My Day At The Mall

Epic Shield? I think so

Today was a special day as I was able to venture across vast distances to take a trek through the Annapolis Mall *cue scary sound effect*. Every time I go to the mall you can be sure something interesting will happen, especially when I have the luck of being with other people. Today I was with 5 people and so I thought I would take some time to talk about my most random day and somehow relate it to technology. I know its such an amazing and interesting idea. Obviously the first thing to talk about would be the camera I used to capture those wonderful moments today. Nothing special, just the camera on my Android phone, but without it the pictures I now have would never exist. Digital cameras work by using a light sensor to record data as a series of 1's and 0's known as binary which is then used to display the collected pixels on a screen to be viewed or edited. My particular camera is 5 mega pixels (MP) and has a dual flash which I didn't get caught using thanks to the natural light around me.

Don't even ask...

The first thing done after arriving at that expansive shopping center was to go check out random stores. In these random stores were lots of random objects which were oddly amusing. Some were obvious as to their intended use and others were of a more distorted perception. Luckily for us all my handy dandy smart-phone comes equipped with Google Shopper which allowed me to scan some barcodes and figure out just what these odd plasticy things do. Sometimes though it is more fun to ignore the intended use and go for a more unconventional take. Technology like this can also be used to save money as applications allow you to view and compare local prices while also looking up user reviews. Even more modern is the ability to use mobile devices as a payment system. Near Field Communication (NFC) is allowing us to just wave our phone around and pay for purchases through systems such as Google Wallet.

Next up on our list of things to do was tweeting about every little thing we did throughout the day. This one is kind of obvious but we used the twitter application on our phones. Doing so allowed me personally to keep my 16 followers in the loop about what I was doing every waking moment followed up by photos of such actions. A more practical use however would be the ability for companies and other important organizations and people to keep in touch with the general public in a much easier way. Social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter allow for businesses to get in touch with their followers in a very simple way. These updates can alert people to new products, new features, giveaways, and even meet ups. Without such sites keeping communication between important people and the general population would be a larger hassle involving mailing lists or having to constantly check websites or news articles. Just think, were would we be without the ability to know every little detail about someones lives? For one it would certainly be more difficult to stalk people... I mean... ya I mean stalk people but your all guilty to!

Dedication

By that point in time I was so very hungry and it was time to eat. Such long lines though. However did I keep myself from dying of boredom? Lucky me I had checkers on my phone. While waiting agonizing minutes to place my order I battled against those red pieces until I achieved absolute victory. I almost got so caught up in the game as to miss my number being called out. The world would be a much different place today if it weren't for digital entertainment. Entertaining ourselves while travelling would certainly be much more difficult and long cross country trips or even global could quickly become well not worth it. Thankfully for all of us the new era has brought wave after wave of entertainment, especially the newest ability to throw angry birds at hungry pigs. If it weren't for games like that I might be forced to slingshot real birds at real pigs. (Not really)

Long hours of walking around that never ending landscape and the agonizing bombardment of people trying to sell me things I obviously don't need left us all so very tired. At long last we came across a store with these wonderful little pieces of furniture. In mere seconds the whole gang was catapulting into soft cushions and closing their eyes to the music that surrounded us. A much needed nap later and we were off to the last few moments of our adventure in which we would tackle the beast. As we approached carefully we saw people getting on and then never being seen again. We walked closer and then first foot on and second foot on and then I freaked out as I was thrust forward and up on the mechanical teeth. Yes I am talking about an escalator. To end our trip we all rode the escalator up and down close to 75 times. During that time we struck random poses and acquired the strangest glares from passerby's. After the first few minutes the people working in the store, Borders, began conversing with us every time we would reach the top. They ended up being pretty nice people and I feel that we made a few more friends that day. Once again it would seem that technology has helped make this world that much more bearable.

Chopsticks have so many uses

Let me know what things you do when you go to the mall or anywhere in public really. Throw those comments into the receiving box below and be sure to follow the blog if you like it. And remember to have a great end of weekend and start of week.