Monday, July 25, 2011

DIGITAL DEPENDENCY

About two weeks ago we lost internet access.  I made two calls to Technical Support.  On the first call I couldn’t understand the technician and I know that he wasn’t understanding me.  On the second call the technician determined that I had a short in my modem/router.  I thought that it would be a simple matter to go to the Big W and buy a new modem/router.  The desktop computer that the modem/router was connected to was over ten years old.  I decided to replace it at the same time I replaced the modem/router.

I bought a new desktop computer and it came with a 20 inch flat screen monitor.  Before I could install the new computer I had to remove from the old computer the pictures and files I wanted to keep.  That was a task that required hours of work.  Finally, I installed the new computer.  That was fairly easy – at first.  I opened the box to the new “modem/router”, took out the instructions and in the first paragraph read, “Plug your new B….. Router into the existing modem.”  It was only a router, not a modem/router!  I returned it to Big W the next day, talked to the salesman and he said, “Yeah, we used to have modem/routers but now all we have are routers.  Why don’t you try the phone store?”   I thanked him and went across the highway to the phone store and bought a modem/router just like the one which had shorted out (after three years satisfactory service).

Installing the new modem/router should have been easy and it was.  Making it work was another story.  First I tried using the installation/activation scheme on the internet.  I was able to get the host computer on the internet.  However, none of the other computers in the house could find a signal and the installation/activation scheme failed halfway through. I called Technical Support. Here we go again.  After two hours on the phone my laptop and my iPad were able to get a Wi-Fi signal from the router and go on the internet.  The desktop in my study found the signal.  I put in the password but the router rejected it – “invalid IP address”.  I will have to call Technical Support some day if I want my desktop back on the internet.  Frankly, for the time being I’d rather not!

While we are on the subject of Digital Dependency – Our television programs come to us by two satellites.  A dish antenna on the roof captures the signals.  A sweet gum tree in my neighbor’s yard is blocking the signals from one of the satellites and sometimes interferes with the signals from the other satellite.  The technician who came out to the house to fix satellite reception said that we have two options – chop down the neighbor’s tree or wait for winter when the leaves will fall.

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

THE DEBT CRISIS

The current negotiations over the debt crisis are not unlike a husband and wife quarreling when the family has reached the limits of its credit and must do something immediately.  The husband charges the wife with spending too much on the household and the children.  She yells back that he spends too much money on golf and fishing trips in the summer and hunting trips in the fall.
He tells her to get a job and add some money to the budget.  She says that if she gets a job they will have more expenses – babysitting, better clothes for her, transportation, and meals out while she is at work.  She asks if he is willing to do half of the housework if she is working full-time outside the home.  It would be better if he got a second job part time.
They go back to arguing over cutting spending.  If they are going to solve their problem and become solvent, both are going to have to make deep cuts in the spending AND one of them will have to get another job.  They may not do what is necessary and resort to divorce, foreclosure, and bankruptcy.  More domestic debt crises end this way than by making draconian cuts in spending and finding an additional source of income.
Congress is deadlocked between Republicans (the husband) who think that the crisis can be solved by making drastic cuts in the Federal budget.  Democrats (the wife) want to increase taxes for the rich and the big corporations.  The Republicans are right in calling for cuts in the Federal budget – where to cut will be the sticking point.  The Democrats are right in calling for increased taxes.  What neither side is willing to face is that to really make this nation solvent, we must raise taxes for everyone and make large cuts in spending.

Sunday, July 3, 2011

LONELINESS AND THE ELDERLY

Loneliness has always been part of growing old.  It is moving toward the end of life, which is a step we all take alone.
Old age is a time when our closest friends and loved ones are dying one by one.  As each one passes from this life and our life, there is one less person who shared memories with us, who understood us, whose care for us gave our person worth.
Old age is a time of diminishing capacities.  We cannot see as well, hear as much, think as quickly, even do normal, routine functions smoothly and effortlessly as we once could.  This makes us a nuisance or at least a duty, to those around us.  Respect for the elderly is a mantle of protection which unraveled a generation ago.  The young push us away from them as useless and a burden.  At best they leave us alone.  At worst they put us in institutions with euphemistic names, exorbitant costs, and prison-like environments.
In a society that is built around the automobile, what does an old person do when they are no longer able to drive or can no longer afford to drive?  How can they go to the stores or to the doctor?  Public transportation belonged to previous generations.  It exists only in large cities now. 
There are no longer neighbors sitting on porches or park benches.  Everyone is inside with the television.  The television provides a virtual family to lonely old people.  They look forward to the ghosts on the screen as they once looked forward to seeing family members come down the stairs or in the front door.  But ghosts can’t hug, or listen, or cry with you.
Modern society has fragmented families, scattering them all over the country like Buddha’s feathers.  For a while the older person may try to reconnect with family by making trips to visit them (picking up the feathers).  As age advances that becomes harder and harder to do.
In the end the old person sits alone.  Even his/her memories no longer keep company for they too have faded.  All there is to do is wait.