Entered on 2001-11-07 at 8:47 a.m..

American Standards

As and American I live in a rather large country. As such a large country, we tend to come up with our own technological standards. We are so good at it, that I never even knew there were other standards. This leads to a lot of complacency on my part. I have found that there are so many things that I take for granted. For instance ethernet and phone connections. Last week it became apparent that anyone who wanted to call me cheaply should call my land-line. Fine, as long as I'm home. The problem is that I have a 20' foot long room and a 15 foot phone cord, attached to the far wall.

No problem, I'll just go out and buy an extension chord... So off I go on my bicycle to the local hardware store, purchase a cord and head home. Then I go to plug it in, and not only doesn't it fit into the socket coming out of the wall, it doesn't fit the end going into the phone either. I hadn't even thought about looking at the connections before leaving for the store.

Ethernet is also interesting here, I have a big coax cable attached to the back of my computer at work, because that's the way they've set it up. If you disconnect my machine, then you have to put a bridge cable back in place of the computer or everyone on the network is cut off.

I could go on, but all of the other examples have left me.

On a second note, the other day I got to drive in a vehicle named "Twingo". Not only that, but it was a 'United Colors of Benetton' Twingo. This meant that although the external color of the car was black, the inside was brightly colored. The seats were covered these bright patches of different colors. This car belonged to the poor French guy who wore the offending tennis shoes.

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