Teknofobe

That's the name of my new trance dance outfit.

In da house!

Ahem, actually, a rather serious point must be made. As well as the things I can't cope with, such as tying my shoelaces, climbing ladders, folding paper in half, etc it surprises me that there are certain technologies that have me baffled, or even worse, terrified.

I am terrified of house alarms, or burglar alarms in general. Not because I go house breaking and these things alert people to my unwanted presence. No, I hate the noise they make when you set them and then again when you enter the house while the alarm's activated. It's that sort of count-down to world destruction, panicky, rapid extremely loud beeping.

First off, you get the "alam activated" code. This is particularly bad if you set the alarm for while you're in bed at night:

"Right, you've activated me, beep, beep, beep. Better get upstairs quick, beep, beep, beep. What, you've forgotten something and need to go back into the kitchen? BEEP, BEEP, BEEP! What about that living room light? BEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEEEEEEEEEP!"

You finally make it upstairs with your heart in your mouth and drenched in a cold sweat; you run into your bedroom and fall onto the bed. Deep breaths, it's OK, you did it, the beep's stopped now. You're safe from harm....

Did you enter the right code? Does the alarm know that you're in the house, in this bedroom? What happens when I go out onto the landing? Will the sensor know I'm supposed to be here and just wink at me, or will it set off an electrical chain reaction in a fraction of a second; setting sirens and bells, strobe lights. Complete sensory overload.

Safer to stay in bed and pray for a power cut before you shit yourself or die of starvation. At least a power cut will set off all your neighbours' house alarms too, then you won't feel such a spaz when you trip yours by going to the bathroom in the night.

Perhaps you did programme it correctly?....

Of course the other way the alarm gets you is when you return home and open the door:
"ENTER THE CODE, ENTER THE CODE NOW!!!!!! DO IT, DON'T FUCK UP, DON'T FUCK UP!!!!!"

They send me into such a panic.


My other hate is microwave ovens. I don't see much point in these things anyway, but when it comes to using one, I'm completely clueless. I could just about cope with the old ones with the analogue dials for power and time, but these modern ones with all these buttons and settings? Forget it.


I was going to spend a bit of time and effort and add some photos to this post, but my eye is fucking killing me and I need to try and see what's going on. It feels like there's something under the eyelid. Bastard!