Are We Really This 
Pathetic? 

I finally broke down and decided to try to become more organized in both my work and my personal life. So, after doing some serious research and shopping around for a couple of weeks, I went ahead and succumbed to the geekdom that surrounds me at work and purchased a Personal Digital Assistant, or PDA.

It's a marvelous thing! It wakes me up in the morning then wakes me up again to remind me that my fat ass needs to be out in the garage working out, then wakes me up again to tell me I'd better get up or I'll be late for work. It then reminds me that it needs to be synchronized with my computer so that it can download all my favorite news and information so I can read about what's happening out in the world while I'm driving to work or if the TV at work is on the fritz and we can't get CNN.

It keeps my shopping lists, my to-do lists, my meeting schedules, my tech tips I learn throughout my day, recipes, e-books, addresses, phone numbers, important dates, train schedules and, most importantly, it can play interactive Battleship with other PDA's!

It allows me to "beam" my electronic business card to other nerds, geeks, techies, gadget junkies, and anal retentives that have PDA's as well as infrared exchange of various software programs between users. This, incidentally, is known in the vernacular as "SEX", or Software EXchange. Personally, I still feel that there is something inherently wrong with five grown men sitting around in a circle having SEX with their Palms.

Anyway, this brings me to this Sandwich's subject. I was sitting at my desk yesterday and decided that since I had a little time while drinking my first cup of coffee of the day, I would catch up on the news of the last 24 hours. So, I whipped out my handy-dandy PDA and and clicked my way to the Fox News Channel downloaded fresh earlier in the morning. The Top Story:

n' Sync captures top awards at Teen something or other.

I had to check that I had clicked on "Top Story" and not some bottom-of-the-page Entertainment Tonight article.

Nope.

There it was.

The Top Story.

Never mind that the FAA had just released their findings in the cause of the TWA Flight 800 explosion, this is BIG! I mean, we're talking n 'Sync here! Forget about the unprecedented televised apology of the Russian Naval Commander, boy bands are the real news!

Well, figuring that this was probably just a fluke, I again checked the "Top Story" on the Fox News Channel this morning. Much to my dismay, another totally inane story was there at the top. "Survivor."

A guy gets a million bucks for going camping. But hey! That's something we all want to read about, right? All the politics, back-biting, whining, and petty bickering involved in eliminating 15 out of 16 people in some dumb contest. Screw the Gulf Air plane crash into the Persian Gulf, man! This is news! Who gives a rat's ass about the poor kids that boiled themselves alive in Yellowstone Park? Faulty wiring in TWA Flight 800? Big friggin' deal! These people are going to do REALLY great things! Like pose nude for Playboy, be spokespersons for Nike, and make the talk show circuit!

Come on, Rupert! This is the Fox Network! You're in America now! This isn't some lame British morning news program with anchors reading headlines from the London tabloids. We should be seeing REAL news on our expensive little gizmos first so we can feel like we're halfway intelligent people!

Then, when nobody's watching, we can scroll on down to the Entertainment section and read all about the kid who got picked to play Harry Potter.

Maybe we ARE pathetic after all.

Mike