Jun 16 2009
Ghosts in the Machines
My new-ish (and so far unbroken) red microwave has a voice feature, presumably for those who are microwaving blind. You can turn the voice low, high, or off, and I keep it off, since I’m not a big fan of chatting with appliances or being told what to do by them, other than by Jill*, my GPS. When I was getting ready for work this morning, I heard the microwave announce “Voice low” then “Voice high”. And I was nowhere in the room. Puzzled, I turned it to “Voice off”.
A few days ago, I had a similar experience with the radio. It just came on, even though I was in the bedroom and it was in the kitchen. Suddenly, the house was full of Curtis Mayfield on KISS FM. Even stranger, when I tried to turn it off, it stubbornly refused, possibly wanting me to hear the end of Mr. Mayfield’s song about hell. I had to unplug it.
Ghosts? Short circuits? Who knows?
When I arrived at BART today, I inserted my ticket in the machine to add the extra $6.20 I needed for my round-trip to the city (I spent $38 filling up the car today. I’m not kidding. I will be BART-ing more often, I fear), and it spit it out with disdain. I tried again, but the machine again pushed it back at me, making a distressed (and distressing) binking sound.
I went to see the agent. He said it had been demagnetized (by my magnetic personality?), and gave me the forty cents that was still on the old ticket. Somehow it seemed like extra money, getting it in coins.
Finally at work, I had a meeting with a gentleman whose firm we recently hired to manage some money for one of our clients. His phone buzzed, and it was his wife sending him a text message to say she was going into labor with their first child (it’s a boy!). In Chicago. We cut the meeting short and he hastened to the airport. I hope he makes it on time. It does seem like a good omen, though, for the beginning of something new.
*You can choose different voices for the GPS, and “Jill” is the American woman one. They should really have voices that are more fun, like Cary Grant or Zsa Zsa Gabor, but perhaps it would take them too long to drawl, “Turn left in 300 feet, dahling.”