If I were to start this off by saying “I remember the days when…”  perhaps a handful would be hooked.  I am a 50 yr.old Luddite. Think about that. 50 years old AND a Luddite. WOW! Hmm. An outrage. So sad. So wrong. (I was going to type ‘so outre’ but I can’t figure out how to insert an ‘accent egou’ on my ‘e’). Need I say more?
The V-Tech phone in my studio bears the dim message “CONNECTING”. What does that mean? I press all the buttons. I can’t get a dial tone, I can’t call out, I can’t even use the intercom feature to alert Andrew to check on his garlic chicken-fava bean –and rice dish that’s sitting on the woodstove. It’s not ‘connecting’ at all. Will Andrew smell the burning meal and be able to identify it as such?  (Not in my experience, but I suppose there’s always a chance.) As a strict vegetarian whose diet is limited to red wine and tobacco, and the occasional hard-boiled egg, I’m not overly concerned that Andrew will waste away due to an electronic gaff (unless, of course, it’s a stroke…dear God, NO). He’s got his peanut butter and jelly and cheese and bread and butter and eggs, eggs, eggs….(please come by , local readers, and get some eggs). But let’s come back to the technological challenges that seem to shadow me like a point-blank gun.  What is up? Do I need to replace the batteries on these phones? What is that? $25.00 per phone for 4 phones?  $100.00 ? This seems outrageous and defies logic? One could simply purchase a new phone system for $69.99! For one thing, it insults and offends my sense of environmental responsibility, for another, it encumbers me with yet another purchase that will continue to offend me (financially and environmentally) many days on end. (What does one do with all those spent batteries?). Worse, what if one decides to simply purchase a new phone system every year (about the time that the batteries run out)? Chuck 5 lbs. of plastic into the heap? Please advise!!!!

On to social networking, and by that I mean Facebook.  I value meaningful communication. I’ve come to devalue Facebook as a venue for meaningful communication. I’m even less fond of it recently. I used to be able to read a piece of interesting and valuable journalism and click on a ‘Share’ button and suddenly, magically, there it was…for all my friends to see (whether they liked it or not). That seems to be a thing of the past. Now, one is provided with the sole option of “Recommend”, and then one is advised that they will be sharing all of their personal information, obviously for the purpose of marketing, with the big, great world. Sadly, I decline. Regrettably, I hit the ‘cancel’ button. Big Multi-national, King-of-the-World- Facebook Brother who was once my friend, is, alas, now de-friended.
Spring will surely ‘spring’.