Sentimentechnology

Why is it, I always get attached to technology that I invariably collect during the course of my life? I am still no closer to my 360, in fact – truth be known, I am getting further away. This is a double blow considering that nearly fifty percent of my birthday fund has gone on trivialities, leaving the once proud amount rather waning. Still, I will not be discouraged! I know, I can sell things on eBay. How about my rather considerable (considerably daft, more like!) collection of phones from days gone by? Well, I could, but… they either are not worth enough to bother going through the rigmarole of listing them, or they are still just too useful! Okay, how about my amassed defunct laptops? Again, I could – but they may still be useful, old games and programs that I can’t be bothered to upgrade or make compatible that lurk around the grotty crags of my office may once again be pressed into usefulness, either out of necessity, or boredom. Right. Old toys? Hmm… but they remind me too much of my youth. A time in my life that is getting further away by the day! Besides, my darling three year old Son has found a boxful, and as a result, are now broken and completely worthless. My old 1:18 scale car collection? I…took ages to get them all together. I don’t want to have to reverse my efforts, losing money hand-over-fist in the process. That leaves… Internal organs. Any of those I’m not using?

It comes to something when I would rather sacrifice a section of my own internal workings that part with a piece of what is rapidly becoming retro technology. I love old gadgets and the like, mostly because they are the genesis which has spring-boarded us to where we are now in the modern day. But then, what would I be exchanging them for? New technology! Hmm… New technology, old technology. New technology, old technology. New technology, old technology. New technology, old technology. New technology, old technology… You know – the more you say it, the less it helps!!

- Galford.

Lead Me Not Into Temptation…?

Okay, so CeX Computer Exchange (is that pronounced Kex, or Sex?) is nothing new. They have been around for a while. My nearest one resided comfortably far away, in the not-very local shopping centre Merry Hill. I have hitherto avoided this haven on the grounds that it would ultimately bankrupt me. But no. The slavering tentacles of what is quite possibly the perfect chain of shops has just landed in my home town. Worse yet, within 100 yards of my current place of employment…!

Apart from eBay, there is nothing that comes close to this paradise. A shop, specialising in buying, selling and exchanging games, gadgets and phones, Undercutting Gamestation and Game for second-hand PSPs and the like. I am the technology rag-and-bone man, and I love amassing used stuff both because it is cheaper than new, and if it’s flat lining or completely dead, I like nothing more in assuming the role of Lazarus or Dr. Frankenstein by breathing new life into it. This is the sort of shop I want to own. Apart from the fact that it would not make any money, because I would personally lust over everything that came in through the door. The bowels of the shop already look like my office desk, albeit better equipped.

I have already been known to pour far too much money into eBay, buying oddities that I will then systematically gang-rape in order to discover every possible function. I love making things do stuff that they were not exactly designed for, and my Gizmondo is the ultimate flagship on the subject. I am not geeky enough to write the programs myself, but I will go out of my way to find them. The thing with eBay always was – all you see of your potential purchase is a very low-grade photo. That’s normally enough to put you off there and then. But, when it’s right in front of you, like Jessica Simpson in an edible bikini, it’s really (I mean really) hard to ignore. It’s true. There’s very little I won’t do for CeX…!?!

- Galford.