I'll set the scene for you:
A 3 bedroom cabin with 7 people and 1 gigantic Labrador. 5 laptop computers, 5 internet browsing smartphones. 1 xbox. 2 TVs.
This is post-Thanksgiving at my house. The family is together for the first time in many months. Are we bonding? Absolutely not. Rather, we're all glued to our respective electronic devices. For a time, I refused to join the crowd. Instead of opening up my laptop and feeding my internet addiction, I flipped through the pages of my wine marketing book. Certainly, I would rather be re-reading Harry Potter or catching up on some Edward Cullen, but I'm trying to be a mature grad student and enhance my mind to get the leg up on the other hundred thousand people that aspire to be wine marketers. Before too long though, I realized that this was too good of a rant opportunity to pass up. And that was good enough of an excuse to fire up the ol' Toshiba. Because really, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em, right?
We're not Black Friday people. First of all, after all the wine we had last night, we were not about to pull ourselves out of bed for a bargain. I have no interest in bolting through the aisles to get my hands on the latest trend. I love a sale every bit as much of the next person, but the opportunity cost of fighting crowds of Octomoms looking for a 2 for 1 Pull-My-Finger-Elmo doll is exponentially higher than any sale is worth. My worst nightmare is arm-wrestling Redneck Peggy Sue for Wal Mart's last copy of Ernest Goes to Burning Man Special Edition DVD. Note to my readers: if you ever find me in the situation, please drag me over to the tools department, find the biggest wrench you can, and hit me upside the head to put me out of my misery because I couldn't live with the shame.
I'll further describe the scene to you, clockwise. My father sits immediately to my left with his laptop. This time he's not playing Mavis Bacon, thank God. He's reading about Tiger Woods and his car accident this morning in which alcohol was allegedly not involved. Ok -- seriously? It was 2:25 AM after Thanksgiving, and he crashed into a tree and fire hydrant in front of his own house. Yeah, my bet is that Tiger had been into the sauce. Although, he is part Asian, so maybe we can just blame the horrible driving on his heritage.
My cousin sits to the left of my father, browsing his iTouch, finding the most obnoxious sound the device can make. This is, of course, interrupted by the periodic public display of images of "hot girls in snow" or "hot girls doing the weather report" or "hot girls carving the turkey" or pretty much any image of some scantily clothed skank doing whatever scantily clothed skanks do. He recently took a shower, and I have a few inclinations as to why.
To his left until very recently was my aunt. Her laptop was on her lap, and I can only assume she was deeply immersed in an online crossword puzzle. A quick piece of advice: never, NEVER steal her crossword. Especially if you like all 10 of your fingers.
I just got kicked out of my perfectly warmed prime real estate couch spot because my cousin wants to show my dad a website, that just absolutely had to be shared.
One more couch cushion to the left is my mother, playing some Boggle knockoff on her iPhone, as she receives text messages from my brother who is across the room on his MacBook. His headphones are on, but I can still hear the Daft Punk.
My uncle is in the kitchen doing who knows what on his laptop.
Every time someone even moves toward the remote to switch on the TV, the rest of us cry out in protest. How dare someone interrupt our internet time with something as archaic as a television. Agreeing on a TV program is unheard of.
A few hours ago, someone suggested that we play a game of Rummy Cubes, a pre-internet family favorite. A few of us were down to play, but upon the stipulation that the game waited until we were done doing whatever we were respectively doing on our computers.
2 hours later and we haven't moved.
This is what technology has brought us. This seems to be a recurring theme in this blog.
Oh well, pretty soon someone will decide that it's beer thirty and the river of booze will begin to flow. My brother and cousin, manly men that they are, will pop open their Mike's Hard Lemonades, my father will get into the gin, my mom and aunt will find whatever is left of the Pinot Grigio, and me....well, I think today I'll start with straight tequila. Then we'll all start talking politics, and reminiscing about the time that Grandpa threw the hamburger across the dinner table. Ah, family.
It's 27 days until Christmas eve. By that time, I am quite sure that we will have acquired another 2 or 3 electronic devices to further excuse us from talking to each other.
Happy Thanksgiving. Or should I say...where's my beer?
