"You've got (junk) mail!" An investigation into OUR e-mails

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Frothing political commentators, both right and left, are missing what is to me the most surprising aspect of the FBI investigation of Hillary’s 30,000 e-mails.

She in four years received just 30,000 e-mails?

I bet I get that many when I duck downstairs for a quick beer.

The FBI is coming under right-wing criticism for not indicting Clinton. I think the FBI should be given the rest of the summer off.

Can you imagine scrutinizing 30,000 of someone else’s e-mails?

I can’t imagine scrutinizing any of my own.

No communications method in our increasingly messy way we have of staying in touch has fallen more sharply than the once-beloved e-mail. They’re totally dreary, rife with spam and so voluminous that keeping up is like trying to keep waves from reaching the beach.

Faxes have more personality.

It didn’t used to be that way.

Getting e-mails used to add zing to your day.

Heck, they even made a hugely successful rom-com about the surreptitious pleasure. It was “You’ve Got Mail!” a still resonant catchphrase anyone who had a a once-hip AOL account enjoyed hearing.

The ’98 Nora Ephron movie starred to of our most endearing stars, Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. Promos made it seem like their on-screen nipples would spring to attention at the chipper sound of the computerized phrase.

I never saw it, but you can bet if it starred Hanks and Ryan it had a happy ending.

Endings, happy or otherwise, are something you’ll never find in your e-mail queue. They never cease.

And I’m just a bit player in the morass, an underemployed nobody. I golf with other nobodies, sure, but they’re nobodies with gainful employment.

They receive exponentially more e-mails than I do. If I get 30, they get 130.

How many of them require a response?

“About 10 percent.”

What’s it like if you don’t check it every hour or so?

“You’re buried. You can never catch up. Our e-mails deaden our days.”

I read that Napoleon used to open his mail just once a month on the assured belief that if he waited that long the issue in the letter would have been resolved.

I understand the wisdom behind this, yet persist in checking my e-mails about once every 10 minutes worried, I guess, that some general attacking Leipzig might be interested in my military advice.

Technology is the willful and agreed upon demolition of charm and all that was once beloved as quaint.

Truly, any communication that doesn’t involve actual eye contact is lacking.

Person-to-person, sure, is best, but I’m so sick and tired of the whole ordeal I’m thinking of going old school. Really old school.

I’m talking carrier pigeon.

Carrier pigeons were used extensively in World War I to reliably convey secret messages across the trenches and German pharmacist Julius Neubronner famously used carrier pigeons to deliver urgent medicines in the early 20th century. 

The birds have been known to travel 50 mph more than 1,100 miles.

Sure, some of the leg-strapped messages may have been smeared with pigeon poop, but I doubt many correspondents would care.

Most of our communications are already so crappy who’d know the difference?

Related …

Why do so many things suck so bad?

Why today you should write someone a letter

For big profits, USPS needs to begin mailing humans

Whining over postal liquor delivery restrictions

Tom Hanks: Actor, man verb

Standing is the new sitting

So I’m sitting here trying to think of a decent blog idea and all I can think about is how I wish I were laying here trying to think of a decent blog idea.

I’m doing this because in my mind I’m wrestling with recent news reports that said  standing has become the new sitting.

This is from Michael S. Rosenwald’s story from The Washington Post (I love the lead):

“Some people can’t stand working. Mark Ramirez works standing.

“He is not a waiter or a factory worker. He is a senior executive at AOL. Mr. Ramirez could, if he wanted, curl into a cushioned leather chair. No, thanks. He prefers to stand most of the day at a desk raised above stomach level.

“I have my knees bent, I feel totally alive,” he said. “It feels more natural to stand. I wouldn’t go back to sitting.”

Well, good for you. I guess none of us wants to be stuck one row behind guys like Mark next time we go to catch a matinee.

The story says standing at pricey gut-level desks (www.GeekDesk.com sells them for $799) is healthy, reduces drowsiness and is shown to increase life spans. It cited one fanatic who not only stands but walks a steady 1 mph on a treadmill while working at his desk.

Clearly, this endocrinologist missed his calling. He’d have made a dandy postal employee.

It’s an interesting debate, but I think I’ll sit this one out.

I learned early on stress is a killer and without fail I’m most stressed the more degrees I am removed from 180 horizontal. So my preferred postures are, in reverse order, sprint, jog, stand, sit, slouch and lay.

I’ve found the circumstance most geared to wellness is center bed, buried toes up in a quilt, while TV Land broadcasts a day-long marathon of “The Andy Griffith Show.”

If research proves that relaxing posture cures heart disease the way it cures hangovers it could replace CPR as a preferred emergency treatment.

I remember reading shortly after President George W. Bush appointed him defense secretary that Donald Rumsfeld’s true position was upright. With great foresight, he stood throughout the day for many of the reasons cited by today’s advocates.

I remember thinking: “Outstanding. What an innovative and thoughtful gent. Now, here’s a good guy to turn to if the country ever finds itself mired in a really stupid war.”

But successful standers are rare. The only two I could think of are “Price is Right” hosts Bob Barker and Drew Carey. Of course, if the tabloids are to be believed, both men spent considerable time horizontal and in the comely company of surgically enhanced women adept at gesturing toward things like skidoos.

At the other extreme is Hugh Hefner, the only man who’s made a success of his life lying down. But that job’s taken and when Hef goes he’s taking it with him.

So sitting to me is a happy middle ground.

I just can’t see standing catching on.

And how would history be altered if great leaders throughout history stood? What if Abraham Lincoln was renown for standing? How would that have altered the stunning Lincoln Memorial?

They’d need a hole in the roof.

How much more mayhem would Custer-killer Sitting Bull have wreaked had he been Standing Bull?

Would The Situation be more compelling if he was The Standuation?

It’s a lot to ponder, especially as I’m still trying to process just how Prop 19 was defeated in California.

You mean there is a deficit of pot smokers in California? The only thing I can figure is they’re all planning on casting their ballots this Saturday afternoon.

Now, there’s a group that’ll never be swayed by the standing-is-better argument.

In fact, many of the most avid pot smokers I’ve known through the years are perfectly at peace only when fully reclined.

Giving them the three options -- stand, sit, or lay -- and there’s only one eventuality.

Sit or get off the pot.