I am not mechanical. That's a role my wife gladly embraces. I am, however, the technology specialist in our family. And we have developed a perfect symbiotic relationship. While I have reached equilibrium in my adult life, my earlier years were marked with mechanical breakdowns. I developed an aversion to putting together and fixing things boys are supposed to be well-suited for and interested in.

I've always been a visual person, however. If someone shows me how to change a tire, I can do it (and I can remember how to do it forever). However, something vital is missing if someone merely tells me how to do it. I get lost in the instructions, perhaps while trying to visualize what I'm supposed to do. It can only lead down an even steeper embankment if it's a manual written by someone whose first language is my first language or a person who has forgotten that he or she is not talking to the initiated.

These stories are, to put it simply, diary entries about my bouts with machines and other things with moving parts.