Cables everywhere

Will you look at this mess? Just look at it! (Are you looking yet?) So many cables in our lives. This is what it looks like behind my desk at home. Many of you have seen this in your own homes, I'm sure. If not at home, then you've seen it at work. Come on, just admit it. You'll feel better if you do. I see cables everywhere I look. I see them in my sleep. I dream about untangling them and winding them, only to turn around and find them in a twisted pile again. (Insert ear-piercing shriek and bad horror movie music here.) Guess I should have thought about all the cables before I got my Computer Technology degree...and my Sound Engineering certificate.

Too many cables in the world! Makes me a little nutty at times. You need to be an expert in signal flow to hook up just about any piece of electronic equipment these days. AC/DC power cables, XLR cables, 1/4" cables, FW400/800 cables, USB cables, Ethernet cables, Tiny-tip cables, RCA cables, Component video cables, optical cables, composite video cables, HDMI cables, DVI cables, VGA cables, iPod charger cables, cell phone charger cables, coaxial cables, cable cars, cable-knit sweaters... I digress. You think this picture is bad? You should have seen what I was looking at when I crouched down behind the recording console this past weekend. I was investigating where I might reconnect the mic pre-amp that had been connected the previous time I used that space, but was disconnected this time around. It was a literal sea of cables that included every type imaginable and ever color of the rainbow. When did it come to this? What happened to simplicity?

Sometimes I gaze upon the pile of cables and wonder about how to reduce it, or make it look less like wire vomit. Usually I sigh heavily, shake my head and move on to something else. I did recently come to the realization that a longer power strip is needed to accommodate the number of cables. For a minute that felt like progress, but then I realized it just meant MORE cables.