no.33 - the Amateur

How did an observation about apparent customer complaints between two different brands of camera (Canon and Nikon) bring me head to head with a self-proclaimed amateur gynecologist and the decline of modern society?

(read on...)

Without prolonging this blog entry with the entirety of my post to the photography forum (which you can read here or here), suffice it to say the replies to my post consisted mostly of two sentiments.

One was that I had "waayy" too much time on my hands. The other was that I had not done my "study" with enough depth, breadth, or scientific rigor.

Many of the critiques posted both these criticisms at once, without any apparent awareness of the contradiction of suggesting I spent "waaaay" too much time in my research while simultaneously berating me for not having spent enough time in my research.

But I am not ready to declare irony dead, nor am I willing to write the experience off as a loss, because someone actually responded to my post thusly:

I'm more of an amateur gynecologist than you are an amateur statistician. At least I know where to look for *my* data. And I have direct knowledge of my customers' satisfaction.

I'll give you a moment to digest.

I would be lying if I said I did not take a bit of giddy glee in my reply: "That must be a real savings for you and your family." But my delight is really not something to be proud of as it is exactly the sort of belittling snipe that I dislike.

The amateur gynecologist did not provide a useful critique, but he did produce an amazing bit of writing. It reveals so much about the writer that I envy his ability to convey so much in so few words.

I could parse all day the self-satisfaction, the bravado, and what I hope is the writer's complete misunderstanding of the mechanics of the gynecological profession. But this is the thing about online forums everywhere - people may post with varying degrees of anonymity, but they still can not help but reveal themselves.

Consider, for a moment, the dozen or so postings in which someone in the forum, excited at his or her own wit, thought to elongate or emphasize the "way" in "waaaaay too much time." I don't blame them for not reading through all the posts - but it must be depressing to learn how woefully unoriginal you are when you look at yourself through an internet post.

The amatuer gynecologist was, I hope, unique.

Forum posts so often attempt to degrade or diminish others because, whether we want to admit it or not, we aren't so far from the chimpanzee cage. There is a fight for dominance and status even when there are bananas for everyone.

For example, take the sleepy arrogance of this response:

"As a scientist... imagine how impressive I find your methodology to be."

To which I wanted to reply, "As an artist, imagine how impressive I find your photography to be," but did not, because it would have reduced us to a state of virtual poo flinging and, to be honest, I kind of liked his photography. But he, like so many others, pretend to expect from my single post a complete scientific study, worthy of journal publication, because it allows him a sense of superiority.

If you wish (and you have waaayy too much time on your hands) read here and here to see for yourself the many, many responses. This, I'm afraid, is the kind of virtual community we build for ourselves. What a shame that when we are put into these nearly consequence free worlds of semi-anonymity, we so often fail to muster the best of ourselves and rather bring out the worst.

no.32 - Ninety-Nine

I don't know why the number 99 should be such an awful thing, but it is. As I stood atop the Empire State building with my wife and daughter, this knowledge was brought home to me as my new camera, (a Canon 40D) ceased to function on the very first day of our trip, displaying the dreaded, ambiguous error 99, ruining any plans I had to take photographs of New York, or my family.

This is the ninth time in two years I have suffered through this error which has rendered various pieces of photographic equipment useless. (Nice work Canon).

Of course, 99 is just the messenger in these events, but it still sits there, grinning and useless, conveying nothing but the fact that I am screwed.

99 is bad mojo and I don't even believe in mojo. Stick a horse-shoe on it all you like 99 Restaurant, your food won't be any less greasy or your waitresses any less surly. (We all know you are just the Ground Round without peanuts on the floor.)

One time we were visiting friends in Iowa who were caring for a cute, but heartbreakingly abandoned little boy who kept singing out "Nine E Nine, Nine E Nine" because his mother had left on the ninety-nine train.

99's biggest claim to fame - besides not quite being 100, is the aggravating song about the bottles of beer, rarely seen through to the end, but which is essentially wielded as a weapon by passengers on road trips.

Now it is true that when I was 15 I heard the song "99 Luftballons" and fell in love - and this was before I saw Nena or her leather pants. I was standing just outside my brother's and my room listening intently, hoping he did not notice me. If he knew I was enjoying that song, waiting to hear who was singing, he almost certainly would have have turned it off.

But, I hasten to point out that the 99 balloons in the song do, in fact, start a nuclear apocalypse, so I think 99 still can be considered to suck even if that song is still totally awesome.

I would have preferred to make this my 99th post, but the Demons come when they come.

The last thing my camera saw

UPDATE: About a month after this post, yet another 99 Demon was found which required me to post this entry.