Recently...
for all we want.
no surprises
the usefulness of gadgets
in the things we do
back and i wonder
in another blankness.
disassembly
i. c. a. i c o
here for now
all but.
disassembly · Monday July 17, 2006
so far this summer i have taken apart the following:
3-year-old dvd player
the dvd player was busted and i opened it to see if i could fix it. no go.
6-year-old pc keyboard
my favorite pc keyboard (which i type this on now) was getting nasty from juice stains, finger prints, etc. on average, i probably used it about 345 days of each year. took it apart and cleaned it. took 3.5 hours.
25-year-old fan
the fan was bought by my parents the summer before i was born. it too was nasty with dust. taken apart and cleaned, washed with water(!). fancy rotating frame fan still works like a charm.
in conclusion:
the older the thing is the longer the life expectancy.
corporate types want you to keep buying, so things start crapping out 1-2 years, as opposed to when they used to make things to last.
case in point, as i open up ours, dad tells of the 35-year-old electric fan still working flawlessly at grandma’s place. meanwhile for the last 5 years my 10-year-old stereo can’t keep the 3-cd-tray shut when its on and keeps sliding out on its own (eventually somewhere around the 6-year-mark they did a class-action lawsuit against the company but you needed the receipt – i frkn moved 4 times in those 6 years, i don’t know where the dang paper is – hard way of learning keep reciepts for big purchases).
also in conclusion (or conclusion #2):
i have too much time on my hands.
and as always not enough.