Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for August 20, 2015

Dad shouldn’t apply for a job at Amazon.

Just you wait for 20 years. You don’t know the half of it.

the batteries went dead in my t.v. remote one night a month ago..up down…up..down…up down….it was a nightmare….i could live without the micro wave….but dont mess with my t.v. remote….

Anyone remember Alvin Toffler’s book Future Shock? The “society of leisure” in which machines would do all the work and people would just sort of sit around? Yeah, because they’re all unemployed.

The problem is people using all of the time saved by the use of such devices to do more work instead of at least splitting it between more work and more leisure time

@LeadingEdge.Hear, hear..(Or perhaps I should say “See, see.”===.(The actual Reply button didn’t work. Perhaps they are still working on yesterday’s duplicating glitch.)

“Car phones”. :) It’s not just rapid change, it’s how briefly some of the new technology lasts. Calvin’s Dad is probably thinking of those devices, usually mounted on a car’s center console, that had actual phone cords. And if he waited a few years when PDAs came out, he could watch those become obsolete as well.

“modems, faxes, car phones” How old is this strip?

I met a very powerful man in the US government once, international law conference I was at, taking a graduate law course, and he said: “I don’t care how many degrees you have at the end of your name, if you don’t know someone at the other end of the phone, you’re not getting anywhere.” Or words to that effect. You have to see and hear and know someone, before you’re going to work with them. Best advice I ever had given to me.

When one is dealing with an antagonistic person who turns face-to-face communication into a contest for dominance, sometimes the written word works much better. It slows down the interchange and gives each person time to think about their words before “speaking” them. When dealing with a committee or a team, a careful balance between the number of face-to-face meetings and the number of emails can be the most efficient approach. Technology can be a valuable tool if we are able to use it but still maintain balance in our lives.

Old expression from the business community in the 60s:

To err is human.

To really screw up, you need a computer!

Long rant, sorry. But I was 12 years old when a neighbor got the first TV in our neighborhood. But, still, I like now. As I said a a few days ago, “I’m a time traveler, hell bent on getting as far in the future as I can!”

I seriously doubt that the government will monitor my thoughts. It’s clear that the folks in Washington don’t give a damn what anyone thinks.

Machinery did make home chores easier and increase leisure, since, in general, the amount of things that needed to be done at home remained constant. For a business, though, when bosses saw that the ‘old’ amount of work was being done more quickly because of machinery \ automation, they just added more work, so employees did not get a break except that sometimes the purely physical aspect of the task was made easier.

Technology has been my saving grace.

And my living hell.

xxx

Can’t wait for self-driving cars. Every day I have to dodge people who think “communicating” is more important than preserving life and limb. To quote one comedian, “I look back fondly on the days of drinking and driving, at least somebody was driving.”

My microwave died and I almost starved before I got a new one. Worst half-hour of my life.

My wife sent a letter to our 13 year old grandson while he was at camp recently. When we saw him at the cabin last weekend, my wife asked him if he read her letter? He said, “Some of it, but it was in writing (cursive), so I could only make out a few words.”

What a shame…

Time for you to get some sleep. That’s what it is.

Hence the monastic spirituality—a balanced life, with work and leisure (and prayer, of course) so that no one element dominates.

Luddite…

Modems, faxes, and car phones? Boy, Calvin’s dad is not going to like 2018 technology…

lol