Hello!

I am about to take a class about technology at my university, Liberty University, in Lynchburg, Virginia.  One of my pre-course assignments is to make a blog that tells something about my viewpoint of technology.  I'm going to sound really old when I'm finished, but the good Lord has blessed me with more than 50 birthdays, so if I sound ancient, there's probably good reason for it. 

When I was a kid (here she goes...) technology was a big part of my life.  My dad had a television repair shop in his garage, and I was his chief tube-tester.  He had a big machine with switches and dials and gauges, and when he was working on a tv, he would pull out the tubes, hand them to me, and I would test them.  There was a rolling chart on the testing machine that would list various settings to use, and I would set all the gauges and knobs, plug in the tube, and wait to see if it would glow or if it was a dud.  I'm not even sure if today's tvs are repairable....  Since my dad was the tv man, we had the first color tv in the neighborhood.  He had some kind of an electronic coil he would use to adjust the picture.  If not, people were either pink or green and kind of wavy. 

When I was in high school (graduated in '76, I'll have you know...) I took a trigonometry class.  Instead of using the tables and charts in the back of the textbook, I got a calculator for Christmas.  It was amazing!  My mom had an old adding machine that she would use to crank out numbers when she balanced her checkbook, but this thing was electronic!!! It complemented my dad's red-crystal display wristwatch perfectly!  The calculator is seriously about five inches by four, and almost an inch thick.  It ate batteries like I eat tootsie rolls, and weighed about as much as a brick!  If I had a test in math class, I'd be sure and bring extra batteries with me just to be safe.  There were buttons for sines and cosines, and tangents, and a whole lot of stuff I don't remember how to use.  I remember picking it out at the store in St. Louis (yes, we had to travel over an hour to buy a calculator....through the snow....uphill.....both ways)  The thing was on sale for half price.  It was a hundred dollars!!!!  Did I mention I was an only child?  <grin>

In 1981 or so, I got a job at the JCPenney's in the next town.  There was a housewares department, and they had the coolest things...microwave ovens!  They were the next best thing.  They were going to make the kitchen oven obsolete, and designed to cook up to a twenty-pound turkey.  There was a probe and a programmable entrypad and everything!  Little did we know that within a short while we would use them for specially-made frozen dinners, heating up coffee, and making popcorn.  I've yet to cook a turkey in one.  Luckily, they are no longer large enough to park a smartcar in.  Did I mention they were on sale for $500 dollars?  My mom and I both bought one!

Somewhere along the line, I got the coolest thing in the world.... an Apple computer.  My then-husband and I had a small men's clothing store and a friend who sold computers.  This was supposed to revolutionize our accounting and inventory.  It didn't, really, but I got good at switching out those big old five-inch floppy discs while I was playing some seriously retro games. 

This led to Pong, then an Activision, and an Atari.  I still blaze at Mario's Duck Hunt. 

Cell phones entered my life when they got so small you didn't have to carry the battery in a bag.  We didn't have a tower nearby, so had to drive up the hill by the funeral home, or further up to the old lead mine mill, and stand just so, to get a signal.  We were lucky.  There's still lots of places that don't have a tower, and we have had one less than a mile away for several years now.  My present husband and I bought pagers so we could be in touch all the time.

When I became a teacher, I saw my first laptop computer.  The insurance representative had one.  It was a grid brand, black and white, and I fell in love.  He ended up selling it to me when the company upgraded their computers.  I gave him $300 for it.  It's still here somewhere. 

My next big technological love affair was my Palm pilot, an affair I would still be having today had the smartphones not come along and my Palm croaked.  I love that thing, and did everything on it from keeping my calendar to reading my Bible. 

I got an iPhone 3gs as soon as my upgrade was ready after their release.  I love it, and will keep it until the 5s come out.  I have it all set up the way I like it, and can't imagine living without it! 

Last Christmas, I got a Kindle.  Holy Cow..... always an avid reader, my eyes are older and have seen so much, I love how I can increase the font size, or have the thing read to me if I am driving!  I carry around about six hundred books in my purse!  And most of them were free!  I can't tell you how I love my Kindle! 

I'm looking forward to learning the educational aspects of current technology, particularly e-readers.  I'll be meeting my classmates soon, and anticipate a heck of a time in Lynchburg.