You would never know that there are four people and two cats in this house. We are all in the different corners, probably all tapping away on our different computers.
Hang on a minute there. Four computers? In one house? That's amazing.
Count again; there is also "the old laptop" which is still functional, but, as is it over seven years old, can't be trusted from one day to the next. That makes five computers. There are a further two computers jostling for space which are in the process of being repaired or rebuilt for friends.
I remember my first job as a lowly minion in the computer department of a large water authority. A team of highly trained technicians, working round the clock, attended to the needs of a 1K mainframe housed in a climate-controlled space the size of a small chapel.
We bought an Amstrad quite early on. I don't suppose the "children" (both around a quarter of a century old now) remember a time without having a computer at home. They were playing "Maths Rescue" in the early 90s, and using a weird little word processor that we acquired somewhere along the line.
Computers have taken over huge areas of our lives; letters=emails; photocopies=scan and print; notebook and pencil=Word documents; family budgets= Excel; catalogues=online shopping; reference books=Google.
It is amazing to think that every day I move seamlessly between technologies that are hundreds, even thousands of years old (knitting, cooking, reading books, playing the piano) and ones that had never even been thought of until maybe a year ago.
(Can't wait to upgrade my smart phone for the next model as soon as my contract lets me!)
No comments:
Post a Comment