Kids Today
20090513
Well, here it is, 4:34 a.m. I’ve been awake for an hour.
I went to Olive Garden for my grand-nephew’s 4th birthday party, and when I got back home, I fell asleep almost immediately, having run around all over town most of the day, starting with a dentist appointment.
The birthday party went well. My grand-nephew is a Spiderman freak, and I managed to find two Spiderman gifts that he didn’t already have. One of them was a book of stickers, which he messed with through dinner, although actually, the kid is also an Olive Garden freak and he scarfed down quite a lot of his spaghetti and salad...
It’s funny how these really young kids are totally obsessed with particular media creations. Could be Spiderman, could be Star Wars, could be Batman. Later, maybe High School Musical or Harry Potter or Hannah Montana.
I mean, God knows, I was the original Beatlemaniac, so I can relate a bit, although that wasn’t till I was eleven. When I was four, the big thing was Westerns. They were all over TV. My particular idol was Rowdy Yates, a character on Rawhide, played by Clint Eastwood! (Ten years later, my first real date was a Clint Eastwood double bill--A Fistful of Dollars and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Probably not a good choice, but that didn’t matter anyway, as she was out of my league.) But anyway, I don’t recall quite the level of obsession my grand-nephew has--until the Beatles.
But then, kids today are somewhat advanced. I mean, here’s my just-turned 4 year-old grand nephew. He’s already seen Iron Man, and he whizzes around the Internet like a pro.
This always makes me wonder, because every week I teach these people in their 40s, 50s, 60s, or even older, and many of them really struggle with computers and the Internet, even though they are often fairly intelligent folks.
One of the big issues is, they are afraid. One of the first things I talk about is, don’t be afraid. You won’t break your computer. You may lose some of the files or stuff you’ve made and you should definitely get anti-virus software, but you won’t break your computer. Your computer is perfectly capable of breaking itself. And it will.
Sometimes, this really helps some people. I say, when you see kids on a computer, they’re clicking on everything, seeing where it takes them. Be that way. Fear not.
I’m listening to Puccini’s Turandot--the Sutherland-Pavarotti-Mehta one. I am opera crazy lately! Opera and hip hop! No telling where my musical inclinations will go. So now the only thing I can’t get into is heavy metal, with a very few, older exceptions. As far as I can hear, it’s just noise, screaming, and stupid lyrics.
I have to say, I’m really not that crazy about country music, in general, though I have been at times. It’s all kind of silly. There’s people today like Lucinda Williams
and Gillian Welch
and Steve Earle,
but most of these folks are really just poseurs, trying to make it with a phony twang in a silly genre whose main purpose is to be a musical hockey, a place for white people.
Time for some leftover Olive Garden birthday cake....
Well, here it is, 4:34 a.m. I’ve been awake for an hour.
I went to Olive Garden for my grand-nephew’s 4th birthday party, and when I got back home, I fell asleep almost immediately, having run around all over town most of the day, starting with a dentist appointment.
The birthday party went well. My grand-nephew is a Spiderman freak, and I managed to find two Spiderman gifts that he didn’t already have. One of them was a book of stickers, which he messed with through dinner, although actually, the kid is also an Olive Garden freak and he scarfed down quite a lot of his spaghetti and salad...
It’s funny how these really young kids are totally obsessed with particular media creations. Could be Spiderman, could be Star Wars, could be Batman. Later, maybe High School Musical or Harry Potter or Hannah Montana.
I mean, God knows, I was the original Beatlemaniac, so I can relate a bit, although that wasn’t till I was eleven. When I was four, the big thing was Westerns. They were all over TV. My particular idol was Rowdy Yates, a character on Rawhide, played by Clint Eastwood! (Ten years later, my first real date was a Clint Eastwood double bill--A Fistful of Dollars and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Probably not a good choice, but that didn’t matter anyway, as she was out of my league.) But anyway, I don’t recall quite the level of obsession my grand-nephew has--until the Beatles.
But then, kids today are somewhat advanced. I mean, here’s my just-turned 4 year-old grand nephew. He’s already seen Iron Man, and he whizzes around the Internet like a pro.
This always makes me wonder, because every week I teach these people in their 40s, 50s, 60s, or even older, and many of them really struggle with computers and the Internet, even though they are often fairly intelligent folks.
One of the big issues is, they are afraid. One of the first things I talk about is, don’t be afraid. You won’t break your computer. You may lose some of the files or stuff you’ve made and you should definitely get anti-virus software, but you won’t break your computer. Your computer is perfectly capable of breaking itself. And it will.
Sometimes, this really helps some people. I say, when you see kids on a computer, they’re clicking on everything, seeing where it takes them. Be that way. Fear not.
I’m listening to Puccini’s Turandot--the Sutherland-Pavarotti-Mehta one. I am opera crazy lately! Opera and hip hop! No telling where my musical inclinations will go. So now the only thing I can’t get into is heavy metal, with a very few, older exceptions. As far as I can hear, it’s just noise, screaming, and stupid lyrics.
I have to say, I’m really not that crazy about country music, in general, though I have been at times. It’s all kind of silly. There’s people today like Lucinda Williams
and Gillian Welch
and Steve Earle,
but most of these folks are really just poseurs, trying to make it with a phony twang in a silly genre whose main purpose is to be a musical hockey, a place for white people.
Time for some leftover Olive Garden birthday cake....