rambling and ranting about technology
I can be forgiven for rambling thoughts when it's 4:30 a.m., right?
Here I am. It's dark, it's cold, and the stores don't open for at least 4 more hours. I have things to do!
Yesterday, I did my walking errands. Today, I do the driving errands. My printer always craps out at Christmas time. It's amazing that an inanimate object has such a great sense of timing. This time, it won't recognize the black ink cartridge even though we've cleaned the jets, replaced the cartridge, rebooted the whole printer, and done all the other easy fixes.
And like most things, you can probably buy a 40 dollar part or replace the printer for about 75 dollars. Shit.
I'm going to take my Christmas letter to the print shop down the street. I'm not fighting with the printer anymore.
Tiffany was over the other day and she spent some time reading through the old Christmas letters which live in the back of the Christmas recipe binder. She thought they were hilarious. I said they got less funny as our kids grew up and we didn't have as much to be sarcastic about. Ha! That is absolutely true. Teenagers make great writing material.
I've been thinking about Google tv. If you don't know what it is, I'm not going to be a very good source of information. I put it in google (heh) and found this http://www.google.com/tv/. But of course, it's all in video and such. No printed information. I'd check it out. Apparently, it's the future of the world.
I'm not even crying about the demise of letter writing, although I am, but this seems to be a way to spend your life sitting in front of the television. It's all there...movies, sit coms, Youtube, the web, email, apps, and probably even Angry Birds.
I wish people would stop inventing stuff because I can feel myself getting behind and I can feel myself getting a bad attitude. I used to worry about it and the fear of suddenly refusing to do things like set a digital clock forced me to learn about computers and cell phones and such.
But I've realized, that for me, technology is just a means to an end. I like the way it makes a lot of things easier. I like being able to shop for things world-wide, I like being in touch with people I don't see very often (or never), I like being able to publish my blog and pictures and I like reading newspapers and daily poems and blogs of friends.
I am complaining vociferously about the time and brain energy it seems to suck and about the social dysfunction it seems to create. Seriously, I had a young woman at my Thanksgiving table sending text messages beneath the table cloth.
I can't complain out loud about this at home too much because Regis is a fan of technology for it's own sake. He loves gadgets. Loves, loves, loves gadgets.
In our house (where two people live) we have these things by which one could access the internet: two cell phones, two desk top computers, a laptop computer, an iPad and probably a thing or two I have forgotten. News flash: THERE IS NOT ENOUGH WORTHWHILE SHIT ON THE INTERNET TO MAKE THIS MUCH CRAP NECESSARY.
We were talking about it last night and he said Google tv is kind of like your first Commodore computer. What??? I had to google that to see what it was. Or, he said, it's like when you used to wonder when phones would become cordless. These are thoughts I never had.
My old friend, Steve Schipp, used to say that the world is made up of two kinds of people: Those who know how to drive fork lifts and those who do not. Maybe it's that kind of thing. Maybe the world is made up of two kinds of people: Those who get Google tv and those who do not. Put me in the latter.
Here I am. It's dark, it's cold, and the stores don't open for at least 4 more hours. I have things to do!
Yesterday, I did my walking errands. Today, I do the driving errands. My printer always craps out at Christmas time. It's amazing that an inanimate object has such a great sense of timing. This time, it won't recognize the black ink cartridge even though we've cleaned the jets, replaced the cartridge, rebooted the whole printer, and done all the other easy fixes.
And like most things, you can probably buy a 40 dollar part or replace the printer for about 75 dollars. Shit.
I'm going to take my Christmas letter to the print shop down the street. I'm not fighting with the printer anymore.
Tiffany was over the other day and she spent some time reading through the old Christmas letters which live in the back of the Christmas recipe binder. She thought they were hilarious. I said they got less funny as our kids grew up and we didn't have as much to be sarcastic about. Ha! That is absolutely true. Teenagers make great writing material.
I've been thinking about Google tv. If you don't know what it is, I'm not going to be a very good source of information. I put it in google (heh) and found this http://www.google.com/tv/. But of course, it's all in video and such. No printed information. I'd check it out. Apparently, it's the future of the world.
I'm not even crying about the demise of letter writing, although I am, but this seems to be a way to spend your life sitting in front of the television. It's all there...movies, sit coms, Youtube, the web, email, apps, and probably even Angry Birds.
I wish people would stop inventing stuff because I can feel myself getting behind and I can feel myself getting a bad attitude. I used to worry about it and the fear of suddenly refusing to do things like set a digital clock forced me to learn about computers and cell phones and such.
But I've realized, that for me, technology is just a means to an end. I like the way it makes a lot of things easier. I like being able to shop for things world-wide, I like being in touch with people I don't see very often (or never), I like being able to publish my blog and pictures and I like reading newspapers and daily poems and blogs of friends.
I am complaining vociferously about the time and brain energy it seems to suck and about the social dysfunction it seems to create. Seriously, I had a young woman at my Thanksgiving table sending text messages beneath the table cloth.
I can't complain out loud about this at home too much because Regis is a fan of technology for it's own sake. He loves gadgets. Loves, loves, loves gadgets.
In our house (where two people live) we have these things by which one could access the internet: two cell phones, two desk top computers, a laptop computer, an iPad and probably a thing or two I have forgotten. News flash: THERE IS NOT ENOUGH WORTHWHILE SHIT ON THE INTERNET TO MAKE THIS MUCH CRAP NECESSARY.
We were talking about it last night and he said Google tv is kind of like your first Commodore computer. What??? I had to google that to see what it was. Or, he said, it's like when you used to wonder when phones would become cordless. These are thoughts I never had.
My old friend, Steve Schipp, used to say that the world is made up of two kinds of people: Those who know how to drive fork lifts and those who do not. Maybe it's that kind of thing. Maybe the world is made up of two kinds of people: Those who get Google tv and those who do not. Put me in the latter.
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