It was time for an upgrade. Life 1.5 was treating me just fine; it was stable, it was familiar, and it provided me with everything that I thought I needed, and I was generally happy with the product. Life 1.5 provided many great features to me as a user, such as the ability to eat anything that I wanted for dinner, hours upon hours of video games at my discretion, binge drinking, and Saturdays spent on the couch. Interestingly enough, Life 2.0 still has many of these same features included, but with a variety of extra features not found in past versions.

In all seriousness, to put things mildly, I’m very happy with my version of Life right now. It’s rather funny how life works sometimes. You plan for a change, and you try in some way to affect a change in your own life, but then you often don’t realize the extent of that change, as it relates to your entire life, in the very moment that the change occurs. Hell, sometimes you don’t realize it for years, or ever. But a change, a big change, a profound change, can cause ripples in your life, changing your life in more ways than you originally intended. Change begets change, if you will, and the next thing you know, your version of Life barely resembles the one that you were using a few short months ago. Maybe it’s because this change in your version of Life changes your personality, or maybe it’s because it simply just changes your perspective on the world. Who knows, but you certainly don’t view the people that you interact with and the situations that you find yourself in the same as you did before, that’s for sure.

Life 2.0 is Peer-to-Peer programming, and sharing with other users abounds. Through its enhanced functionality, your use of Life 2.0 might actually improve or upgrade the versions of Life used by your peers. Your boss may have more free time based on your increased responsibility and drive at work; a significant other might see their version of life upgraded as well, as they begin to care for you in the same way that you care for them. The enhanced functionality purposely allows each user to experience Life differently.

So as I sit in a first class seat on a non-stop flight from San Diego, CA to Charlotte, NC, returning from one of the best weekends that I have experienced in quite some time (which is a story that I will share some other day in the near future), I contemplate when it is that I will next need to upgrade my version of Life. Life 3.0 includes a diamond ring, and the ability to search for florists. Life 3.5, dubbed a mini-upgrade, involves strollers and carriages, and a college trust fund, and it packs a mighty big punch for the price. Life 4.0 is nicknamed ‘Retirement’, and it involves much less work to get it operating, and is very easy to use.

Regardless, I like the program. It suits me. Most definitely, it’s better than Death 1.0, which is never in need of an upgrade. You’ve heard what they say about Death 1.0, right? It’s like Internet Explorer. Nobody really wants it, but you can’t get rid of it, and you eventually end up having to use it for something.