Friday F-Off: Automation Nation

Friday F-Off: Automation Nation

I am all for progress. Hell, I have an iPhone 6. I have accepted many automated features that get entwined with my life. Some of them I love. Some of them I am not so impressed with.

For example, I love the automated parking app. Wait. No I don’t. First of all, it was my idea more than 11 years ago. That’s right, before ‘apps’ was even a word, I had researched a parking system that would automatically deduct the time required when you parked in a spot. There were no patents pending and nothing quite like it anywhere else I could find. All a car owner needed was a transponder and it would talk to the parking meter and deduct the exact parking amount and warn you when it needed reloading. Fucking brilliant! But I had a toddler and a fetus… Now, 11 years later the Toronto Parking Authority announces with authority their ‘NEW’ service where you can pay with an app. Shit heads. First they give me a ticket, then they steal my soul.

A better example is the automated Purell dispensers. OK. I kind of like these, but they rarely seem to work. Also, as soon as you think the dispenser is empty and pull your hands away–Bammo! Purell dispensed. They puddle and pool under the machine and the floor is clean enough to eat off of but my hands are still germy.

Automated check-in for flights. This was a fabulous idea until everyone caught on. Early adopters won out here. Now it is faster to go with the surly girl at the counter. ‘Welcome to Air Canada. We aren’t happy until you’re unhappy, I mean happy. Can you please wait while I go on break?’ She was polite, because Canadian of course.

But the douchiest of all automation is the auto toilets. I loved the kick lever. What the fuck was wrong with the kick lever? It worked. It required no hands. It flushed only when you were good and ready. Perfect system. Until… some man got involved. I say it was a man because it is my uncertified opinion that men don’t use the stall and wouldn’t dare flush anyway because they don’t flush at home and ‘isn’t that someone’s job? I don’t want to take away someone’s job.’ So a gay man got involved and said to some automation asshole ‘Can we just get the men’s toilets to flush without us even thinking about it?’. Come on, he had to be gay right? No straight man would walk into a boardroom and admit that he is repulsed by the giant fecal display in the art exhibit stall. Don’t straight men brag about the size of their turds? Maybe there are too many gross generalizations in this paragraph or maybe it is just gross.

Anyway, I am furious with the automated toilet. They claim they are using less water. Poppycock! (I just said that.) The automated porcelain ass holder I used today flushed once when I was done and once when I was done putting my purse on my shoulder. 10 gallons instead of 5. Save not! They say they are more hygienic. Poppycock! After I do the ‘I’m done dance’ in front of the sensor without luck I am forced to press the button. Not with my foot as in the previously unbroken system of the kick lever, but with an actual digit because the button is small. It is small enough to contain the fecal matter of all the previous coffee drinkers because I am sure that button stays uncleaned forever.

But, just when you thought the auto toilet was the douchiest thing in the public bathroom (not including the public, cuz that goes without saying), I run into this! I will give you a moment to read and digest while I wait.

On the surface this seems like a perfectly reasonable thing to advance in bathroom technology. But wait! (Come on, I waited for you…) I have been training myself for years to rub my hands under the dryer. That shit is ingrained! So now every time I am checking to see if something is in my teeth and absentmindedly rub my hands under the dryer the fucking water turns on and I am at square one! No shit. I have to OCD and go back to the soap stage. I know, I know, I am an idiot. Or am I? Yeah, pretty much sure it’s a YES on the idiot scale but it seems perfectly logical at the time as I washed my hands today for the third time. That’s right ladies and gentlemen, I got distracted only two times and had to start over.

Toilet people, please stop automating things that worked perfectly well before. I beg of you.

What automated gizmos get your goat? Don’t even get me started on automated goat herders…

Life with Baby Kicks

Comments

  1. The Fitbit craze! Come on, enough with the step counting already. I did 15,000 steps today! That’s great, Gerald, I ate a whole tub of ice cream. I’m not saying they don’t work, Gerald has actually dropped a lot of weight using the whole idea of steps and all that shit, but then thanks for making me feel guilty for doing zero steps for the day, Fitbit people!
    kdcol recently posted…The most beautiful girl in the worldMy Profile

  2. Sadly, most of these newfangled gadgets we just have to live with. Such is progress. I do think you should sue the Toronto Parking Authority to get your soul back, though. 🙂
    Bun Karyudo recently posted…Little RocksMy Profile

  3. Poor idiotic, soulless Kristine…

    This morning I received a very nice and unexpected “I love you” text from my husband while he was up in our bedroom and I was downstairs drinking tea, perusing my favorite blogs and ignoring my son. When he came down I told him how sweet and romantic his text was. His response: “Oh, I was just playing with the auto-scheduling texting feature on my phone.” I wonder who else received that text.

    I hate the automated toilets, too, because they scare the shit out of me when they flush a second time for no apparent reason. Saving water? That’s not only poppycock, it’s stuff and nonsense! #FirstWorldProblems

  4. Recently I was in the airport in Amsterdam and had to use the toilet before I got on the plane (because I’m not ever using the toilet on an aeroplane) the fucking stupid automated bastard thing started flushing WHILE I WAS STILL FUCKING SITTING THERE!

    I, like you, also hate automated toilets. And iTunes. Get rid of your iPhone immediately, iTunes will enslave us all before long.
    PinkNoam recently posted…7 Days in FranceMy Profile

  5. I want to say automated toilets, but those have already been covered, and automated sliding doors because I’m not unusually short but seem to be just short enough to have to jump up and down to activate the opening mechanism and they can’t just give us a damn handle. The most insane thing, though, is automated customer service “chat” that tries to convince you you’re talking to a real person but is really a computer giving responses based on keywords in what you say. I spent ten minutes trying to get a straight answer from one of these things once. I didn’t care that it was more cheerful than the human I was eventually forced to talk to.
    Christopher recently posted…A Fistful of Coppers.My Profile

    • Oh, good ones! I don’t like the auto revolving doors either. If you get too close to touching anything (old dog new tricks problem) then you are stuck until it is good and ready to start again. This call is being recorded for training purposes…

  6. Can I get an Amen on the auto toilet? Amen sister! Along with my hatred for the auto flushing toilet is the low flow toilet. Our local Whole Foods grocery has a low flow toilet for the general public to use. And the one-stall toilet is in the middle of the store cafe. I’m not kidding when I say it took 14 flushes to get ride of my pee and one toilet seat cover. When I exited the restroom everyone looked at me and it was all I could do not to yell, “I did NOT just have a BM in there!” Thanks Whole Foods for embarrassing me in front of a group of strangers in your quest to save water. Which doesn’t even work by the way. Bastards.
    Gina W. recently posted…Kids Being Dicks (Part Seventeen)My Profile

  7. You said poppycock. That’s why I love you. #effitfriday
    Absolutely Prabulous recently posted…Taking a Short Blogging Break To Be a Wife and Mum!My Profile

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