Big Hair, Russians, and Technophobia

You know, I think I'm terminally stuck in the 80's. I still like acid-wash jeans. I still like gravity-defying bangs. I still like Duran-Duran and the Bangles and Hall and Oates. And I still like Footloose and Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Just One of the Guys.

But especially in my books and movies, I still like the Cold War. That sounds insane, I know, but it was so much easier to do villains and spies back then. Everybody knew how espionage worked; you went to the Russian embassy party, tossed bon mots with a few well clad enemies, snuck upstairs to pick the lock of a Poobah's desk while the guards watched the soccer match, took pictures of top secret documents with your tiny camera, went back downstairs narrowly missing detection by guards who finally heard you, and made an attractive fellow agent livid but terribly attracted to you as you drove off in your sportscar.

The current Enemies of the State don't lend themselves to my imagination. Neither does modern technology. A cell not getting service just doesn't have the same menace as a phone that suddenly goes dead. A couple on the run don't seem so alone when they have GPS and OnStar. Granted, if I want my lovers forced into close quarters I can always whip up a blizzard. Provided of course that the cabin they wander into won't have a generator and a satellite.

What about you? Do all the current goodies excite you, or spoil your fun?