Thursday, October 21, 2010

technology crazed-- the cell phone for old people




Is this not the perfect phone for old people? I want to order one right now. I swear I would actually call my relatives and return phone calls if only I could dial them up. I had just begun to learn the cell phone and now there is the bluetooth. what is that-- an off color implant?

Last year I was at the rowing centre down by the lake and someone had left an old rotary phone for people to use in a Quonset hut. The women under thirty had no idea how to use it. They kept pressing the numbers under the plastic circular dial disc and finally said, "I guess it is broken." I showed them how to to dial (now an antiquated verb form). They stood there waiting for the dial to move for each number. I said you had to use your finger and put some muscle into it. It really did take a lot longer than I remembered. Before they got all the digits dialed they said "Forget it, this is like Pony Express!" and hung up.

So If you remember the dial phone you are old. If you remember when the phone only came in black you are really old. If you remember the party line you are ancient and if you remember when the phone was a wooden box on the wall you are barely breathing.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

technical challenges remembering white out



I just loved this picture. When you find you are fixing your computer screen with white-out you know you are old. In fact if you are reading this and even know what white-out is then you are old. Remember that little bottle of correction fluid. Whenever you needed it to fix a typo (another archaic term) in a term paper the white out was always too thick. (It had a shelf life of five minutes) and you needed to go out in the middle of the night and get a new bottle. I eventually found you could add Cutex nail polish remover to it as a thinning solvent. Whenever I handed in my papers they smelled like a beauty parlor. If you remember WHITE-OUT let me know. Now there is a business I would not like to have inherited!