Keeping up with the times
My dad is an incredibly intelligent man but sometimes he just gets lost in translation.
Back when I was in primary school, I remember coming home with my family from a parent teacher evening and we were all starving for dinner and demanding Macdonalds. Dad drove us through the drive through and attempted to order our dinner.
We get to the window and he ordered himself a Big Mac. The women replied by saying ‘Sml, Med or Lge.’
Confused about her question he replied, ‘Ok, how about a Quarter Pounder.’ Once again the woman replied ‘Sml, med or lge.’
I have never seen such confusion on a grown man’s face in my life. All he wanted was a simple meal and instead he was faced with too many confusing options.
So imagine how hilarious my life became when Foxtel IQ, Mac Book, Facebook etc. came into existence!
Steve at work
I was in Brisbane for his 50th birthday a few weeks ago and unfortunately my extended family can become quite exhausting. In an effort to take time out, I went upstairs to watch a show that has been taped from the TV.
As I went to turn on the machine he came running up the stairs screaming at me to leave the TV alone. Apparently there are taping machines that will not allow you to watch what you have taped at the same time as it is taping something else. As I have never been exposed to such an inferior machine, I did not understand this concept and complained that his machine is ‘stupid’. My dad was very emotional about the whole situation and made me help him research taping machine options for the rest of my weekend in Brisbane.
Two months later, I went back to visit him and he was (and still is) so excited about his discoveries. He came home from work with a skip in his step explaining to me how he has worked out which taping system he wanted and that it will be installed in a week (unfortunately he has too many TV’s and is getting it installed to the wrong one so that next time I need to escape extended family it wont help me at all), but I was happy for him anyway.
He then went on to tell me how in his research he had discovered the IPad. He has owned the IPad for a few months thinking it was purely an online newspaper. Imagine his excitement when he discovered that it does so much more such has allows you to write notes and keep a calander etc.
Now although he is hilarious and I love how behind the times he is, is it really appropriate to assume that people (excluding media) who have tried and tested methods of doing things for years just have to change their thoughts and adapt. The fact that he is actually trying is a huge credit to himself but on top of getting used to the new options out there, he is also faced with 1000 different versions of the same thing. It’s confusing!
Technology may be taking over the world but maybe some of our old and current methods should be preserved. For example, reading the newspaper over my Sunday coffee is something I cherish and look forward to every week. I should not have to change that. Imagine bringing your laptop to a café on a Sunday morning to read the paper over a coffee? How is that enjoyable?
