Monday, June 1, 2009

Overrated technology: Leaf Blowers and Automatically-flushing toilets

(Today's guest blog is brought to you by Field Guide -- sorry about the delay.)

When I see someone using a leaf blower, I feel really sad.

I feel sad because I put myself in that person’s shoes and think how pointless and meaningless life must seem: I am an Hispanic immigrant, standing on Poplar or Central, blowing the leaves of the overprivileged into the street, and cars whiz by me and blow them right back onto the sidewalk or into the yard. And I don’t care because I’m paid to do this. (Leafblowing = Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.) No matter what, the trees are going to continue to produce leaves, and they’re inevitably going to fall to the ground. And rather than composting them, I blow them into the street. This is job security.

Leafblowing is the quintessential example of futility. It’s the ultimate in technological and social resignation. Paying people to do futile, pointless work.... And is there anything worse than pointlessness? I can’t imagine waking up every morning thinking, “I’m going to use a leaf blower all day long.” This is not meant to be disparaging to the landscaping and yardwork community. I would love to plant things and tend gardens and mow lawns (especially with the old-fashioned human-powered lawn mowers), and as an occupation, landscaping and gardening work – farming and tending in general – are tremendously rewarding jobs.

But leaf blowers ruin it. Leaf blowers emit fumes into the air which decrease air quality. And they disperse the problem of errant leaves without finding a real solution. Leafblowers are the manifestation of NIMBY. Or NIMFY (if it’s the front yard). They’re ubiqutous flagrant examples of the decline of society.

Automatically-flushing toilets are not far behind on my worst-inventions list. There are several worst-case bathroom scenarios that transpire in the ladies’ lavatory as a result of automatically-flushing toilets:

Scenario 1: You want to sit to do your business, but you want to paper the potty first. So you grab a handful of tissue and wipe down the wet seat. Your bending over the toilet causes the toilet to automatically flush, creating more water to spray on the seat.

Scenario 2: Repeat Scenario 1 first. If you’re lucky, the self-flusher has been tricked into submission and won’t flush again. You wipe down the seat (again) and then paper the potty. You may now assume the position.

Scenario 3: Repeat Scenarios 1 and 2. You’re done with your business, and now you have to finish the process. You lean over to reach for the TP and the self-flushing toilet is activated by your booty lifting off the seat. Your backside is now wet and sprayed with toilet bowl water. Congratulations. Now you have the TP that you used to paper the potty stuck to your hindside.

Isn’t this ridiculous? I don’t even understand why automatically-flushing toilets even exist. Are we such infants that we have to relegate bathroom cleanup to automated toilets? Are we not capable of flushing on our own? And let me tell you, airports are the worst. Not only do you have all your luggage in the stall with you, creating a more cramped environment, but those automatically-flushing toilets are super-aggressive and ultra-sensitive.Moreover, yellow is mellow, but brown goes down. Automatically-flushing toilets are not discriminating about their contents.

Modern technology can be really humiliating.

Of course there are underrated conveniences like a dishwasher or like a milk/cream foamer for coffee that I really appreciate and am not willing to get rid of. Autoclaves are nice as well. As are indoor-outdoor thermometers. And pyrethrum bug sprayers.

1 comment:

Stephanie said...

Take all your horrible self-flushing scenarios, and add a child who is only very recently potty trained. Or "was" potty trained- now the kid is scared of toilets and you have to start from scratch. Sigh.