Albert Einstein said, "It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity."

Well friends, I am here to confirm this observation by giving you an account of several hours in a day that I experienced recently.

It started like any other; I called into the office to check my voice mail while on my way to the grocery store. There were no messages but I did have six 'urgent' e-mails that were delivered to my handheld Blackberry several minutes later.

These urgent demands included confirming dinner plans with a friend, scheduling poker night with my buddies and trash-talking from one of my fantasy football cohorts.

Rather than going through the drive-up at the bank, I opted for the ATM. I used my "money card," as the kids call it, since I can't remember my account number. Bankers don't like it when you don't know your account number.

At least the automated-teller said, "Thank you for banking with us" in a nifty little English accent. (I wonder if they could program it to speak Pittsburghese? "Thank Yunz fer bankin' wif us, n'at?")

Once at the grocery store, I spoke to no one and instead, read an e-mailed list of items I needed to purchase for the week (sent from myself earlier in the day to remind me what I needed.) It's my new grocery list method.

Even when items couldn't be easily found, I simply walked around and hunted for them rather than asking for assistance. I didn't want to inconvenience anyone at the store; they all seemed pretty busy scanning inventory with little laser beam thingies that blipped like a heart monitor.

Checking out was a story in and of itself! I purchased $50 worth of food and no one helped me scan, bag or check-out. A change machine urged me to place my crispy new $20 bills into it, promising that yes, it would in fact make change — and it did. This machine also printed a receipt thanking me for the business and asking we to please stop back.

An automatic sliding door opened to the parking lot where I popped the trunk of my car with a remote.

Once in the car, my cell phone confirmed that I had a text message and a voice-mail message.

Both messages were from my cell phone provider informing me of new, updated changes about to occur that would change my life forever!

Upon consideration, my hopes are that these changes involve putting human beings back into the picture sometime soon. How scary is it that we can go through an entire day and have zero interaction with another human being? We all need someone to make us smile, or talk to us or even make us angry.

Emotions are the fabrics that make us human beings. Does a receipt saying "Thank you" give you the same feeling you're supposed to get when someone smiles and says the same thing?

I know. You're thinking: "Get over it; it's just a little thing to make life faster, a little emotion removed from the equation is no big deal."

I disagree, and so does Vincent Van Gogh, who said, "Let's not forget that the little emotions are the great captains of our lives and we obey them without realizing it."

I'm afraid that none of us have little emotions anymore, and therefore, we are losing our humanity.