Main Street

The black mirror
I’m one of those dorks who carries a smartphone and hauls it out every few minutes to stare at wee images on Instagram, haiku snark on Twitter, or find out what my family and friends think of Bernie/Trump/Hillary/Walking Dead/Clumsy Cats on Facebook. I stare into that black mirror dozens of times a day, and sometimes I even use it for making a phone call or sending an email.
I suspect I’m not alone in my manic melange of obsession, abhorrence and muddle over my adherence and addiction to the device.
I used to get all the stupid apps, the app that looks like a cigarette lighter flickering, the app that sounds like a shotgun cocking, the app with the Samuel L. Jackson impersonator cursing and the cray-cray app that maps nearby WiFI and radio signals and turns those shortwaves into electronic music. After the novelty wears off (about 10 minutes) I delete them, but my smartphone is dumb about these things and keeps them, lurking, in a cloud somewhere in case I feel stupid again.
There are useful apps too, and I’m partial to the local ones. The city has an app where you can report potholes (they don’t fill them, but they log your concern). The Chamber of Commerce has an app that works like a mobile trip planner, for locals or visitors.
There’s the slightly creepy Nextdoor app, that encourages you to disclose too much about yourself, your grooming habits and when you leave your home unprotected (or is that Facebook?).
I like the weather apps, that show the weather in all the places I want to travel and where my friends and family live. (Sorry Sis, I guess it’s still snowing in Kalispell. It’s springtime here.)
I also enjoy the music apps, rediscovering old songs that sound a lot like the other old songs I like.
Nerd apps are good. The hypsometer (look it up), the calculator, the translator and the temperature converter are cool, because who has time nowadays to multiply by 1.8 and add 32?
My favorite apps allow me to read newspapers and that makes me part of the problem. The “Oakland Tribune” and the “Contra Costa Times” are disappearing, folding into a vaguely named “East Bay Times.” Two publications will replace six, and promises of “hyperlocal” features sound too good to be true.
Who would have thought that you could take an interesting, timely and useful collection of all that online stuff, print it on flimsy paper and deliver it on time every day or every week?
Of course, it would cost money and we’re all getting used to getting our news online for free, as though reporters and editors don’t cost a thing.
Maybe we need an app that allows us to fill imaginary potholes, so we can feel like we get something done when we stare at the black mirror and poke at the screen and wonder where that local newspaper went.
Ray Holley is a print dinosaur with a fancy device. He can be reached at

ra*@so********.com











.