I want my toggle button back

Sometimes I miss broadcast TV. Not in a nostalgic, rabbit-ears kind of way, just in the very specific, muscle-memory way that shows up every football season when I’m holding a remote and trying to do something that used to require exactly one button.

You remember the button. The sacred toggle: Game on NBC. Tap. Game on ABC. Tap. Back again. Tap.

Now checking another score feels like navigating airport security. Exit the game. Home screen. Open the right streaming app. Confirm I’m me. Find sports. Find the game. Click in. Wait. And by the time it loads, I’ve missed too much of both games.

And if I want to go back to the first game? I repeat the pilgrimage. Because nothing says progress like a longer walk to the same couch.

To be fair, the modern TV universe is dazzling. Infinite choices. Every game somewhere. Highlights, stats, alternate angles, documentaries about the long snapper’s childhood goldfish. It’s abundance on a cosmic scale. The problem is that abundance now comes packaged with friction: tiny bureaucracies of clicking and confirming that sit between me and checking in on other options.

Old broadcast TV had limits, but it respected momentum. It didn’t ask who was watching. It just switched the channel.

I’m not giving up streaming. I like choice. I like having every game within reach. I’d just like one honest button again. One small, beautiful shortcut between curiosity and knowing.

Translated into Data

 

Something gets lost when every corner of life becomes optimized, monetized, tracked, and translated into data.

We were promised “smart” everything. What we got was a world that’s constantly trying to convert human existence into a subscription model.

And everybody seems OK with it. 

Not surprising. Human beings will normalize almost anything if you wrap it in convenience. Especially if it arrives with clean branding and free shipping. So now we now carry tracking devices everywhere voluntarily and get annoyed when they only predict half of our desires correctly.

Even creativity gets treated like a branch of logistics. Algorithms decide what music gets heard, what writing gets seen, what paintings get shared, what jokes survive longer than six minutes. The machine doesn’t ask whether something is true or beautiful or even interesting. It asks whether people paused long enough while scrolling on the toilet.

No, I’m not anti-technology. I like being able to find obscure books in thirty seconds. I enjoy GPS that tells me to “go past this light and turn right at the next one.” I’m grateful I can talk to people across oceans instantly … and not pay huge additional fees to do that. But I think something gets lost when every corner of life is targeted for conversion into data to be crunched into information to be used or misused in any variety of applications.

Some of the best parts of life happen when nobody’s measuring them. They remind you that life is supposed to be lived, not continuously processed.

And maybe that’s what I really miss. Not old objects. Not rotary phones or bank books.

I miss a world where living wasn’t a business model and existence wasn’t a revenue stream.

My New TV Career

So I asked ChatGPT what television show I should be on.

I was expecting maybe they'd suggest I'd be a compassionate senior surgeon on "Grey's Anatomy", a savvy Chief of Police on "Law and Order", or perhaps a love interest for Hannah Waddingham on "Ted Lasso". Nope. AI thinks I'm a cowboy.

Chat GPT response: You look like you belong on Yellowstone 🤠 — the rugged beard, weathered face, and easygoing grin give you that Montana rancher energy. You look like the guy who’s been working the ranch for 30 years, knows everybody’s secrets, and isn’t afraid to tell the Dutton family exactly what he thinks!

ChatGPT tends to suck up to its prompter ... so I guess "weathered face and "working the ranch for 30 years" could've been a lot worse.

Pumpkin Spice Rant

 

Yep, it’s pumpkin spice season. That magical time of year when the leaves turn orange, the air gets crisp, and very coffee shop transforms into a pumpkin-themed hostage situation.

And now, like a viral infection, it's spread beyond lattes and breakfast pastries: It seems that every corporation has collectively decided that everything you consume must taste like a scented candle. You can now pick up pumpkin spice cereal, popcorn, hummus … HUMMUS. What culinary genius decided chickpeas needed to taste like Thanksgiving dessert? 

At this point, I’m expecting my multivitamins to come in “Autumn Harvest” flavor and my dentist to offer a pumpkin spice root canal.

And heaven forbid you don’t like pumpkin spice. Suddenly, you’re not participating in the season. You’re a monster. A joyless, cinnamon-deficient goblin. No ... I just want to taste my food without feeling like I’m being gently strangled by a Yankee Candle.

But hey … I get it. Autumn is beautiful. The leaves are changing, the air is crisp, and everything feels a little cozier.

So, happy Fall.

May your coffee taste like coffee, your candles remain strictly decorative, and your pumpkin spice exposure be limited to medically acceptable levels.

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If you enjoyed this quick rant, you should enjoy this quick poem: The Sneering Pumpkin

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And, of course, this from Joe Lennon: