An Open Letter to Technology

An Open Letter to Multitasking Man Hair #Goals

An Open Letter to Technology

Dear Technology:

In writing this week’s Open Letter to Multitasking Man, I glanced back at the Open Letters tag in my blog archive and realized: I sound like a technology crank. Whether it’s my thoughts on the Handybook App or the Selfie Stick tourists on Alcatraz, all I lack is a knotted afghan around my shoulders, a TV Guide in my hand (LARGE PRINT VERSION,) and the wafting smell of Ben Gay from my aching shoulders.

So today’s Open Letter is meant to set things straight. I love you, Technology. I love the clever ways you make things easier to know, like what time it is right now in Hyderabad (10:22 pm,) and how you make it easier to stay connected with people whose absence from my life would make it measurably less awesome, like my college friend whose adorable daughter just won a middle school basketball tournament. I love how you set my coffee percolating before I even wake up, and how you heat up the floor in the downstairs bathroom on a cold day (the best home renovation splurge ever.) I love how you record Downton Abbey when I’m out so I don’t miss one melodramatic, contrived plot point, and I love how you identify any song I hear on the radio within five seconds of my pointing the Shazam app. (The latest: “Shine” by Banners.)

But what I love most about you is my Mac N’ Cheese app.

Back in the olden days of the early 2000’s,when the girls were eating the purple box Annie’s Mac And Cheese like it was its own fifth food group, getting mac and cheese on the table took WORK. You had to boil water. Then open the box and pour the noodles in. Then find milk that hadn’t spoiled, and mix it together with the all natural organic cheez powder and pray it wouldn’t clump into globs that would break apart to reveal a powdery center when the kids were eating it from their melamine bowls. Homemade mac and cheese? I only did that for special occasions, like when the Queen of England came to eat.

this is not a sponsored post. I truly love the Homeroom app this much.

But now I have a little white tile on my iPhone that allows me to order what I believe is the best mac n’ cheese on the planet, from Oakland’s own mac n’ cheese-dedicated restaurant Homeroom. From the long list of choices, including Mac the Goat (made with chevre) to Spicy Crab Roll Mac to Classic Mac, I just click my favorite, add extras like crispy breadcrumb topping, or vegetable mix-ins or a side salad that will cut the risk of heart attack infinitesimally, and submit my order.

Thirty minutes later, I pull up to the Fly Through lane around the corner from the main restaurant and dinner’s ready to go.

Thirty minutes after that, there are four empty pans of various sorts of mac n’ cheese littering the counter top, as well empty containers that once held Brussels sprouts roasted with bacon, and/or steamed broccoli with Ranch dressing. There are also four cheese-bloated bodies littering the house, saying, “I didn’t mean to eat the whole thing. I was gonna save some for lunch tomorrow. But I couldn’t stop.”

As I tell the kids, “I didn’t make dinner. But I made it happen.” And it starts with a tiny square on my iPhone screen.

Technology, on top of everything else, you’re my sous chef, and for that I’m appreciative.

Best regards,

Nancy

This is totally not the worst rap video I’ve ever seen.