NETWORKING NOTES

Merriam Webster:

Main Entry: net·work·ing Function: noun Date: 1967

1 : the exchange of information or services among individuals, groups, or institutions; specifically : the cultivation of productive relationships for employment or business
2 : the establishment or use of a computer network

Social networking has traditionally been done before technology was invented to speed the process.  As a child, I know it, retrospectively, as 'visiting' to places I needed to walk or talking on the telephone.  Passing notes in class was another, if the teacher didn't catch you and embarrass you by reading the note to the class..  Later, much later, since I am now what I call a senior-senior, there are so many ways to network it makes me want to turn the clock back to when life was simple however short-lived.that desire.   First came 'chat' on the computer, then cheap phones like SKYPE, easy to do fax on the computer or separate units, mobile phones to cell, then text was added, web pages, blogs, My Space, Facebook, and then the dams burst.   There are so many ways to stay in touch with more people than you ever knew had touched your life or cared what has happened to you..  In fact, it is quite difficult to hide, for those trying to do so.  

Google will track everyone down.  We apparently appear on the marketing networks as they infiltrate our computers with those little programs they drop on us to spy.at what we view, what we buy, and I can only guess at what they see through the portholes of my computer.  It makes the saying "My life is an open book" a truism.  .

Those of us who have always thought of ourselves as social, may be having second thoughts.  I, for one, find myself feeling somewhat anti-social at some of the intrusions.. You may think I am complaining about the contacts by my 'friends'.  Not at all. On Facebook I can choose them to be friends, leave chat rooms when people come on for whom I care little, screen my phone calls, (should I choose, aided by caller ID), or even yank phones from their connections though that is time consuming since I have 9 phones (extensions or remote included) scattered around the house and rarely turn on my cell (#10) which I prefer more for emergencies or calls of my own making.and never turn on at home.

What then and I whining about, you might ask. It is the learning curve that only those under 10 years of age can master quickly; who find these things intuitive and don't spend hours as I do trying to understand  manuals.  The second reason is that everyone I know seems to have more expendable time than I do.  I really find that I am not interested in knowing that 30 seconds ago a friend was planning to cook their supper.  I realize that is small of me but, at my age, I think I have limited brain storage space for trivia and fear crowding out the stuff I really wish to remember.  The only good thing about all this is that what I have written is the worst of my current problems.  Despite fearing the world is trying to use up the rest of my life, I've really got it good.  However, having it good does not mean that there is a paucity of things to complain about...I'm told to keep my brain active.  This works.

WHY INSTRUCTION BOOKS ARE IMPORTANT

Being senior offgers advantages, and like everything else, a few drawbacks. Amazingly technology has shown us great tools, but by the time we can really afford them, some of us are so old we can't remember how to use them, if we haven't for more than 10 minutes, or where we put the manual. I've hunted for an instruction book for hours only to eventually remember that what-ever-it-is didn't come with one. You are supposed to get your help needs online. Finding a printed manual takes less time than trying to find online instructions. After I go through their time saving short cuts of irrelevant-to-me FAQs it occurs to me that I still might remember what it was I was not understanding. It is always depressing to me that I never seem to be in step with the majority; when not even the FAQ list has my question in it.

The CPU running my brain has slowed down. I carry the simplest cell phone someone else's money can buy (a loving Xmas gift to me for a year). I have two digital cameras (one a point and shoot, sort of) so I don't need a camera phone. It is rare for me to make or receive calls on my cell, actually. Thus, I can't retain the instructions on how to retrieve voice mail from one phone to the other as they get upgraded just as I'm beginning to master the one I have. That might be remedied if I gave people my number and turned it on, might it not?

Having forgotten my phone on for a day or more, when I picked it up it indicated I had missed a call. My last phone had a password to retrieve voice mail and I vaguely remember not ever having completely mastered it before I found myself with a new phone. About every 10 or 20 years I go through the folder (s) of instruction manuals I throw into a drawer when I get something knew. Though the admonition to "RFM, Mom" rings in my ears, I regret to say that even if I read it, I retain none of the instructions until I have repeated the steps often enough to have them embedded into my cerebral cortex.

Years ago we spoke of computers as 'intuitive'. If someone said that today, people would ask what they meant. My American mind does not work in tune with the Taiwanese, Japanese, Chinese, etc. mind that built the latest torture device. Power ON buttons are unmarked and hidden; LED light are on when the unit is off and vice versa; all buttons work in the reverse of the last version you owned which took years to master. Tonight my struggle is my inability to find the speaker phone on my cell. When I have wanted a private conversation, the poltergeists who inhabit the phone have turned it off. Since there are no instructions I could locate on turning it off, it stayed on until the poltergeists decided they had embarrassed me long enough. Now that it is off and I want it on, it can't be done....at least by me.

I'm looking for an instruction book that is written the way my head understands things. Is that too much to ask? Lastly, I want some standardization of appliances. It would be nice if I could go to someone's house as a guest and not have to grovel (in order to heat up water for tea)for instructions to their microwave.