Progress Bars

I'm annoyed by progress bars. I have a love/hate relationship with progress bars depending on the situation but most of the time I swap from love to hate and back in just seconds. If it tells me it takes half a minute, I'll love the damn thing and I'll probably ignore it. If I have to upload 5Mb and it takes like about 45 minutes to upload this to a server using FTP, watching a progress bar can be quite annoying, trust me.

The thing is, why am I watching that crazy progress bar at all? What is so appealing about these things? Why can't I just leave them alone for a while and do something else in the mean time since all I have to do is check when it's done to see if there were any errors, or if it succeeded at all. I think that is the main purpose of these things anyway, so what is the point in staying there and watch the progress [if there is any at all].

I reckon I became an addict when I used to work as a system operator. My job was to maintain all the Macintosh computers of this multimedia company based in the centre of town, next to China Town, the red light district and all the drug addicts and drunks. The job was nice and the company was situated in a tiny old castle with very thick walls keeping the dreariness and emptiness from the surrounding area and it's inhabitants and dwellers out.

Maintenance would mean, installing, updating and upgrading software and operating systems, network [TCP/IP settings], and defrag hard disks using Norton Utilities: the worst application, with nice graphics that keep you updated about the state of your fragmented hard disk. Eyes that start to become itchy and red from watching these bars, all six of them. Challenging myself by placing bets on the bar that would finish first like horse races. Pathetic really, isn't it?

I have to admit I used to love and/or hate it and I still do, I wonder if anyone else, is as weird, as I am. I know one other person who will remain unmentioned but who shares the same idiocy... He actually reminded me of my silly behaviour because he did the same the other day. So I'm still left wondering about the reason why. I hope someone could tell me, I would really like to know...