Forget this Ice Bucket Challenge that has got hopelessly lost its fundraising direction, and has become as dumbed down as Going Gangnam Style.
Instead, take up my The No iPhone For A Day (NiFAD) Challenge.
After a few arduous years of going out with females who go out with their cellphones and flirt on the side with WhatsApp, twitter, Facebook, WeChat, Weibo and UberTaxi, and, a few days ago, having lunch with three other guys, and looking up to see that all of us were on our iPhones, I have decided to give myself the Herculean task of leaving my apartment tomorrow with only my door keys for company.
Sure, I will be fully clothed and have my wallet with me, but I am leaving behind what my entire being is based around these days- my iPhone, with all those apps I have downloaded ‘cos they’re free, but, most of which, I never use, plus ridding myself of all “contacts”.
This is me going out into that technological-driven world buck naked and feeling like a nervous virgin on his first date with a horny Mrs Robinson.
Gawd knows, I have had to prepare for this as an athlete would if competing for the Boston Marathon, the World Cup or the World Curling Championships.
Speaking of curling, part of my preparation has consisted of sitting in front of the mirror and exercising my entire face in order to put up a brave front when sitting in a bar or restaurant with nothing for company. Except for my door keys.
With my iPhone, I am in touch with the world.
When at home, my cellphone is all the company in need.
It accompanies me to the loo, it’s there while I watch CSI:Miami and wonder why David Caruso looks more pale than the late Johnny Winter, and then when in bed, it’s there next to my head- on Silent, but still with the vibrator on so I am constantly in touch with the world- and the world with me.
It’s also why I keep such weird hours and only come to life around 4am and then keep going like an Ever Ready Rabbit on Bolivian marching powder.
When out there in that big old world, and not to look like some sad lonely loser, my iPhone, which I am constantly spoiling with new wallpaper, different covers and ring tones, is always that fallback ploy of googling away pretending to try and find anything- the love lives of llamas, the history of the Byzantine Empire, the Kardashian wikipedia page- in order to look busy when, actually, having nothing going on.
I called- on my iPhone- and guided by my contact page- let people know my war and rage against the machine of being reduced to a Ben Hur-type slave to technology and, like Russell Crowe in “The Gladiator”, was going to stand up to Emperor Techus.
It will be tough.
Gawd knows, the many ways my iPhone has supported and been there for me, except for those times when I couldn’t find a charger and had to leave my date and rush home to bring it back to life.
But, now, well, now I now want to hate it.
It’s suddenly made me feel like a girlie man who has never known the feeling of having balls. Or the feeling of feeling my ball.
Those who have listened to my NiFAD plan are worried for me: They ask if I am ready.
They wonder if I might get lost and, if I did, how I would be able to find myself again by using my recently downloaded UberTaxi app?
They wonder- as do I- how I will be able to get from my apartment to anywhere other than the laundromat across the street without Google Search and Google Map.
And once I, somehow, found somewhere to go, what would I do once there?
Do I sit and scribble down ideas for songs with a PEN- on a paper napkin?
Who carries a PEN around these days?
And what if someone came up and actually started SPEAKING to me? What would I say?
What if I have to- quelle horreurs- have to make eye contact?
Could I just DO IT like Nike says I should?
Being overcome with fear listening to all this, I gripped my iPhone so hard, I gave my left hand muscles I never knew it had, and also felt an anxiety attack coming over me like a wave of email spam breaking through every anti-virus filter.
I had to stop speaking to these alarmists and move to a Happy Place.
This is when I decided to chillax and check out the ring tones available. And when I heard Samba and Sci-fi, I got melancholy.
I thought about a female I lived with and whom I gave the gift of love in the form of a shiny black iPhone.
And though when she would kiss it and say, “I ruff you” while a then-iphoneless me watched and thought she was a silly psychotic bitch I needed to delete outta my life, I now understand how she felt.
The iPhone opened up a whole new world for her.
Instead of living out of a suitcase, she could live in iPhone land.
She could lose herself on twitter and play silly games and clean and pet her new i-friend.
If she was crazy before, she was now even crazier, but with iPhone method to her madness- like my own iPhone life today.
Tomorrow, however, all this stability will be left behind.
Tomorrow, even though the new woman I am seeing will be busy cheating on me with WhatsApp, I’ll be going back to the future- even further back to those days when we carried mobile phones designed like irons and which weighed heavier than bowling balls.
Tomorrow, I walk into an iPhone world where I’ll stand out like Kunta Kinte at a Ku Klux Klan rally and sing out, Free at last, Lordy, Free at last.
It might get uglier than Nick Nolte and Gary Busey- combined- out there, but I’m prepared.
I have grown some mighty big balls.
Hans Ebert Chairman and CEO We-Enhance Inc and Fast Track Global Ltd www.fasttrack.hk
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