High Tech Headset

I'm lying here on my couch trying to find the most comfortable position to relieve my aching back. I have one leg propped up on the back rest in hopes that I can rest my laptop on it and balance it enough so that I can type, all while not wrenching my neck too much. It sure would suck to create more problems for myself just for the sake of using this laptop. I've been on conference calls for the last 3 hours, so lying down has not been that much of a hardship. I have a headset that plugs into my laptop, so it was kind of nice to have my hands free while these phone calls took place over the internet.

It got me to thinking, however, about a voice activated way to type. Could I really be effective that way. It would almost seem a little too much Hal 9000/2010: A Space Odyssey. But hey...it's 2008 and we can voice activate so many other things at this point. We can bark at our cell phones to dial somebody by name. Several auto makers boast the voice activated stereo features that allow the driver to change the station or CD without removing their hands from the wheel. "Play artist, Michael Bolton." You've all seen that commercial.

One of my co-workers had a severe hand injury that required surgery and he had to wear a cast for 2 months and was forced to try a voice activated software so that he could type emails. It was either that or endure the painfully slow method of typing each letter one at a time with the index finger on his good hand. I sat in the adjacent cubicle to him so I got to hear him talking into his headset in the monotone, staccato voice that the software responded best to through his headset microphone. He...had...to...talk...really...slow...ly...in...order...for...it...to...com..pre..hend ..his...words...and...some...times...still...made...mis...takes. I'm sure it drove him crazy because it drove me crazy listening to him do it. If it made a mistake he had to tell it to backspace and then try to re-do it. I don't think this would work for me. I'm probably too visual at this point. I really benefit from the words appearing on the screen as fast as I can type them. As anyone that has been in a serious conversation with me can attest to, my mouth often gets in the way as my thoughts attempt to traverse the path between my brain and someone else's comprehension. I have this bad habit of trying to censor things that come out of my mouth that kills conversations some of the time. This is not a problem when I type. When I type, things just sort of flow. If I want to take it back, I backspace. If I want to let it hang there in the air like a cartoon dialogue bubble, I do that and just look at it until I decide that it sounds okay or that there's a better way to say that. The finish product is none the wiser. But saying these things out loud and then trying to take them back, just confuses everybody.

You're confused now, aren't you? Just be glad this isn't a verbal blog. You can just pretend that I speak as clearly (and you're laughing if you don't agree that I write clearly or coherently) as I write. Oh well, back to reality. That's enough randomness for a Monday morning.