McHuston Booksellers

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Tag: literature (Page 25 of 39)

Nyuk Nyuk. A funny thing happened…

August 8, 2013 /

Humor.

It’s a funny thing. And I mean that literally, but not completely. That’s because what one person sees as a real knee-slapper another person might find annoying.

Keystone cops. Three Stooges. Legends. Sure, but I don’t think I ever laughed once. Slapstick just isn’t my thing. I hear people laughing (probably pre-taped and added in post-production) on the Funny Home Videos show, but I usually just cringe. I feel horrible for those people who tumble off the stage, ride their skateboards into the sides of parked cars, or slide down the snow-covered hill into a crotch-killing signpost.

Why don’t I see the humor in that?

Same reason a comedian named Steven Wright bombed in Tulsa years ago. I’d seen him on the Tonight Show and laughed out loud. Rare stuff for me. He followed a manic, frantic, prop-using funnyman on stage. Steven Wright’s brand of humor was a little more cerebral. Not brainiac stuff, really. But his droll delivery combined with his off-the-wall observations worked for me. When I saw him, he looked just like he does in the accompanying image.

Example (delivered in a deadpan, straight-face): Went home last night. Accidentally put my car key in the door lock. Turned it and the house started. So… I took it for a drive around the block.

The club was called Jokers. I was one of the only ones in the audience that night that laughed out loud. A few minutes after his set, I glanced to the side and saw Mr. Wright standing next to me. I apologized for the crowd, and admitted that I thought he was hilarious. He thanked me for the support. He had heard my laugh in the otherwise private-conversation-invested audience.

The humor-spectrum is the reason that so many different types of comedians can find success. There are that many people who find the various routines hilarious.

Tonight, I laughed out loud. The television is on in the office while I do some bookwork. (Book store, bookwork: get it? Yuk-yuk-yuk! Puns… the humor genre universally considered unfunny.) The CBS program Elementary is showing and Sherlock Holmes (I can only watch television based on literary fiction. –Joking) responded to a question posed by his assistant Watson.

Holmes, describing a remodeled wall in a home: …and the decomposing body caused a concave bulge in the wallboard.

Watson: You’re sure his body was hidden behind the wall?

Holmes, looking hesitant: Pretty sure.

The camera jumps to the interior of the house, where a gaping hole has been punched in the sheetrock and a body-shaped black-plastic-wrapped package is clearly visible. And it’s clear that the answer Holmes gave was purposely-driven, perfectly-timed:

Understatement.

I laughed out loud.

Realized immediately, that – just like the Steven Wright portion of that night at the comedy club – I was probably not in the majority in enjoying that humor.

So, I’m sitting here thinking: It’s funny how humor is so funny. And its just as funny how some humor is not-so-funny.

Some serious thoughts, there.

Makes me laugh.

Come visit!

McHuston

Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main St. Broken Arrow, OK!

An iCure for iSick iPads.

August 6, 2013 /

Somebody in my impressionable youth told me, “If you can’t fix it with a hammer, get a bigger hammer.” Amazingly enough, I’ve had that work for me on occasion.

Usually doesn’t have anything to do with delicate computer technology though. I’m not sure a bigger hammer would have brought my waterlogged cellphone back to life.

Imagine my surprise then, when I did a search on iPad troubleshooting. The symptoms? Where the screen should be displaying white, was a dull red. Not just backgrounds. The shades of white in photographs and other images were the wrong color too.

She admitted that she had dropped the iPad. It was kind of slippery, she said. It may have come out of her hands. Once.

This revelation is being shared – not as a public shaming for letting an iPad hit the ground – but as a tutorial on how the thing can be repaired.

With a hammer.

Actually, I didn’t take a hammer to it, but I probably would have if I’d had one handy. In this day and age, when we have trouble with something, the first thing we do is Google it. Which is exactly what I did.

Unbelievably, the search results brought up a string of conversations written by folks with the same glowing red iPad screens, all of whom admitted the tablet had been dropped. Not so unbelievably, many of them blamed the baby, a neighbor, or their mother-in-law.

Almost every posting was bragging about having repaired their iPad by:

SMACKING IT ON THE BACK.

I immediately had a mental image of a newborn iPad being readied for its journey into the great computer world and receiving that life-bringing Smack! Picked up the tablet and gave it a whack. Nothing. Whack. Nothing. Third whack. Nothing.

Back to YouTube. The image is of an actual video in which a successful computer repair person brought their sickly iPad back to health with a hammer. (If you can’t fix it with a hammer…) Picked up the iPad. No hammer at the ready, so I grabbed the salt shaker from the table. Tap. Tap. Double Tap. Nothing.

Back to YouTube. After rereading those really happy people who revived their beloved tablets with the Smack-Method, I thought I’d give it another try.

Baby slaps. SMACK.

Red gone. Color correct.

iPad: Back in business.

The moral here?

It would follow the lines of that bigger hammer thing, but would include some newborn slaps and a salt shaker – which sound kinda like a bad science fiction movie plot.

Always happy when things work out, however crazily!

Come visit!

McHuston

Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main Street, Broken Arrow OK!

It’s tough being Vintage.

August 3, 2013 /

“Upgrade,” they urge. “Upgrade!”

“Up your nose,” I reply, “with a rubber hose.”

Well, I don’t really say that. But sometimes the sentiment crosses my mind. Bigger. Better. Faster. Smaller. Quiet. Louder. It’s all the latest. Upgrade! The one you have is old.

Old = no good, in their book.

I’ve just never felt that way. If you could see my collection of junk, you’d probably note my appreciation for the status quo.

For example: I drive a red Firebird that I have owned for more than a dozen years. I still enjoy tooling around in it, although I wish the air conditioner would heal itself. Beside me is an acoustic guitar I bought in Kentucky just after my high school graduation. Obviously, it’s almost old enough to draw its musical Social Security. (Only a slight stretch there…) Some things were better-made back in the day. They lasted longer.

When my Sony digital camera (the one probably found in the Smithsonian as the very first digital device, it’s so old…) – when it up and died, I bought another on eBay. An identical camera, with the ancient technology and dinosaur-size. It worked great and did everything I asked of it. I never wished it would do something that it couldn’t. Didn’t need to store 6,000 pictures or have it slip comfortably into my shirt pocket. I liked it. I replaced it, with an exact replica.

The death of my cell phone wasn’t the fault of age or technology. I sent it to a watery grave, despite hearing an ominous Thunk! when I loaded the washing machine (the same washer I bought twenty years ago, still working fine, thank-you-very-much). Should have investigated the Thunk! further, but I didn’t. The phone-in-laundry-waterproof test failed. Dead as a hammer after the spin dry cycle.

The cell is nice to have, even if I don’t use it all that much. So I visited the Sprint store, where my powers of invisibility kicked in at the worst possible moment. Pinched myself, held my breath, prayed to the god-of-digits hoping the young woman would be finally be able to see me standing there. Alas. To no avail.

I don’t frequent phone stores much and maybe the clerks all sense that, like dogs smell fear on me when I draw near them. When my pleading look did not even rate eye contact, I gave up and left for that electronic retail experience, diving headlong into the internet waters in hopes of finding a replacement phone.

The word “Upgrade” came up right away. I’ve been with the company for more than a decade (much more) and my contract expired years ago. My Sprint website password is as old as my car.

Andre, the Sprint guy: You should be seeing a link at the left for your options.

Me, after clicking: Those phones look like they came over on the Mayflower.

Andre, the Sprint guy: You could Upgrade instead of replace.

Some of this exercise is just lost on me. I asked Andre to subtract twelve from his age and think about where he was at that time. He admitted he wasn’t driving yet. That’s how long I’ve been a paying customer of his company. But for me to get the latest, greatest cellphone – completely free of charge – I have to become a new customer with another company. My drowned phone is no longer offered. I guess it was a lemon that got squeezed out of the lineup. I had just figured out how to Bluetooth it, too.

Sprint won’t extend me an offer for a Snazz-phone. Can’t get the next great thing. No smart phone for this dummy.

Oh, sure. I can get a sort of retro-looking flip-flop if I sign a two-year deal. The nice phones? Nah. Those are reserved for New Customers. It’s like Andre was pawning me off on Verizon or AT&T. Maybe a WalMart no-contract deal. Hey! I just want a telephone to go along with my monthly bill.

After nineteen-and-a-half minutes (I asked Andre how long we had been talking, and I guess he was timing it. Accurately.) – after that time, I felt guilty thinking he probably should have closed the sale in that length of time. I told him I’d look over the website more closely and call back when I was better informed.

Of course, I went straight to eBay.

Samsung Exclaim, with the Qwerty (fun typing there) keyboard, up for auction in several colors and varying-degrees of abuse. I place a bid. Checked it this afternoon. Won it. At this point, no six-hundred dollar smart phone for me. No upgrade. Just a twenty-dollar replacement version of the drowning victim.

Of course, to get it activated, I’ll have to visit the Sprint store.

Where I am invisible.

I’ll see you right away, if you – Come visit!

McHuston

Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main Street, Broken Arrow OK!

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