In a world powered by technology, driven by bottom lines, and information-accessible world-wide, it's a wonder we're not all robots. The temptation to so fully digitize oneself is great. When was the last time you bought a stamp or sent a personal letter to a friend? We send e-cards and gift cards instead, and how much do we even spend communicating one-on-one? It's in this atmosphere of wireless capability that even home automation becomes important, or seems to.

I can remember when letter-writing was an art form and those who were good at it seemed to be building libraries of goodwill for themselves. Everyone liked to get a letter in the mail; I think we still do.

When I moved to Toronto, the big thing was plasma big-screen TV's. We had to hire a Toronto TV installation crew to put ours in because one couldn't live without it, could they? We have to automate every aspect of our homes these days or we just can interface with others. Goodness, even the language has changed! And it's everywhere! When the kids in Grade 3 know more techno-terms than grammatical ones and can fly your computer around the room compared to you, you're in trouble.

Now, the Toronto TV installation crew that we hired to our install was strictly a company that dealt with TV installation nothing else. But they still had some opinions, and good ones, on how to automate our home more. Like we needed this! It seems that in Toronto, TV installation crews are versed in these things because they like to automate their own places to the max. I suppose that they see new and cool stuff all the time and want to be new and cool themselves. They sure were open about where we could (and because we could, we certainly should) make changes and upgrades.

For example, no one turned knobs anymore. There were about a dozen areas where the knobs on things were disparaged and new digital systems described as better, more efficient. Because they were so enthusiastic, I didn't want to ask our Toronto TV installation crew whether these handy gizmos were then more prone to breaking or just quitting. I didn't want to dampen their pioneer spirit. Toronto is a town that invites change and yet remains true to its history. These guys were just a cultural phenomenon and I had to give them credit for their broad knowledge base.

Being from Toronto, our TV installation crew was notably down-to-earth. I thanked them for their advice and they gave shrugs and the foreman said, Hey, take it or not this is your home. I thought that classy.

And I'm keeping my knobs, guys. Sorry