and exercise my atrophied muscles, which have experienced no movement all winter, notwithstanding the involuntarily twitching they go through whenever some 15-year-old kid frags me during a networked game of Unreal Tournament (damned that forced feedback).

I related this to my reader, and we got into a discussion about Mac users and our need to “give it a rest” from time to time. I’ve written about this before, but felt it needs to be said again: Mac is great; Mac is good; let’s thank Jobs and knock on wood, but let’s also remember that sometimes there is a fine line between Mac evangelist and weirdo. At least that’s what I said to this reader when he said -- like I’ve never heard this before -- “you’re nothing like your writing.”

That worries me, because I run into my share of Mac users who could a full prescription of the proverbial Chill Pill. Maybe they, if they were to meet me after reading my writing, would be let down that I’m not as rabid as my writing is fleshed out to be.

I really don’t spend my free time licking the sides of my G4 Cube, I don’t care what my wife says.

Think of this as a Public Service Announcement. A reminder to love your Mac, respect your Mac, but also to unplug your Mac from time to time. I’m told that’s healthy. Apple’s stock value won’t go down if you’re not keeping up with every Apple-related fart that is published on Mac OS Rumors. The end is not nigh if you have Mac OS 10.0.2 on your machine while there version 10.0.3 is running on your friend’s computer.

Sir, put down the mouse and step away from the iMac! Make-no-sudden-moves! I know it’s difficult, but you CAN do it! That’s it, sir. Walk over to the counselors standing by the squad car. No, that’s okay. Yes, it’s natural that you get “the shakes.” That will subside in a few minutes.
Now, promise that you will stop humping that iMac, each and every one of you. It’s disgusting. It’s embarrassing. It’s my turn :-)

Fini.

This column is © 2001 Rodney O. Lain. All rights reserved.

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About Rodney O. Lain

A former journalist and college prof, Rodney lives in Minnesota, where he freelance writes by night and works by day as a junior manager for a Fortune 50 company (daily he bemoans the fact that he was assigned a Gateway laptop by the IT guys). He has a soft spot for H. L. Mencken, Steve Jobs, Prince, Richard Wright and other well-known status-quo breakers. Rodney also writes "iBrotha" for Mac Observer and "Things Macintosh" for Low End Mac. Also, he writes about religion, race and culture at his website iBrotha.com.

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