Sunday, March 22, 2009

What I Learned at Book Club This Month: vol.4

I've always considered myself to be technologically advanced.

It started back in 1983 when I went to my friends house to watch a movie on her cutting-edge, new VCR. It was amazing to watch a movie RIGHT IN YOUR OWN HOUSE!! and her whole family gathered around to watch a James Bond flick (you know the one, where the bad guy plots an evil scheme to rule the world while James meets the girl with the questionable morals and ends up making out with her right before she tries to kill him with her stiletto heel?) Well anyway, I found it extremely difficult to follow the plot because I was so distracted by the flashing "12:00" on the VCR's screen. It seems that no one in the family could figure out how to enter the real time, and I vowed right then and there that if I was ever lucky enough to own my own "Entertainment Wonder of the Future", I would learn how to set the darn clock.

Subsequently, I've done my best to keep up with all the technology that has occurred in the last 25 years. I'm the geek that reads owner's manuals cover to cover to ensure I know how the machine works, and I'm always pining over some new toy I can plug in. Heck, Lauri and I were one of the first people I know to try out the internet. I think the big sell was that you could see movie premieres RIGHT ON YOUR OWN COMPUTER!! and we sat patiently in front of the library's computer monitor while it sang its special dial-up song and tried so hard to bring up a home page for the next 15 minutes. I don't think we ever did see any movie premieres that day, but we both promptly got internet in our own homes whereupon no one could ever call us again because our phone lines were busy all day.

So in all this effort to be hi-tech savvy, you can understand my dismay when I Learned at Book Club This Month that I was the only person in the room without a Facebook account.

Sure, I had heard Facebook rumblings among my friends. There were side conversations about "friending" and "wall posting." But to realize that I was the only one without it? It felt like I might as well go fashion myself some stone tires, ditch my car engine in favor of feet propulsion and call up Fred Flinstone on my shell phone, because I had just richocheted myself into the stone age.

So, after some extensive research on the matter, I've come up with a short Should-Jennifer-Get-a-Facebook-Account pro/con list.

Pro: I can keep up with friends' day-to-day lives.
Con: Apparently, my friends' day-to-day lives consist of nothing more than "What Your Shoe Size Says about You" quizzes.

Pro: I can reconnect with old high school buddies.
Con: I don't remember many of my high school buddies, and I'll be opening myself to ackward moments of "I'm sorry. We met at a football game? We made out under the bleachers? Was I really that big of a floozy?"

Pro: I can stalk my kids.
Con: My kids will think I'm a stalker.

Pro: I can post a profile picture of myself that tells the world what I'm all about.
Con: My profile picture will most likely tell that world that lately I'm all about donuts and french fries.

Pro: I'll always have somewhere to go when I want to waste time on the computer.
Con: I'll always have somewhere to go when I want to waste time on the computer.

Looks like the jury's still out.

Sincerely,
Jen

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

YAY!!! The Monthly Column is back. I missed those! ;-)

Don't worry....as long as all of your appliances have the right time.....you'll always be a technology superstar!

Susan said...

wow! now i am thinking should i have a pro/con list to see if i should have a facebook account or not! thanks jen for confusing me! lol! i love to read your stuff! and if i had my opinion, you'd just make facebook all that much better too!

Lauri said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Lauri said...

I guess this was the book club I missed because I do not have a facebook account, nor do I want one. I didn't get a myspace when my kids had it and since my kids have facebook I don't think I need one too.
I always love your monthly report. However, I was surprised you didn't mention all the porn we could of accessed at the library.

Pam said...

Love your writing! It's simply the best (:

Candy said...

Hand it to Lauri to keep us "naughty!"

Jennifer you as so hilarious I can hardly stand it. Remember the plan? I'm so holding you to it.

Candy said...

Yes, um, change the "as" above to "are." Or maybe I meant "is." Could go either way.

hav an specul Day'
Luv;
Candy

smartalec said...

I had a dream last night that you blogged again, already.

Needless to say, I'm am disappointed that you didn't.

Also, I don't know whether to be proud or embarrassed that you just called yourself a floozy, on the internet.

That's all. Love,

Alec

Jen said...

I didn't call myself a floozy. Because I wasn't. Reeeaaally. I was your typical wholesome, apple-pie kind of gal. I could just forsee somebody trying to capitalize on my extremely poor memory skills by making things up about me.

Love,

Mom (aka: Saintly example of female purity

Stephanie :) said...

Whew! When I started reading this post about how tech savvy you are/were, I was fearful that since book club was at my house last, that there was some blast from the past at my house that you secretly wish you could fix. I will admit that my VCR/DVD clock flashes 12:00, but in my defense, the stupid machine is plugged into the socket that is also connected to the wall switch/light fixture. I refuse to fix the time everyday. So my rambling is all an effort to tell you that I LOVE your column! And if you do decide to join FB, know that you'll have a bunch of friends that happen to read the same books you do! Blah blah blah. I've written enough!