I know I'm a dinosaur, but I don't quite get all the new internet sites. When I was a young man I called friends, went out and did things with them, and was, frankly, quite busy. I still am. I'm active in several organizations, and have difficulty finding time to get things done. Even finding time to blog once a week is difficult. That used to be the norm. Well, Things Have Changed.
The plethora of websites that people have time for boggles the mind. Facebook is the best known, I guess. Everybody posts what they're up to, check what everyone else is up to, lets the world know everything about them. When I want to let someone know, I call. If I'm short of time, I e-mail. There isn't much I want to tell the world about myself. Someone checking out my Facebook page won't find out much of what I'm up to, even if they're on my short list of friends.
Then there's twitter. I really don't get that one. People "tweet" every little thing they do - how do they have time to actually "do" anything? And who really wants to know? I'm too busy actually doing to "tweet" you, and except for my wife, and perhaps a couple friends, I may not want others to know what I'm doing.
And then there's the endless e-mails forwarded. Please, before forwarding to me, please check it out on snopes.com. I flush most of the junk people send me.
Now we have Pinterest - you pin up things of interest to you, for all the world to see. I guess that's useful to some - you can save things to check online later, and it will always be there - if the site succeeds.
I guess what I don't get is where are all these people getting the time to spend online? What is it that they're not getting around to? Don't they have any hobbies or interests? Are they really that efficient in getting things done? Or don't they have a life? To me having a life means actually seeing people! At the computer, time has no meaning - you look up and it's three hours later. Personally, I'd rather do that in the garden, or reading. Why did staring at a screen replace human contact? Are our personal contacts that unsatisfying? Is bowling so boring? Or is physical activity just too much trouble?
Others have said this before, and better, but if you are busy living, I don't see how you have the time to hunt around online for meaning - and that includes reading this blog. If you do, I'm flattered, but better you should read, paint, garden, clean your closets, call a friend!
