Que sera, sera, whatever will be, will be, but first I need more coffee.

Month: April 2011

Tchooka tchooka tchooka. Kerchunk

I just read that the last typewriter factory shutdown. It was in India. It’s been many years, probably more than a decade since I’d last used a typewriter, manual or electric. I even had an electric typewriter in the 80’s. There was a point in the 90’s when I’d gone completely over to computers for all my typing needs and wanted to give a typewriter a try again. For old time’s sake.

The first thing I noticed wasn’t the speed. It was slower, but the hard return. You are typing along and then you reach the end of the line and you have to hit the return. There is a noticeable delay. It wasn’t anything I’d noticed before. With computers you just keep on typing and it wraps automatically. No delay. On my first Macintosh I installed Underwood typewriter sounds so the keystrokes sounded like a typewriter. It was amusing for a few minutes.

My mother had a manual typewriter and if you typed too fast, the keys would bunch up and you’d have to pry them loose one by one until the clump fell apart and the remaining keys fell back. 

Like so many other eras that have ended few will mourn it’s passing or noticed that had even come to an end.

Social Media

I really don’t know what the term means, but I do know this. It is a mistake to have your friends using all of the same social media that you do. I’ve offended someone on one of them, but I can’t go to the other social media to vent because they are on it as well. Fortunately, they are not here. I should probably apologize, but what I posted wasn’t that bad… in the grand scheme of things.

I recently posted on Facebook about it’s fine grain control of what your FB friends see and what you see. I hide most people from my status feed, because for the most part I don’t know them or haven’t had that much contact with them online. I’ve also created groups that only certain people can see what I post.  If I post something a little off color, I don’t want my father-in-law seeing it. Although I mostly group people into ultraconservative, conservative, and normal. I’ll occasionally make political posts to the conservative group. Normal sees everything.

I know that I’ve offended my conservative friends from time to time (and deliberately so). What I don’t understand is why they either don’t unfriend on Facebook me and maintain contact via email or hide me from their feed.  I’ve even explained in so many words how they can control what they see and who sees what they post.

Cabin in the Woods

 Before Facebook and Twitter there was LiveJournal. I rarely used it. And still I don’t post much here. It doesn’t feel as active a community as those others. And that’s the way I like it. It’s my cabin in the woods, my retreat. There are occasional visitors, but for the most part. It’s just me and the journal. There’s more room to spread out. And there’s not as much shouting as there is on Facebook. Facebook are places in the city you hang out with friends and Twitter is like the streets where you can chat with your friends but strangers can join in too.

It’s nice to come here and visit from time to time and post my thoughts.

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