Is it what makes you old is you don't care anymore about "such things"?

[Tamara]

One thing for sure is that I am now more picky about newfangled technology and trends. My line of thinking is that why text/blog a conversation when you can pick up the phone and call that person, or gasp, see them face to face. Then there are all the new and growing words that go along with texting. I once thought there was going to be a fight when I heard one worker call another a DINK. Only later did I learn that DINK now means "Dual income No Kids." We are getting a whole new language out of this but what we really need is to relearn how to communicate.

One of these lists has the phone I use today, a Razor, as a museum piece. Perhaps so but when you spend your work life in a place like this:

not only do you want to get away from it when not at work, but really going from 10 screens of information to one that fits in your hand is quite the downgrade.

I have been considering getting a smartphone for a particular use, but have not gotten around to yet. Have other things to be concerned about.

It does make it rather interesting since people assume that since you work in the computer section, you know all about the next new thing on the market.

As it is, my way of electronic communicating follows a different path. Long story short, as Walter Mathau said in "First Monday in October"........"the telephone has no Constitutional right to be answered."................I'll answer my phone when I'm ready, not just because it makes noises.

Interesting enough, a lot of people, even of this generation, don't understand this frequent response from me: "Msg Recvd & Undrstd". I suppose it must be because it is derived from how an oldster talks.

[bonehead]

I have always used JFK and now that you mention it Jack Kennedy. Never ever used John Kennedy and only use John F Kennedy when someone doesn't know the first two names. Same holds for RFK or Bobby Kennedy.

As for Doktor, yes it is FDR and also Ike besides LBJ.

One thing for sure is that I am now more picky about newfangled technology and trends. My line of thinking is that why text/blog a conversation when you can pick up the phone and call that person, or gasp, see them face to face. Then there are all the new and growing words that go along with texting. I once thought there was going to be a fight when I heard one worker call another a DINK. Only later did I learn that DINK now means "Dual income No Kids." We are getting a whole new language out of this but what we really need is to relearn how to communicate.

[tbm3fan]

On "Who is JFK?"..........

Like Back to the Future, huh? Sort of catches one, coming or going.

As it is, that sort of hit me when I was talking to my father once, say around when I was 35. We were talking about JFK and at one point, he starts talking about "Jack Kennedy" and I didn't know who he was talking about so I asked. Exasperated, he told me "John F." and everyone knew that Jack was short for John.

Well, I didn't, and at the time, I just took it as part of my ignorant social learning, where there were many factors of popular culture I just didn't know (and still don't, but perhaps of different types).

But now that you mention it that way, I suppose it may have been an element of time lines.

I have always used JFK and now that you mention it Jack Kennedy. Never ever used John Kennedy and only use John F Kennedy when someone doesn't know the first two names. Same holds for RFK or Bobby Kennedy.

As for Doktor, yes it is FDR and also Ike besides LBJ.

[Tamara]

So you guys better don't ask about FDR then

Given the current political climate, I would imagine his initials come up a lot in conversation. Just like here in Texas, especially around Austin, if you say LBJ, odds are people know who you are talking about.

I guess it all depends of whether or not the initials are used in this or that region. Ie, those in NYC probably know that JFK is Kennedy.....though whether they know it as an airport or a past president, is another thing.

Me, I like to play on the humor of the US political arena, however dark it might be. So I refer to some administrations as Bush the First or Bush the 2nd. And what's the importance of November 22nd?

Why, it's the anniversary of LBJ's Ascension to Power!

[Doktor]

So you guys better don't ask about FDR then

[Tamara]

I guess it depends on the child. For example I clearly remember watching the JFK-Nixon debate on B&W TV when 7 years old with my parents. I was quite enamored by JFK and his coolness. Now old would be when I mention JFK to a college student and they have no idea who I am talking about. I need to say John F Kennedy and not the more typical JFK used in the day.

As for war my most constant memory is of Vietnam from 1963- 1975 or from 9-22 years old.

On "Who is JFK?"..........

Like Back to the Future, huh? Sort of catches one, coming or going.

As it is, that sort of hit me when I was talking to my father once, say around when I was 35. We were talking about JFK and at one point, he starts talking about "Jack Kennedy" and I didn't know who he was talking about so I asked. Exasperated, he told me "John F." and everyone knew that Jack was short for John.

Well, I didn't, and at the time, I just took it as part of my ignorant social learning, where there were many factors of popular culture I just didn't know (and still don't, but perhaps of different types).

But now that you mention it that way, I suppose it may have been an element of time lines.

[tbm3fan]

You want to feel old?
Considering we don’t really pay attention to the world until we’re about 5 years old, and nothing outside the family and close friends until about 10, . . .

I guess it depends on the child. For example I clearly remember watching the JFK-Nixon debate on B&W TV when 7 years old with my parents. I was quite enamored by JFK and his coolness. Now old would be when I mention JFK to a college student and they have no idea who I am talking about. I need to say John F Kennedy and not the more typical JFK used in the day.

As for war my most constant memory is of Vietnam from 1963- 1975 or from 9-22 years old.

[Tamara]

You want to feel old?
Considering we don’t really pay attention to the world until we’re about 5 years old, and nothing outside the family and close friends until about 10, . . .

A 30 year old doesn’t remember the USSR, and probably never wrote “19_ _” as the date on a check or letter (remember those?).

A 20 year old doesn’t remember a time when we weren’t at war.

Let's see, what can I say about outside the family that I recall before I was 10 (though granted, it was in the POV of a mind that young). I recall the 1968 Presidential Race......and yes, I thought it was a foot race. The Huntley-Brinkley Report. The moon landing. Apollo 7 and on. How in love the country was with the Nixon family. Death of Eisenhower.....and my next door neighbor murdering his boss.

Granted, as look back to bring up those memories, a lot of them are about family life, about things around me, but I do remember outside things, too.

Like I said, about the only time I feel old is when I realize that my high school friends have beautiful children.......entering or in college.

As things go, my state of mind is a great advantage and disadvantage about one's age. On one side, best said, I see myself as a 30's in their 20's (and really, I'm in my 50's). In that I still see, do a lot of the fun THAT I DID in my 20's but with something of the wisdom of my 30's.

But on the other hand, that is part of what puts me so far out of my time line when it comes to dating. Never married, never been close to that. When it comes to dating, the people I might seek have "had experiences" like most people in that age range and it is totally unknown to me.....and those in my mental age are too immature for me, probably of the mind sets that these lists produce.

SHRUG! (for the most part, on most days). I live with it in it being a certain life style.

And I still write checks.

[bonehead]

Gone are the days when my music irritates my parents……now I find myself yelling at my kids to turn that crap down.

A 20 year old doesn’t remember a time when we weren’t at war.

Neither is a 60 year old+

[tbm3fan]

Aren't you a breath of fresh air

[DOR]

You want to feel old?
Considering we don’t really pay attention to the world until we’re about 5 years old, and nothing outside the family and close friends until about 10, . . .

A 30 year old doesn’t remember the USSR, and probably never wrote “19_ _” as the date on a check or letter (remember those?).

A 20 year old doesn’t remember a time when we weren’t at war.

[Tamara]

A friend posted this on my Facebook page and how did I rack up?

Well, for most of the items listed, I either didn't know what they were talking about, had never seen them, or haven't cared about them in decades. I can't remember the last time I ate at Micky D's having given up on fast food probably in the 80's, have never seen The Lion King, never watched Friends, only saw the first Potter flick last month, when Miley pulled her doggie stunt I had never heard of her (and thought in the days after for a while, that Miley was the boy), X-files burned me from watching it with the movie, I don't have HBO so S&TC was a passing fancy when I was at Mom's, didn't know about this Pepsi Blue or MD Black till about 10 minutes ago, my video store is still around, and GoldenEye to me is like OHMSS in that it is an older Bond movie that is still in the modern world (ie, in OHMSS, they switched from using Bell 47's and the like to Jet Rangers).

So Brad Pitt is 50, so what? People age and the one good thing about the more famous actors is usually, one can find a flick with them in it of them at their best age, not the way they are now.

If anything makes me feel old, is realizing where high school classmates are now with their lives, such as retiring from the Air Force with 30 years. It is looking at cases of murdered children and thinking what they would have been now if that path had not been crossed. It is realizing how long I've been in this location, of the changes that have occurred here and to me, those changes are still new, but really, they were years ago.

But interestingly enough in an odd way, there are some things I feel very young about and not necessarily in a good way. I still feel like a teen, a kid, when I go to the auto mechanic to get my car worked on. Way back then, it was a hatchback world and the dealer mechanic telling me before I even got out of the car that he couldn't work on it today (go away). While the mechanics of now may not treat me like that, there with my own truck that I bought from them for almost 40 grand, that feeling is still there.