Writer's Island - Changed - 2/12/08

I am a dinosaur. The world has changed around me and I have tried my best to stay the same. Some call me old school. I think it is more like old fool.

Although I have always known I was behind the times, it was never more evident than a few days ago when I went to a Best Buy with a friend. I often go to Best Buy, but I hardly ever venture into the bowels of the store. Luckily for me, the DVDs are right in front of the store.

This particular day we had to go back in the computer section, as my friend was looking to buy some hardware to make her computer wireless, or hairless, or something. As the computer tech conversed with her in computerese, what I heard was the same thing Charlie Brown hears when a teacher or parent talks: "wah wah wah wah wah" (I may have spelled that wrong). Soon tiring of feeling like a moron I roamed the store. I was confronted with items that I not only had no use for. I did not even know what they were. I am not talking about a few items. I am talking about aisles of merchandise. If a Best Buy store was designed with people like me in mind, it would be the size of a 7-11.
To say that technology has passed me by is an understatement. It has passed me by faster than a Corvette passing an Amish buggy.
My microwave and VCR still permanently flash 12:00, keeping me in a permanent Twilight Zone episode.


My son recently gave me his TIVO, as it was already obsolete to him. He had upgraded to the Time Warner Cable HD Digital Video Recorder, whatever in the hell that is. Whatever it is, it has superseded a technology that I didn’t even have yet. I hooked it up and I can play the programs that he had already recorded but there is no hope of ever recording any of my own. The instructions are only slightly less technical than those to disarm a bomb, and no less tedious. The TIVO has a bright future as a dust magnet and may soon be featured on EBAY.

I do own a cell phone, but resisted it for years. I am certain that there are Bushmen in the Kalahari that had cell phones before I did and probably more bars than I have in South Carolina. My son has an I Phone, which does everything except perform fellatio. I think that feature is available as an add-on. My phone has a piece of tape holding the battery compartment closed.


It is not only the changes in technology that confuse and irritate me. It is the 21st Century life in general. I think it was Ben Franklin who once said: “Believe half of what you see and none of what you hear.” He was way ahead of his time. With programs like Photoshop and airbrushing, I can’t believe anything I see.



I have to run anything I read through Snopes to authenticate it and who’s to say Snopes is not corrupted.

I love sports, but with steroid abuse, referees and umpires on the Mob payroll, and cheating scandals, I have no faith that results or records are not tainted.


The changes in our lives resulting from the attacks on 911 are too numerous to discuss here but one that has affected me personally is that air travel is no longer enjoyable. It never was never really a pleasurable experience, but know it is downright unfun. Gone are the days of arriving at the airport 20 minutes before flight time, curbside check in, and casually walking to your departure gate.

Now I have to be sure to wear my good socks since my shoes will definitely be coming off. I want us to be safe, but until there is a documented case of a fat, 55 year old blonde haired, blue eyed, pasty skinned, man involved in air piracy, let me keep my damned shoes on.

I am so tired of our politically correct existence. I am fat. I am not gravitationally challenged or horizontally skewed. A janitor is a janitor. He is no type of engineer. It is a noble job but no one goes to MIT and gets a degree in custodial services.


And don’t get me started on press 1 for English.


I watched the Grammy Awards and it is my learned opinion that today’s music sucks. We have to worry about: global warming and dirty bombs.
Sport sex has horrible consequences making it not worth the trouble.


You have to shred your trash to keep someone from stealing your identity. Anyone who would want mine is a sad case indeed.

Kids can’t just go outside and play. They have to be watched every minute and equipped with tracking devices. Everyone from the clergy to educators are potential pedophiles.

This has really turned into a rant. I guess the bottom line is that I was born in the wrong generation. I would have been more at home typing this on an Olivetti.