Anonymity Therapy

Officially known as the 'Witness Protection Program.' Unofficially, it should be considered a form of therapy.

I see value in being forced to live amongst the unfamiliar. There are too many mental triggers that go off when you look at a familiar street name, a coffee shop, or the same face that serves you coffee every morning, on the dot. I sometimes cannot glance down a street I frequent without being overcome with a feeling of obligation - to what, I can't always pinpoint - that serves as a reminder that I am tied to, needed by, even the things I consider to have little immediate value to my daily agenda.

Anonymity is the tool that allows us to be introspective; instead of imprisoning ourselves up in a dark room and meditating, or attempting to procure a slice of silence throughout our day so we can 'think' to ourselves, we can do the same so long as nobody recognizes us and every element of our environment is foreign to our five senses.

I'd like to try this out by taking a small boat in the middle of the ocean, which I think is currently the only compromise, but I'm sure the Coast Guard would interrupt my therapy session.

(Middle) Ground (Zero)

I sat through a talk yesterday - ok, I stood, as "host" - given by a prominent Bay Area entrepreneur. I listened. I took mental notes as furiously as I saw pens scribbling and laptop keys transcribing wisdom-nuggets. The room was packed with Charles Schwab and Suze Orman proteges. I was disappointed at what I heard.

There has been a slow death of the Opinion and a rise in the Middle Ground, the compromise that tries to keep all ears happy and appears to be the more intellectually superior alternative to the stereotypically narrow scope of the lone opinion. That's a shame; I'm surrounded by Middle Ground these days: reversible clothing, interdisciplinary majors, "full-service" services, sweet & sour. Come on, the "breakfast sandwich" ? I can't remember the last time I heard a solid, abrasive opinion. Are people too exhausted to defend their viewpoints? Can we outsource that task, too?

During the Q&A session I heard many honest, specific questions. I'm of the belief that specific questions deserve specific answers, useful or not, intellectual-sounding or not, because a vague response that covers the spectrum of possible responses is of no more use than a rhetorical question given as the response itself.

The climax of irony for the evening: "I don't like to take risks."
- (visiting entrepreneur)

I wonder if the speaker was able to delegate risk-taking for the past 25 years and what risk-evading venture capitalists fund middle-ground ventures. Maybe the fact that I can't think of any says enough. Really, what tech venture (the speaker's company) is stuck at 'startup' status after 11 years? I should've asked, "Does Moore's Law stutter?"

High-Def Highs

I had a high-definition camera shoved down my throat Friday morning. I can't imagine people liking anything shoved down their esophagus (you try writing the plural form of that) regardless of the limitless cranberry juice and saltines they are entitled to post-procedure which, by the way, somehow restore electrolyte balance better than any I.V. bag ever could. Even with a fully numbed field of taste buds and lips that seemed to weigh a quarter-pound each from their numbness, I had to eat something and swore I could think back to whatever the food tasted like at some point in order to convince myself that I was in fact eating; my upper GI tract wouldn't be cooperating for another 24 hours.

The doctor met me in the procedure room which was ice cold. According to the nurses, this was to keep 'bacteria from proliferating.' Right, because bacterium go on a labor strike at 10 degrees below normal room temperature. If you are about to perform a medical procedure on someone, you should be keeping them comfortable and I don't mean simply offering them a warm blanket (I declined).

The fun part of this is always in seeing how high you can count to after they administer anesthesia and before you completely pass out. I think my record is 72 seconds. I remember making a 'roofie' joke to the doctor before passing out, asking if he'd call me the morning after. I saw a smirk then remember waking up with a headache and my wallet untouched, which means either he can somehow identify a maxed-out Visa card or he is still shy after all we've been through.

What they should do for patients, I mean to really capitalize off of this whole 'digital age' thing, is to offer the HD footage of their insides in video Podcast format. If you can't be awake for the whole thing, you should have the option of viewing it from the beginning - Tivo style - on your little portable media player (as I carefully tip-toe around the shameless plug for App...oops, there we go again). And because full motion video of your insides is just so, well, gross, it has built in Search Engine Optimization potential; the amount of traffic such 'train wreck' entertainment would bring means a gold mine of advertising space for the site hosting the footage. Imagine dating profiles based off 30-second endoscopy clips: "Hi, Mandy! I think we have the same esophageal scar tissue caused by our GERD!"

And how could I forget my nurses? I will cash in all my karma next time and tell one how I am pretty sure the anesthesia isn't supposed to wear off so soon, but if she would join me for a cup of coffee at the cafeteria, it would take my mind off the pain. And she'd still have to push me in a wheelchair and refill my Ocean Spray. Ah, the other side of blackmail...the side you're not on!

Hangin' With Mr. Bluetooth

I saw Mr. Bluetooth at the Britannia Arms pub two weeks ago. He was hanging out in a corner of the dance floor, adorned with faux dog tags and white-knuckling the long-neck of his Corona Extra. Extra, as in 'look at me, I'm extra douche.' I'm pretty sure we are all allowed at least one stereotype, maybe two, but any more and we parody ourselves.

Mr. Bluetooth was silent and not moving, but he wasn't drunk. He had a look of intent in his eyes, which my own pair followed and estimated to be locked onto a group of bouncy college posteriors; at least he was logical. Good for him.

But that was all the logic that Mr. Bluetooth brought with him to the pub. (Note: Any place that sells hard liquor cannot be called a 'pub,' by definition of the word) Either he was a sports agent or a surgeon or a drug dealer (do any of them have social lives, anyway?) because he stood there with a blinding blue light flashing from his ear lobe. So bright was this light that the noise of the live band playing and the flailing of double-fisted drinks wasn't enough to distract the runway light emitting from Mr. Bluetooth's head. If the venue had been open air, I would've ducked to avoid landing gear.

Do we seem more unavailable when we wear a headset and therefore cooler? Outside of the 9 to 5, it's out of place. Outside of wearing one while driving, it serves little function. Besides, with stylish cell phones and cell phone adornments, why negate the 'personality' you can attribute to your cellular by wearing a headset so your phone stays buried in your denim? Steve jobs would shit an iPhone - fully activated - if people kept theirs in their pockets and only used their headsets.

Is this a new fad? Do people stand there with their bluetooth headsets, permanently on, without a need to talk? This must be the succession to wearing sunglasses indoors of the 90s. Or tucking your shirt in your underwear of the 80s.

Someone should document the change in times not just by what is stylish and what music is popular, but also by what new and retarded trend currently fits the direction of the consumer market. I predict groups of young folks congregating around their music players hooked up to portable speakers (the analog..well, the digital...of high schoolers lifting their trunk lids to blast bass-filled noise pollution marking their 'territory'), outdoors, and hordes of drunk girls rushing over to dance to the coolest tunes playing within earshot, like beads attracting bare breasts at Mardi Gras.