No New Tricks

As some of you might have guessed from my previous posts, I am
not technology-friendly. This old dog is not very accepting of new
tricks. I put off getting one of those new-fangled DVD players for
a long time. Middle school kids would offer to bring a movie for
a Christmas party, and I would tell them, "But my TV only plays
tapes." Oh, that didn't bother them. "I can bring in my DVD player
and hook it up." The h*** you say! When my then-7-year-old
child promised to hook it up if I would get one, I knew it was
time to give in.

Down through history, I would have been one of the doubters.
Sail to America? (OK, so it probably wasn't named America
yet, cause we were trying to get to India to spice up our lives,
and that map-maker hadn't named my country after himself yet.)
I would not have gone. What if the ship went over the edge of
the world? Then where would I be? Hanging by my fingernails,
gasping, in the waterfall at the edge of the world, still with no
spices!

So maybe they kidnapped me and made me go. "Hey, Hillbilly
Mom, look at this red juicy plant thingy! Try a bite. They're
great!" Uh...no. Everybody knows tomatoes are poisonous.

"Let's move out west! There's free land and gold and buffalo
as far as the eye can see." No, thank you. I prefer to keep
my hair on my head. I don't want to live in a dirt house and
sweep the dirt that falls off my dirt ceiling off of my dirt floor
and out the door into the dirt.

Why would anybody need a bank? Are they too lazy to dig
a hole in the backyard and bury their money like everyone
else? I swear...the way some people put on airs.

Telephone? Is that like a really long string and a bunch of tin
cans? What was wrong with the Pony Express?

Vaccinations? You want to do what with that needle? Stick
some disease in me so I can make antibodies against it just
in case I ever get exposed to it? I think I'll take that chance.

Send a man to the moon? And bring him back safely? How
can you do that when the technology to run a future calculator
takes up an entire room? What are you, a movie producer?
(We'll discuss my moon landing propaganda another time.)

Cook food without heat? That radiation might give me cancer.
How can something cook from the inside first? With no heat?

CDs? That will never catch on. It's gonna be pretty hard
to carry those things around and try to play them in the
car or on a Walkman. That would be like carting a 45 rpm
record around with you. You'll need to strap a record-player
on your back and get a long extension cord.

Information Superhighway? What is that creepy little commercial
girl talking about? Will we ride on the big big bus and zoom
around to different libraries until we get our fill of book-learnin' ?

And don't get me started on MP3s and picture phones and
missions to Mars. It is boggling my mind. Must. Stop. Now.