Let me tell you about my pet hate. Well, one of them. I have so many I don’t think my hard drive is sufficient to even list them all in abbreviated form. But number one, numero uno, the Big One, the real thing is people walking along staring at their (ffaaaaarrrkkkin) phones.

THERE’S A WORLD OUT THERE, I want to shout at them, AND YOU’RE MISSING IT ALL, STARING AT THAT POXY PIECE OF TECHNO-SHIT. GET A FRIKKIN LIFE!!!!

But social norms dictate that I’m not allowed to say that, nor anything else. All I can do is push them when they’re walking down the crowded walkways at Charing Cross tube about to bump into me, tut a bit and mutter the odd, discreet expletive at them. But they’re oblivious to me. And to the rest of the real world. What’s happening in virtual space is far more important to them.

And now I know why.

They’re flirting. Chatting up. Having ‘relationships’. ‘Dating’. Because its all changed. The whole world. The whole ‘scene’. The whole ‘obscene’.

Meeting people used to involve going out and sort of, meeting people. Find someone you like the look of and work out the fastest way to get them naked. I’m being honest here. Honest to the horrible, single-minded, obsessed youth I once was.

The process would involve talking, humour, alchohol sometimes, meals bought, bars visited, Sunday walks, and generally very little football. Unless you were lucky enough to reach the ‘endgame’ during match of the day which was just visible over her left shoulder and hoping her parents movie was a long one. So you could whisper ‘I love you’, directing it at your favourite player so you didn’t have to cross fingers.

Today its different. Its more like pornography involving someone you ‘know’. But only really ‘know’ in the virtual world. Kids (according to a frightening article in the paper) talk and text whilst in their own homes. They send ‘selfies’ in various stages of undress and provocation, employ ‘sexting’ in place of ‘pillow talk’ and lead full and wonderful relationships without ever having to leave the solitude of their own locked bedrooms.

Fantastic. You don’t need to bother taking a shower before a date. Nor use make-up; you can photoshop. Its cold, its distant, remote and solitary. It lacks the sensation of ‘touch’ completely.

But this is all part of evolution. Started with the industrial revolution in… whenever that happened. First came the steam engine, then the printing press, next was the vibrating dildo and finally the i-phone. And all this bollox that passes for ‘social interraction’ in the post-millenial world.

The only problem is that evolution is totally dependent on procreation. The successful passing on DNA to the next generations. Survival of the fittest does not mean those who go to the gym more often. It refers to reproductive ‘fitness’. The more genes you pass on the more your own little quirks may be carried forward.

So unless children are to be born with a USB nob I really don’t know how far this current obsession can be taken. Its limited by its own stupidity. We can’t link the physical to the technical. Not yet anyway.

I’m off to the pub. Well, I’m going up to my bedroom to look at pictures of pubs on my ipad and texting my mates.

Happy saturday. Though not as happy as it was before rain stopped play on the tennis court.

 

A xxxx