Harrumph File #049 01.02.201_ Flying cars/Technology, what a pisser.

     So here we are, 2010 is in the books.  One more year down but am I really any closer to the flying car I was promised back in the 60’s that they said everyone would have by 1985?  Hell no!  We’re 25 years overdue on this technology & I want to know just what they’re doing about it.  I also want to know who the heck is in charge of flying car technology.  Why don’t we have a flying car technology Czar?  We have Czars for everything else; hell, we have a Czar in charge of hairless Peruvian yak mating habits, it’s high time the president appointed a flying car Czar.

Is that June Cleaver?  Where's the beaver?

     And, it’s not just flying cars.  We’re all supposed to be living in domed cities with high-speed, electro-magnetic, single-car train tubes connecting them.  You know, if we were all living in domed cities we wouldn’t have to spend billions on the global warming scheme.  If it’s a constant 78° inside, who besides Al Gore cares what it’s like outside?  Besides, outside the domes the wasteland would be dominated by radiated mutants, self-actuating killer robots, and dinosaurs, so who would want to go out there anyway?  Man, not only don’t we have a single domed city yet but the only people-moving electro-trains we use are light rail systems like BART.  Jeeze, they should’ve named it BARF instead.  Even Disney couldn’t get “rocket rods” to work right!

     Anyone out there got a robot like “Rosie,” the Jetson’s always-ready-to-go-to-work maid?  No, I didn’t think so.  So far, the only robots I’ve seen are industrial robots that fit nameplates onto car bodies (“wow!” He said sarcastically,) educational robots that can figure out the difference between a coffee mug and a lego (if given enough attempts,) and break-dancing French robots that make you-tube videos.  I’m sorry, after a big new year’s party, I don’t need dancing robots (unless they’ve got huge boobs,) I need a maid that can lift the couch with one arm and vacuum the beer cans away with the other.  Damn… dancing French robots… that’s just flat-out wrong.  Don’t even get me started on Jetson-mobiles.  If I don’t have a flying car by now, I don’t have a prayer of getting a Jetson-mobile any time soon.

     So, I asked a buddy of mine how he liked his recent vacation on the moon.  When he looked at me with the same blank stare that Joe Biden uses, I said “You know, the vacation where you fly the Pan Am shuttle to the big space station wheel and then connect to the moon base where you four-wheel around Armstrong’s footprints or take a trip to the ‘dark side’ of the moon, accompanied by appropriate Pink Floyd music.  You know, the ones we were promised to have by 2001?”  NOT!  Yeah, another broken promise.  No cool moon base, no more Pan Am, and the only space station we have is this international monstrosity where we have to rely on Russian Soyuz capsules to bring our astronauts home.  Really?  We’ve gotten to the point where our people have to ride in those Russian pieces of crap?  Ummm… news alert here people… those Russian things are held together by duct tape and chewing gum… and I’m all outta gum… And, I don’t want any comments from Russians saying things like: “You Americans think you’re better than everyone else.  Our rockets are just as good as yours… Glorious tractor factories… yada, yada.” C’mon, face it clowns, if your stuff was as good as ours, Aeroflot wouldn’t be flying 767’s.

     Laser guns, transporter beams, time machines, incredibly small bullet sized nukes, x-ray glasses, communicators that work 100% of the time (unlike cell phones,) bionic eyes that can look into that hot neighbor chick’s apartment from 500 feet, universal translators, food replicators, talking dogs, computers that never crash (and speak in sultry, “Jessica Rabbit-like” voices,) personal submarines, jet packs, invisible paint, single-person flying saucers, “real” magic, supersonic zeppelins, light sabers.  All these things were promised to kids growing up in the 60’s and do we have any of them yet?  Nope, not a single friggin’ one.

     Instead, what have we got?  Cell phones that you’re constantly trying to get one more bar out of so that you can make that really important call without it dropping.  Computers that give you the blue screen of death at the drop of a hat (or give you an error message that looks like: “There was an unexpected error in the widget sizing transmogrification file (0xC0001234.)”  What the hell does that mean, and where exactly is C0001234?)  Dogs that still bark, and light sabers that you have to attach an LED blade to in order to exercise your inner Jedi.

     So, the next time you’re watching the Discovery channel and they tell you about the latest, greatest, coolest thing that’s just around the corner, remember the immortal words of Mr. Spock:  “Bullshit.”  Harrumph…