We've made it to Thursday---have you participated in Act Happy Week? Has it made a difference? I think it has for me--I've tried to be deliberate with my actions and my thoughts this week, choosing to have a positive attitude and surround myself with people and things that make me happy. Of course it was extra easy to be happy last night...I came home to find supper totally prepared by my son who is home on spring break. Buffalo chicken soup was simmering in the crockpot, a homemade apple cake fresh from the oven was cooling on the kitchen counter, and a yummy apple/grape/walnut/honey salad was in the refrigerator. Oh yeah, that made me really happy!
Video games. Cell phones. I-pods and Mp3s. HDTV. I-pads. I-phones. I-anything. Laptops. Notebooks (and I don't mean the spiral kind). Skype. You-tube. Facebook. IM. Google. I asked son number two what made him happy and his reply was technology. I try to stay informed as best I can but there has been such an explosion of new technologies in the last decade that it could be a full time job just staying abreast of all of it. Fortunately, I can leave that to my son and it makes me happy that I have a tech 'go-to' guy in my own home! The other night he was patiently explaining about his computer's memory capacity...megabytes and kilabytes and I was really trying to undersand, but I think I relate better to the poem below than I do to computer hard drives!
Remember When ...A Poem About Technology
James S. Huggins
A computer was something on TV
From a sci fi show of note.
A window was something you hated to clean
And ram was the cousin of goat.
Meg was the name of my girlfriend
And gig was a job for the nights.
Now they all mean different things
And that really mega bytes.
An application was for employment.
A program was a TV show.
A curser used profanity.
A keyboard was a piano.
Memory was something that you lost with age.
A CD was a bank account.
And if you had a 3 1/2" floppy
You hoped nobody found out.
A computer was something on TV
From a sci fi show of note.
A window was something you hated to clean
And ram was the cousin of goat.
Meg was the name of my girlfriend
And gig was a job for the nights.
Now they all mean different things
And that really mega bytes.
An application was for employment.
A program was a TV show.
A curser used profanity.
A keyboard was a piano.
Memory was something that you lost with age.
A CD was a bank account.
And if you had a 3 1/2" floppy
You hoped nobody found out.
I've heard so many (grumpy) people bemoan the fact that 'all this technology is mucking up our world', but I politely disagree. Certainly there is a downside, but it has enabled all of us to reach out around the world and realize that we are becoming a global society, not an insular one. And I believe that the more we can discover that we aren't so different after all is a very good thing.
I happen to really admire the gifted violinist Joshua Bell, and just yesterday I came across an interesting article about how he uses technology to navigate his complex world of performance and travel. If you are interested in reading this article, here is the link (ah yes, 'links'...another great tech advancement!)
http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/columnist/talkingyourtech/2013/03/19/joshua-bells-digital-life-games-youtube-samsung-note-ii/1954999/
And while I normally don't put so many links in my blogs, it somehow seems appropriate for today's post. So here is a link to a beautiful little video that will bring a smile to your face and joy to your heart. It guarantees that watching it will make you 'instantly 100 times happier'. I'd settle for ten times happier!
http://www.upworthy.com/bookmark-this-for-when-you-re-sad-and-instantly-be-100-times-happier?g=2
And finally, here is my son's suggestion for the best tongue-in-cheek poem about his love for technology, from the off-beat movie Napolean Dynamite. As another song reminds us, today let us "Don't worry, Be happy!"
I read the poem aloud to Don and we laughed out loud!
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Claudia