I love gadgets. My wife hates them. Well, let me correct that. She hates them for the short period of time between the moment I buy them until the moment she begins using them and eventually claims ownership over them.
Case in point: My DVR.
I remember how much I was looking forward having my DVR installed, so I could record my favorite shows and watch them whenever I wanted to. My wife thought the extra $6.00 a month for the service was a waste of money, especially since I still had an old VCR laying around that, according to her, I could use to do exactly the same thing the DVR would do.
A month after I had brought the DVR home, my wife had to attend a work related event and she wouldn’t be home until late that night. Without my help (or knowledge), somehow she managed to program the DVR to record one of her favorites shows. That evening, as soon as she walked into the house she checked the DVR to make sure it had recorded the show. In horror I saw her smile when she found it stored deep into the DVR hard drive. That moment I knew I could kiss my DVR good bye.
Nowadays my precious DVR is full of soap operas, episodes of American Got Talent and similar atrocities. No matter how much I erase these things, there is never enough space to records my shows in full, and most of the time, they get shopped in the middle, usually right before the guys from Myth Busters are about to try a new experiment to prove or bust a myth.
But this love-hate relationship between my wife and my gadgets go far beyond my DVR. Similar things had occurred with the Netbook that I purchased with the idea of taking it with me whenever we travel. After telling me that she didn’t understand why I would need another laptop, she now ask for it to check her emails while we wait on the airport. Because it is so small and convenience, she also uses it do some of her work while she is in bed at night. or whenever she goes to a work seminar. Recently she finally confessed that those things are really cool and she wants one for herself.
The same thing happened with my iPhone. At the beginning she thought that the iPhone was just another cellular phone and she couldn’t understand all the hype around it. After using it several times, she now constantly asks me for it to get some information on the internet or to find a restaurant nearby. Last week she told me “You know, I think I want an iPhone”
So the relationship between me, my wife and my gadgets goes something like this:
1. I buy a new gadget
2. Wife complains that it is
a. Too expensive
b. Unnecessary
c. a and b
3. Wife tries my new gadget.
4. Wife likes my new gadget, but wont’ admit to it.
5. Wife finally admits that she likes it and claims ownership over it or asks for a similar one for herself.
And the story repeats itself with every new thing I buy.
