guest editorial

So here we are.

I am sure that after two years you devoted dozens must be tired of reading posts that are from my same, tired, warped, food-centric, underemployed, Generation X, puppeteer’s point of view. 

In the spirit of presenting diverse voices and opinions, we have a special guest with us today: the bird inside the Flintstones’ camera.

Hiya, folks. I know that you’ve never heard much from me in the past, except for the occasional aside when I would break the fourth wall to say such punchlines as, “It’s a living,” or “Oh, my aching beak,” or “It’s a lousy job, but someone’s got to do it.” (Yeah, it all sounds funnier in Mel Blanc’s voice.) 

I still don’t understand why you abandoned my great old technology. What could be simpler than pointing a hand-carved granite camera at your subject, pushing a button that hits the butt of a little bird inside, who is provoked to look out the lens and carefully chisel the image of said subject onto a small stone tablet? 

Don’t get me wrong. Your old, classic Pentax K-1000 was a thing of beauty, with its sturdy housing and built-in light meter... but film? All those chemicals required to develop the images, all those chances of loading the film incorrectly, all those mechanical innards... it sounds so complicated! SQUAAAK!

And sure, these newfangled digital cameras can seemingly do anything. They have a zillion megapixels, whatever those are, and they produce incredible clarity, and they have amazing sensors so they can shoot in low light with no flash. I can make a picture in low light with no flash, too, you know. I just have to squint a little. And if you drop my camera, I can just fly to safety. You drop that fancy digital camera and you’re screwed, cousin. 

You also don’t have to worry about one of my pictures being accidentally deleted. You’d have to work really hard to accidentally delete a physical stone tablet. You’d have to bang it against your cave wall... and even then, you could always cement it back together. 

And sure, I guess my handiwork lacks some of the color or stunning details that a digital SLR would capture, but then again, my rudimentary rendering isn’t going to highlight all of your rosacea and wrinkles. I’m better than Botox in that regard (or, as we call it in the Hanna-Barbara stone age, Bo-rocks). 

Let’s not forget that when your inevitable Ice Age or apocalypse occurs and all the electrical grids go down, your digital toys will be rendered useless, and you’ll be begging for a talented bird like me to capture your cats and babies onto stone. Plus, stone is acid-free! Great for archival purposes!

I’m not saying all of this because I’ve been out of a job for a million years and I’m tired of spending all of my days crapping on statues. I’m just saying that maybe this obsession with all things shiny and digital isn’t as great as you think it is. Newness is fun, sure, but all newness eventually gets old, and just because something eventually gets old doesn’t mean it should go the way of the dodo. 

Except for the dodo. He definitely deserved to go extinct. Trust me, that bird was an idiot. 

I hope that you enjoyed this little diversion from my animated, nameless, fictional, and copyrighted guest. It does not necessarily reflect the opinions or beliefs of this network, its affiliates, or its parent company. 

Yes indeed. Welcome to me.