I'm Back

I'm back...connected to the world again....but I am not sure for how long.  Same computer...still acting up. Of all times for my computer at work to go down...on my late days.  In the morning, my son is still asleep, so I was unable to get to my home computer, and when I get home on my late days, all I want to do is eat a little something and get some rest. I'd really like to get a laptop.  I've been thinking about it.  I really should do it...although I am not really sure how they work...like how does the internet get installed...because without that, there'd be no sense in having one.

As you all have probably figured, I'm not one of those gadget people, never have been and probably never will be.  Don't have a cell phone and don't want one.  I have have my phone at home and my trusted answering machine; that's good enough for me...and only recently when my phone died out, did I go wireless...and I am still trying to figure out how all of the buttons work.  Nope, I'm not up on all that new technology...all those gadgets that people stand in line for hours for on the day they come out...just so they can be one of the first to have one.  I Pads, I Phones, Wii, Nooks, and that other fake 'book'.  Give me an old hardcover any day, and I'll be happy.  But take my computer away?  Now, that's another story.

Computers, though?  Computers are another thing. Computers have made our lives so much easier....that's for sure. But take them away, and you can have a real case of stress on your hands. I found myself obsessing over what I was missing. Now, mind you, not only was I totally cut off from all of you, my dear friends, but I also couldn't do any work...so imagine what a boring time I had.  Everything here is done on the computer nowadays, and our work program can only be accessed through the internet...which sometimes makes me wonder how confidential our client's information really is.      

Technological addiction....In the 50's, the radio was our main source of entertainment. We'd all gather round to listen to shows such as Dragnet, Burns and Allen, Barbara Stanwyck.  Few families had televisions until the early 60's, but I remember my grandparents getting one in the late 50's. On Saturday nights my grandma loved her Lawrence Welk, and Ii remember how my cousin, Tim, and I used to lie on the living room floor cracking jokes about the bubbles.  Grandma's face would redden, and she'd get so angry.  I hope she knows that it was all done in jest.

In the 60's and the 70's, it was the television set that kept us in our homes, glued to some addictive sitcom or one of the soap operas.  We didn't have cable back then; we just had the standard basic analog black and white...no VCR's, no DVD's, nothing. But, wow, the shows sure were special back then. Personally, thanks to grandma and her soap addiction, I grew to love As the World Turns, Dark Shadows. Guiding Light, and then in the evenings, it was Dallas, Falcon Crest, Knots Landing. Anyone remember them? 

I especially remember the year of Who shot J.R? How could I forget.  That was the year that I moved here to New York City ...1979/1980.  Had no money back then, so, of course, I had no television...and I can still remember how I felt the night I knew the show was airing. Why, it just about killed me knowing that the whole world was finding out the answer, and here I was...sitting in some dinky little transient hotel room...doomed to learn the answer two days later while standing in line to pay for a Hershey's chocolate bar.  And when I think back on it,  I guess you can say I felt the same sense of loss that I have these few days without my computer.


So, I guess what I am trying to see here is that we humans have always been addicted to technology in one form or another...and one day in the future, computers will most likely be as passe as the old black and white or the weekly radio show...but we'll find have something else to keep us occupied.  You can mark my words on that one.