17-Apr-2007

Cliffhanger has recently acquired a Blackberry, as she is apparently indispensable to her company and must be available at all times in case of a crisis.  I compare this to my job, wherein my boss thinks I'm mad at him if he asks me to order a new ink cartridge, and it amuses me.  Now, the Blackberry has changed Cliffhanger's life, whether or not she'll admit it.  At first, she couldn't type on it, so I would get very short correspondence from her normally prolific self, things like "Thx" or "Home ho?"  She was extremely proud of herself when, on a five hour road trip from L.A. to Pebble Beach, she composed a two-paragraph opus on bull semen and sent it (the email, not the bull semen) on its merry way to my email address.  What can I say?  She can't possibly go twenty-four hours without conversing with me, and if we don't have anything pressing to discuss, she'll find something.  Like my career.  Or bull semen.  Of course, this email also happened to come to me the day I found out my job would no longer exist at the end of this month.  In fact, Cliffhanger has an uncanny sense of impending tragedy, so that I was actually on the phone with my boss learning the bad news when the email came.  When I explained my lack of response the next day, Cliffhanger merely replied, "Do you know how long it took me to compose that goddamn thing?"  The Blackberry has rendered her incapable of sympathy, you see.  It has ripped out her soul and replaced it with a microchip and a side of snark.

Now, though, she has reached the low point of her devil-ness, because her new favorite Blackberry trick is to actually respond to  an earlier email from me while I'm SITTING RIGHT NEXT TO HER.  And she'll giggle, then look up at  me, and I'll wonder aloud why the fuck she's staring at me and giggling.  Did I forget to wear pants?  Is my nose on fire?  Oh, no.  It's just the new technologically-crazed, maniacal robot that has replaced my friend.

But at least I can now bother her twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.  I say it's well worth it.