Well, That's Not Good

February 23, 2022

Aaaand $500 later, I have a new phone. I decided to drop my old one just as I was closing my car door when I was leaving work today. Good news? I have excellent timing. (Note the sarcasm...) The phone hit in the split second the door hit the frame. The door 'caught' it on the way down. The bad news? The screen was so damaged it rendered the phone inoperable, flickering feebly and spastically. Did I have insurance? Yes. Did I want to wait three days to get a new one? No. They transferred my insurance to my new phone and I had to just pay off the old one and then purchase the requisite accouterments. Crossing my fingers that everything transfers from The Cloud, since I couldn't do a phone-to-phone transfer.

A Long, Long Time Ago

September 30, 2009

I caught one of my kids texting during class yesterday. It's a common occurrence on campus--I'm sure it's a problem on most campuses these days. It wasn't during a test or anything, so I wasn't worried about cheating, but it is against the rules, so I gave him his warning and then asked him to put it away. He sheepishly apologized, and then said, "Didn't you ever text during class? Did you ever get caught?"

First of all, I'd like to take it as a compliment that he thinks I'm young enough to have texted during class. Upon reflection though, I realize he has never even known a world where texting wasn't ubiquitous; as far as he knows, it's always been around. I don't mean that literally, of course; the kid knows that cell phones and texting were invented in the modern world, but they just don't stop to think about how modern it all really is.

So I told him no, texting wasn't an option for me when I was in high school. No one had cell phones, let alone unlimited texting plans. "What did you do then?" he asked. "How did you talk to your friends during class? Did you seriously just have to wait til lunch if you were bored?" He looked incredulous.

"We passed notes. All through class. If our friends didn't sit by us, we'd just pass them down the rows until they got where they were supposed to go. And yes, I'm sure I passed as many notes as anyone else." I got a little nostalgic thinking about passed notes to boyfriends about plans for the Friday night football games, and passed notes to best friends about who the new cute boy in class was. And of course, I thought about passed notes about how BORING class was that day. I get it. If I see 'em texting in class, I understand. I still ask them to stop, but I don't get mad at them.

"Whoa....total old school!" my charming student said.

Old school indeed.