If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Image courtesy of 89studio / FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
I grew up in the 80′s. I distinctly remember the Cabbage Patch doll shortage and the wait list to get one. I also remember the Mario Brothers craze when Nintendo came out. My best friend and next door neighbor had the latest and greatest in video games. I would go to her house to play Pac Man on her Atari and she was the first of my friends to get a Nintendo and Super Mario Brothers. And us kids were all quick to pick up the how to when it came to playing Super Mario Brothers.
My parents? Well, they were the pinball generation. My mom sure could play a mean game on a pinball machine (I think she can still kick my ass on an old school pinball machine), but she just didn’t quite get Nintendo. The Christmas Santa brought our Nintendo I was awoken by my parents trying and failing miserably at the game. It took all I had in me to not get out of bed very early Christmas morning (or maybe more like late Christmas eve) and show them how it was done. I repeatedly heard the tell tale tones that meant Mario and or Luigi would be sent back to the beginning to try all over again. There was also lots of laughter, so at least they were getting a kick out of the game. I don’t think my parents ever did manage to make it out of the first part of level one. If they did manage to make it to the castle it was a complete fluke or probably with a whole lot of assistance.
It was very amusing to me. Something so simple in my mind was causing my parents (the people who were supposed to know more than me) so much trouble. I thought if I just show them *how* they’ll get it. They did not. Their minds just were not geared towards those 2 dimensional video games. Old fashioned pinball machines where you could physically tilt the machine were more their speed. It was good for a laugh for me though.
Who knew 20 plus years down the road I would be the butt of some smart aleck kid’s joke (well, my parents probably knew). That’s right folks, my life has come full circle. I spent my childhood rolling my eyes at the things my parents couldn’t do and desperately trying to teach them how to do it, to being that parent who needs to be taught.
I apparently was not born with texting thumbs. While they were pretty good and well versed in the pushing motion that was required on the Nintendo controllers, they are not so adept at moving across a keyboard at stealth speed to send texts. They are rather clumsy when it comes to that. I am, much to my teenage daughter’s horror, an index finger texter. I feel that I am more precise at hitting the correct letters when using my pointer finger. When I try to be all teenagery and use my thumbs I just end up double hitting letters and inevitably the “x” always manages to get pressed when I use my thumbs.
So my texts end up looking something like this:
I xcslled xthe xsxchoooll toxday.
That’s supposed to say, “I called the school today.” I guess it’s a good thing there’s auto-correct, but auto-correct drives me batty anyways. I know, what should I expect out of it though when I’m typing like above? I should count my lucky stars that it even somewhat manages to come up with a word I was trying to type. Of course forget about it when I do manage to spell something correctly, but it’s the wrong word. Like in or on. Why are the “i” and the “o” next to each other? Maybe texting keyboards should not be qwerty keyboards. Or maybe my thumbs are just not as dexterous as they once were.
So basically, if you ever catch glimpse of me texting, I know I’m doing it all wrong. I am reminded of that on a daily basis, but I’m going with the do you want it fast or do you want it right motto to texting? Perhaps the two are not mutually exclusive, but hey it gets the job done and at least there are no imminent sound effects signaling death to my texting (ahem, sorry for the dig Mom and Dad). Get me an original Nintendo Mario Brothers game and I’ll totally school you!
Do you use any newer technology in a way that your children find funny?
