Thursday, January 9, 2020

On Being a Luddite

Those poor Luddites. They existed for a very short time awhile ago, like in the previous two centuries. 
They were famous for eschewing technology...like steel plows, store bought cloth, prepared meals in a box that came to your door...that kind of stuff.

They died out rapidly, though remnants of that kind of thought still exist in limited ways among certain German type religious orders--Amish, Mennonites (not so much) and Hudderites. They are a minority, though, and I think they are maintaining their traditions with breaks when horses and buggies are rather inconvenient in 2020 USA.

Anyway, yesterday I finally got my second child to delete all these files of other peoples' writing from my WORD. I know nothing about where this stuff goes, how it is kept and brought up with a stroke of a few keys and all, but I knew I had a shitload of words that were not my own stored somewhere in the magic box.

I got the feeling these words that were not my own were clogging up my computer so I wanted them out. Of course, I couldn't do it on my own, but the kid stepped in after four months of begging on my part and within 20 minutes max, deleted all those thousands of words. Books worth! Several times over.

That done, to my relief, I decided to do some registering for the writers' conference in April. In the past, although the preferred method of payment was cyber, which I do not trust even though I do have an account but I don't know why, I have paid by check. Yes, paper. Yes, it may have been a royal pain in the ass, but I was allowed on account of everybody loves my wit and general vivacity.

It didn't work.
I had to go through that thing I do not trust and entrust it with my credit card numbers  because I can't remember passwords or even really how to use that thing...though it would allow me to pay by credit card through them. Cost me an additional $3!!!

I am pissed off.
Yes, being a Luddite is difficult and I can hear those little rat bastard millennials shouting OKAY BOOMER, but know what I say to them?

F*ck off, babies.

  

1 comment:

  1. Preaching to the converted, Irene. Though I do pay for many things online, I still have a flip phone, and only use it to make or receive URGENT calls when I'm not home. I don't want to be distracted by having email, texts, and the Internet always at my fingertips. I pay cash for most things in my everyday life, too, rather than run up my credit card. I consider myself at least a semi-Luddite.

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