Can Modern Life Sometimes Be a Bit Too Convenient ?

Started by mongers, May 01, 2014, 08:57:55 AM

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Richard Hakluyt

That would be my experience too, having a hot bath is the redeeming feature of returning from a camping holiday back to the daily grind.

alfred russel

Quote from: Malthus on May 01, 2014, 10:48:37 AM
Anyone who thinks modern life is too convienient should spend a couple of weeks at my parent's cottage (US: "cabin").

No effete modern conveiniences there - if you want heat, you chop firewood; if you want water, you pump it by hand into a bucket and carry the bucket up the hill to the cottage. If you want light, you pour kerosene into a lamp, carefully adjust the mantle, and light it, keeping an eye on the mantle so it does not carbonize and burn the place down. If you want to go to the toilet at night, you use a chamber pot (which then needs washing the next day) or walk in the dark to the outhouse. If you want a bath, there is the lake. For vegitables, there is a small gardan, requiring work to maintain.

It is amazing how much of one's time is spent simply arranging to exist.

It is my dad's notion of paradise, but not really mine  :lol: ... though the setting makes up for the primitive facilities.

I've taken some remote hiking holidays in places like that. Let me tell you, watching the hired help struggling with the elements to keep us comfortable and carrying our gear, really brings home conveniences of the modern world.
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

There's a fine line between salvation and drinking poison in the jungle.

I'm embarrassed. I've been making the mistake of associating with you. It won't happen again. :)
-garbon, February 23, 2014

Tamas

Quote from: alfred russel on May 01, 2014, 11:20:21 AM
Quote from: Malthus on May 01, 2014, 10:48:37 AM
Anyone who thinks modern life is too convienient should spend a couple of weeks at my parent's cottage (US: "cabin").

No effete modern conveiniences there - if you want heat, you chop firewood; if you want water, you pump it by hand into a bucket and carry the bucket up the hill to the cottage. If you want light, you pour kerosene into a lamp, carefully adjust the mantle, and light it, keeping an eye on the mantle so it does not carbonize and burn the place down. If you want to go to the toilet at night, you use a chamber pot (which then needs washing the next day) or walk in the dark to the outhouse. If you want a bath, there is the lake. For vegitables, there is a small gardan, requiring work to maintain.

It is amazing how much of one's time is spent simply arranging to exist.

It is my dad's notion of paradise, but not really mine  :lol: ... though the setting makes up for the primitive facilities.

I've taken some remote hiking holidays in places like that. Let me tell you, watching the hired help struggling with the elements to keep us comfortable and carrying our gear, really brings home conveniences of the modern world.

Yeah. Quite frankly, anybody who thinks what we have is TOO convenient have no real grasp of what non-convenient life means.

mongers

Quote from: Tamas on May 01, 2014, 11:22:54 AM
Quote from: alfred russel on May 01, 2014, 11:20:21 AM
Quote from: Malthus on May 01, 2014, 10:48:37 AM
Anyone who thinks modern life is too convienient should spend a couple of weeks at my parent's cottage (US: "cabin").

No effete modern conveiniences there - if you want heat, you chop firewood; if you want water, you pump it by hand into a bucket and carry the bucket up the hill to the cottage. If you want light, you pour kerosene into a lamp, carefully adjust the mantle, and light it, keeping an eye on the mantle so it does not carbonize and burn the place down. If you want to go to the toilet at night, you use a chamber pot (which then needs washing the next day) or walk in the dark to the outhouse. If you want a bath, there is the lake. For vegitables, there is a small gardan, requiring work to maintain.

It is amazing how much of one's time is spent simply arranging to exist.

It is my dad's notion of paradise, but not really mine  :lol: ... though the setting makes up for the primitive facilities.

I've taken some remote hiking holidays in places like that. Let me tell you, watching the hired help struggling with the elements to keep us comfortable and carrying our gear, really brings home conveniences of the modern world.

Yeah. Quite frankly, anybody who thinks what we have is TOO convenient have no real grasp of what non-convenient life means.

You love your blanket statements don't you.
"We have it in our power to begin the world over again"

Sheilbh

Let's bomb Russia!

Malthus

Quote from: alfred russel on May 01, 2014, 11:20:21 AM
Quote from: Malthus on May 01, 2014, 10:48:37 AM
Anyone who thinks modern life is too convienient should spend a couple of weeks at my parent's cottage (US: "cabin").

No effete modern conveiniences there - if you want heat, you chop firewood; if you want water, you pump it by hand into a bucket and carry the bucket up the hill to the cottage. If you want light, you pour kerosene into a lamp, carefully adjust the mantle, and light it, keeping an eye on the mantle so it does not carbonize and burn the place down. If you want to go to the toilet at night, you use a chamber pot (which then needs washing the next day) or walk in the dark to the outhouse. If you want a bath, there is the lake. For vegitables, there is a small gardan, requiring work to maintain.

It is amazing how much of one's time is spent simply arranging to exist.

It is my dad's notion of paradise, but not really mine  :lol: ... though the setting makes up for the primitive facilities.

I've taken some remote hiking holidays in places like that. Let me tell you, watching the hired help struggling with the elements to keep us comfortable and carrying our gear, really brings home conveniences of the modern world.

:lol:

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

Phillip V

Quote from: mongers on May 01, 2014, 08:57:55 AM
So my question is, do you find any aspects of modern life, just a bit too convenient ?
No. Plenty more conveniences to be had and invented. I still wipe my own ass.

Caliga

0 Ed Anger Disapproval Points

Syt

Quote from: alfred russel on May 01, 2014, 11:20:21 AM
Quote from: Malthus on May 01, 2014, 10:48:37 AM
Anyone who thinks modern life is too convienient should spend a couple of weeks at my parent's cottage (US: "cabin").

No effete modern conveiniences there - if you want heat, you chop firewood; if you want water, you pump it by hand into a bucket and carry the bucket up the hill to the cottage. If you want light, you pour kerosene into a lamp, carefully adjust the mantle, and light it, keeping an eye on the mantle so it does not carbonize and burn the place down. If you want to go to the toilet at night, you use a chamber pot (which then needs washing the next day) or walk in the dark to the outhouse. If you want a bath, there is the lake. For vegitables, there is a small gardan, requiring work to maintain.

It is amazing how much of one's time is spent simply arranging to exist.

It is my dad's notion of paradise, but not really mine  :lol: ... though the setting makes up for the primitive facilities.

I've taken some remote hiking holidays in places like that. Let me tell you, watching the hired help struggling with the elements to keep us comfortable and carrying our gear, really brings home conveniences of the modern world.

Ok, Niles.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.
—Stephen Jay Gould

Proud owner of 42 Zoupa Points.

Tamas

Quote from: mongers on May 01, 2014, 11:50:48 AM
Quote from: Tamas on May 01, 2014, 11:22:54 AM
Quote from: alfred russel on May 01, 2014, 11:20:21 AM
Quote from: Malthus on May 01, 2014, 10:48:37 AM
Anyone who thinks modern life is too convienient should spend a couple of weeks at my parent's cottage (US: "cabin").

No effete modern conveiniences there - if you want heat, you chop firewood; if you want water, you pump it by hand into a bucket and carry the bucket up the hill to the cottage. If you want light, you pour kerosene into a lamp, carefully adjust the mantle, and light it, keeping an eye on the mantle so it does not carbonize and burn the place down. If you want to go to the toilet at night, you use a chamber pot (which then needs washing the next day) or walk in the dark to the outhouse. If you want a bath, there is the lake. For vegitables, there is a small gardan, requiring work to maintain.

It is amazing how much of one's time is spent simply arranging to exist.

It is my dad's notion of paradise, but not really mine  :lol: ... though the setting makes up for the primitive facilities.

I've taken some remote hiking holidays in places like that. Let me tell you, watching the hired help struggling with the elements to keep us comfortable and carrying our gear, really brings home conveniences of the modern world.

Yeah. Quite frankly, anybody who thinks what we have is TOO convenient have no real grasp of what non-convenient life means.

You love your blanket statements don't you.

They make life nice and easy ^_^

Malthus

Quote from: Tamas on May 01, 2014, 12:56:12 PM
Quote from: mongers on May 01, 2014, 11:50:48 AM
You love your blanket statements don't you.

They make life nice and easy ^_^

:lol:

Some good zingers in this thread ...
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

Norgy

Quote from: Richard Hakluyt on May 01, 2014, 10:51:53 AM
I was just about to say that a lot of touristic activities support mongers' hypothesis  :D

A fortnight at the cabin would be just about perfect to remind one of modern conveniences.

Yes. No hot water, outdoor toilet, wood stove. It's fun for three days.

Admiral Yi


PDH

No way, you want the hot water beside the toilet, not under the toilet.
I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
-Umberto Eco

-------
"I'm pretty sure my level of depression has nothing to do with how much of a fucking asshole you are."

-CdM

garbon

Quote from: Norgy on May 01, 2014, 01:47:20 PM
Quote from: Richard Hakluyt on May 01, 2014, 10:51:53 AM
I was just about to say that a lot of touristic activities support mongers' hypothesis  :D

A fortnight at the cabin would be just about perfect to remind one of modern conveniences.

Yes. No hot water, outdoor toilet, wood stove. It's fun for three days.


QuoteIf you find yourself trapped in the middle of the woods without electricity, running water, or a car you would likely describe that situation as a "nightmare" or "a worse case scenario like after plane crash or something." White people refer to it as "camping."
"I've never been quite sure what the point of a eunuch is, if truth be told. It seems to me they're only men with the useful bits cut off."
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