‘Cartronics’ – Can you hear me now?

I used to listen to in-car music for relaxation and entertainment until I was about 18 when then something happened. I am not sure what changed, but time apparently passed me by and car electronics got muddled and confusing. The last thing I remember was hooking up a simple $20 in-dash car stereo cassette player to some 6” X 9” speakers that I (stupidly) just set loose on my rear window deck. At the time the world had just started concerning itself with strapping in babies to car seats, so nobody thought much about free-flying speakers denting your brainless teenaged head in an accident.

Don’t worry, I never got beaned by the speakers but those bulky noisemakers did jog my memory in how far society has progressed in portable entertainment technology. Today unless I want to pack a huge set of ear-muff headphones which would dwarf the music player, most people stick those ‘ear buds’ in their head. Does anyone else detest this word ‘ear bud’ as much as I do? I always think buds as organic with chlorophyll, roots, and pods. Since I have enough dirt in my ears already, I don’t want any kind of ‘buds’ poking around near the inside of my head. I also hate these tiny microscopic cords that these audio ear-plugs strung up with. I think I have dental floss that is thicker and definitely more durable than these junky wires.

Now music and phones also all come ‘Bluetooth’ enabled. Do you use a toothbrush to clean these devices? I doubt it since I am generally aware that this is a one-eared headphone. Only rarely does my neck ‘bristle’ but why would I ever stick a toothbrush in my ears to clean them when my Waterpick does such a great job already? What is the electronics industry’s obsession with the color ‘blue’ anyway as in Blue Ray, Blue LED and of course the ubiquitous Bluetooth? This is probably the mood all the techno geeks are in once they find out that only ‘Blue Bloods’ can afford all these whiz-bang electro-gizmos.

Of course cell phones and GPS satellite navigation have revolutionized in-car communications and emergency response these days. We used to have only real LIVE humans to distract us before. Now it is so much more convenient to have a dash-mounted robot navigator berating your every driving decision, along with your spouse in the back seat. At least between phone tasks to order pizza, check Facebook, and yell at your kids, that cell phone MIGHT have enough battery left to call for a tow truck to get you out of that ditch quicker? And with your Bluetooth boom sealed in one ear and your Ipod earbud plugged in another, you can still always turn on the car radio for relaxing entertainment … but the question is - will you be able to hear it?