Thursday, February 21, 2008

Monitor problem

Yesterday I brought home 2 wide screen monitors from work. Imagine my excitement.

I plugged them in and fired them up, and quickly saw that the right one was damaged as shown in the picture below. During our morning meeting, Chris asked how the monitor was. I responded to the affect of "it looks like it got hit by a baseball". Naturally, Chris assumed that I was playing baseball in the house, so I had to explain that "looks like it got hit" and "got hit" are two entirely different things. I don't think I convinced him.

In order to clarify the extent of the damage, I photographed the damage and sent the email that follows the image.


Email: 2/21/2008, 10:07am

For the purposes of demonstration, I have attached a photo of the monitor problem discussed during our morning congregation. Though it is not clear in from the mere photo, a spider web of cracks starts at the center of the black hole and extends outwards, its fingers entwining themselves with the fabric of the screen. One may observe a parallel between that and the effect of professional baseball on our every day lives. The closer you are to baseball ,the more it affects your life as symbolized by the greater density of cracks. For those that are less involved, the cracks are fewer, but ever present. It is for that reason that I have elected to title this piece "The Baseball Effect".

The point has been raised that while I refer to the black hole as a "baseball", the screen was not actually hit by a baseball. I concede the point with the caveat that in art you must be able to think in the abstract. When Vincent Van Gogh drew the Mona Lisa, did he actually know a person name Lisa, or is she an imaginary figure that represents the best of what he saw in people as a whole? When Michael Jackson created the thriller video, was he trying to express to us that we really need to be careful about dancing zombies, or was he using that as visual conduit to some deeper meaning? These questions may not be answered, but still must be asked. Was my monitor hit by a baseball? The scientist in me says no, but the artist and philosopher think "perhaps".

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

You really shouldn't play baseball in the house, I think is the Real Lesson, one in which you seemed to miss completely, with all your psychobabble and over analysis.