Wow, according to the posts record, I haven't actually posted a new blog in this Blog. Been so busy being snarky, mean and insulting on my other blog ( blatant plug) that I kind of forgot to post anything from here. I'd like to claim that I was just too busy to do more than one blog or that some horrible life-altering event happened to distract me, but really it is because I have the attention span of a gnat. The only reason I actually remembered this blog is because I happened to click the blog name button at the top of the Blogger site and saw a couple more pop down. So, since I am making a concerted effort to do more writing and be more productive, I am back writing this little puff blog. I am sure all of the people who get notified when a new blog is posted are going to be more than a tad surprised after 3 years.
So the original goal of this blog was just to comment on the odd or interesting things I had seen or done during the day. I have commented on birthdays, parking, churches and oh so many other topics. I just wanted a place to talk about things that made me stop and go “Hmmmm.” It was never meant as a deep, meaningful source. My only goal with this blog was to make you smile and laugh or at the least go, “WTF?!” With that in mind, let me tell you about my most recent WTF moment and see if it amuses you. (Keep in mind, that even if it doesn't amuse you, I will keep rambling on and on and on so you are warned that I will not shut up any time soon.)
As a little background, I am from LA (that's Lower Alabama) and spent most of my life in areas so rural that little towns of 500 or so people was deemed a major metropolis. The first house I remember living in had no running run, heating or air and no electricity. We had a truly fancy outhouse with three holes and fresh water came from a well where you lowered a bucket down 60 feet. Even after all of these many years away from there, I am still very much a product of that kind of life.
So day before yesterday, I was reading a rather interesting piece in Scientific American online talking about how much 4G communications had spread and was also discussing the next generation of the Internet which would be able to access it. After I read the article, I (as I always do) scrolled through the comments section for my own amusement and one comment from a very young looking fellow read as follows.
“If I couldn't access the internet anytime I wanted to, I would just die. No one could ever survive without it.”
Now, folks, I LOVE the Interwebz and I happily admit that I am constantly using my smartphone and tablet to access everything from Facebook to YouTube no matter where I am. I check my emails and text various friends and family more often than a hyperactive teenager with five hands. I would feel severely inconvenienced if I couldn't do these things when I wanted and where I wanted. Don't even get me started on all the mobile games that I waste time and money on. That being said, I can state plainly without hesitation that I COULD very easily survive without it. Hells, I survived 30 odd years without the Interwebz and 40 odd years without a smartphone or tablet. My first couple of decades, we ALL had tablets and you wrote in them with a pencil. My first experience with meeting with others with a computer was a dial-up connection to Electronic Bulletin Boards. My first use of the internet was more dial-up and America Online. Apps were short for Appetizers and had nothing to do with games or chatting.
Now that I have established just how old I am, let's focus on the poor soul's comment again. Now some of you would prolly call him/her/it? a spoiled and entitled brat and you might be right, but the funny thing is you might be wrong too. I remember back when I was starting college and started to hang out with people slightly higher up the food chain. I told them about how I had lived growing up and they would say, “No lights? No running water? My God, I would die if I had to live like that.” (As a side note here, I have to add that once I had begun living in an apartment with said lights, water and an air conditioner/heater that I wasn't really sure how I had survived it either.)
So, to me it is funny watching each “older” generation talking about the “spoiled and coddled” new generation because dollars to donuts if you could magically travel back in time, you would hear their parents saying pretty much the same thing about them. The whole idea behind learning and developing ourselves and our world is that the next generation won't have to lack the things that the previous one did. Even now, we have a generation growing up that has never been without smartphones, ones and high speed internet and you can bet there are plenty of people out there who had to deal with flip phones and hitting the same key three times to make “S” looking at them and thinking, “You know back in my day.”
In the 56 years, I have been on this planet, I have seen what was literally Science Fantasy become fact. I have seen inventions that even the brightest and more talented genius from the 1970s would have deemed beyond impossible. I sit at my touch screen reversible laptop/tablet combo while posting this blog over my high speed internet while checking my emails on my smart phone with the inch screen and 4G access and my mind boggles. I personally cannot wait to see WTF is coming next. Until then, however, YOU KIDS GET OFF OF MY LAWN AND GET A JOB! OH YEAR AND HAIRCUT!
