Wait a minute. You mean to tell me that if you cry on TV you can be President of the United States? If I'd have known that....
Pam's xB has all the conveniences, including a CD player, remote keyless entry and power windows. Stealth Reliabity, on the other hand, has a radio. If I want the window down, I crank it down. If I want the passenger side window down I pull over, turn off the engine, walk around the van, unlock the door, open it and roll down the window.
Yeah, that's a pain, but it works every time. Pam's car, on the other hand, has three windows that work and a fourth that works about once in 10 tries. I'm not sure which I prefer.
Our water heater stopped heating yesterday. I checked the electrical and everything was OK up to the water heater so I figured it was internal and required a plumber's expertise. He came out this morning while I was on a job and told Pam that the box on the top was kerput. The lady who owned this house was oversold on almost every good or service she bought and this water heater was no exception. She got it in 2006, it's 55 gallons huge, and has a 5"x7" box on top that has lights and dials and inside holds a circuit board. This extra feature is supposed to save money (don't ask me how) and the lights alert you to any malfunction in the heater.
Alas, they don't alert you to a malfunction in the box itself. The guy said there was a recall on these boxes a couple of years ago (does us no good now) and he might be able to get one shipped in by Friday.
For the next two or three days we'll be showering at the gym and using paper plates. By the time we've paid for a new version of that fancy box and the plumber's time we will have far exceeded the savings that box could have brought in the next 100 years.
Will the total cost of the repair exceed that for the installation of a new 30-gallon water heater from Lowe's. Probably. It's too late for that now, but that cheap basic water heater with a single element and a dial at the bottom would have been trouble free for 20 years. Sort of like crank windows.
The double-edged sword is evident in the church, too. I'm printing out our bulletin on 24 lb. white paper from Office Max and I've dropped in a map of the Fertile Crescent. At Celebration I would have projected that map through the laptop and data projector. Same with the map of Canaan I'll draw on the white board hanging on J & A's kitchen wall. Walter will play his guitar hooked up to a small amp and lead the singing without benefit of a mic. We'll read the words off of sheets of paper. It's not Hans Gruber and Silent Night, but it's not high tech either. Then again, the sound board won't hum, the projector won't mysteriously go dark in the middle of the service and the mics won't crackle.
Are we better off for all the technology? Has it enhanced the ministries of the local church? As a teacher I really enjoy the benefits, but there are definite downsides.
Doesn't make a lot of difference since we can't go back. Cars, water heaters, the church...they've all moved into the 21st century. When the time comes, Pathway Bible Church will take advantage of all the benefits and we'll deal with the problems.
But there's something to be said for crank windows.
1 comment:
Hey, Jen Goulette here. Just wanted to let you know that not all crank windows are good. For example, hypothetically speaking, if your sister had crank windows in her living room and the cranks were about 2 or 3 feet from the floor and you were standing close to the window and saw your adorable niece do something camera worthy and you squatted, straight down in an extreme hurry to get the picture before the moment passed and your bottom end found the handle of the window crank which was sticking out about as far as it possibly could, that might not feel too good for about a week or so. You know, just hypothetically speaking. :)
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