Not the Only One

I love Louis C.K. He's such a great comedian because he's genuinely disappointed in humanity and because most of what he says is right on point.

 I hate cell phones too. Not so much for calling other people, but because people really don't talk to other people on them. And even if you do, you can't rest the phone on your shoulder to write information down. You have to do the left hand, across the body hold or use the speaker. That creates an annoying echo for the other person and there's no privacy with either.

 There's always the impersonal, unintelligible text though. Maybe it's just me and my particular phone, but I literally can't do it. My normal sized hands are too big for the minuscule keyboard and I find abbreviations irritating. I have a minor in English. It severely pains me to not use proper spelling and grammar no matter how efficient it may be. As a result, it takes me five minutes to go back and correct every other word. I also can't fully communicate via text.  I like to elaborate and convey some emotion which you can't do when it takes that long to type.

 Then there's the apps!!!! An app for everything you could need or didn't know you needed. I recently went to my boys middle school open house where half of the teachers immediately instructed parents to sign in under our "padlet". Then we were shown Morpho which is an app. for downloading a selfie to record and read your writing assignments. Can you say over the top and creepy? What the hell! There are at least four different sites we can log into to check their homework, their grades, their teacher blogs, their fair information, (there are now History fairs), and now they want to add another one?

 When I was in middle school our parents didn't track our every minute in school. We wrote assignments down in a small pad and were taught to be responsible for our own work. Here's an idea. How about we just use a pen and a piece of paper to sign in, talk to our kids about school, and have our kids actually read their stories to us face to face without the avatar.

I'm all for keeping up with technology to improve our live but at times I find it unnecessary. What's wrong with using simple means if they're less complicated, just as effective, and more humane. Call me old fashioned, but it would be nice if more people weren't constantly walking around staring down at a screen.