BLAME THE PROGRAM

This is an experiment of sorts.

Normally I write my blog while on my blog. This time I am attempting it on my regular word processing program.

Some advantages are immediately popping up, particulary with my absolute and complete inability to spell anything correctly. I can't spell my name accurately most days.

But in here Word picks up my lame attempts to convey a particular word and effortlessly fills in a completely inappropriate word that is nothing at all like what I am trying to spell.

It also refuses to accept words /names which I regularly employ (Najale, Wiltfong, Fordyce's sermons) and will offer substitutes such as captain for capable, grievance for groaning, and lithium for lightning.

And it's much easier to blame a computer program than my own shortage of writing prowess.

YOU ARE NOW IN THE FUTURE

Jen sent this wonderful YouTube link about a Conan O'Brien guest talking about how "Everything Is Amazing, and NoBody's Happy."


It's sort of a neat coincidence (or cosmic luck,) that tonight I was talking to my older brother (57 year-old hippie who tunes pianos in Wisconsin - I could write a book), and we were comparing some futuristic 50's predictions, and how things actually turned out.


I loved how my brother put it - "We didn't get robots like we expected - we just got smarter appliances."


Instead of a robot to answer your phone, the phone became an answering machine - then cordless - then wireless. To clean your house, we didn't envision Dustbusters, bagless vacuums, carpet washers. In fact, wall-to-wall carpeting wasn't common until what, the 60's?


The Internet - Issac Asimov's "Multivac" in 1956; iPhone to a Star Trek communicator; H.G. Wells described portable television.. this was in 1899, folks.


If you were able to view the future in, say 1956 (year of my birth - yes, when dinosaurs roamed the earth), how would you describe these to the cavemen who lived back then?

- An iPod? DVDs?

- Electronic voting? (Well, at least when it works correctly; I'm still miffed that Gore lost in Florida back in 2000)


- How you could file your taxes on the Internet?

- How we use debit cards?

- ATMs - man, how did we live when you had to go the actual bank BEFORE 4 p.m. to get cash? Hmm... maybe that's why we are all so badly in debt - another topic for another time.

- Having closed-caption television (a necessity of life for me-of-limited-hearing)


- Using automatic sliding doors every time you go into the mall.... heck, what about MALLS?

And for goodness sake, a BLOG?


Now, granted, there are some things we all thought would have by now.


We would all be a heck of a lot smarter - we would have eliminated wars, disease, and have communities on the moon and Mars... and certainly better late-night television.


But hey, I'm very happy about the things I do have.

DOGS ON BLOGS

I love taking my dog, Murray, on walks. He grabs the nearest tennis ball (or the Frisbee, but only when he can't find a ball), lays it obediently before my path, and waits, almost shaking in anticipation, for me to kick it. He then bounds after it, and brings it back as fast as he can.

Delilah, on the other paw, must be on a leash all times she is outside. Greyhounds have only two speeds - racingfastblurofdogpassingby, and couchpotatoe. And they have one direction - straight ahead. No reverse available on these models.

When I take them both on a walk, however, they are completely unified on one particular thing - a bush, tree, tumbleweed, cactus... anything where another animal has urinated.

I used to think of dogs sniffing at each other's private parts as just disgusting, and would get impatient with my own dog sticking his nose literally up my ass.

But today, a huge light bulb went off over my head.

It's a dogs' blog.

"Wow, Ruckus met this little sweet bitch, and he thinks this may be the one! And Ragman had to have surgery - man, he already lost his nuts, how much else can they take from this poor guy?"

"Well, over here Hank says he almost caught two illegals last night; Border Patrol was just ahead of him. Geronimo has a crush on that little poodle, and WOW, it sounds like... oh, forget that, it's just a rabbit's pee."

We have gossip via the internet - canines have it through pee.

SO WHADDAYA THINK?

I have been looking for a wider sort of format, and since I have no idea (yet) how to design a template (in fact, I'm still not entirely certain what a 'widget' is other than it's not contagious), I am trying out some.

I LOVE the fact that the 'birds' above are like fuzzy pipe-cleaners - watch 'em for a second - don't they make you laugh? But I don't know how to bring the blog title UP.

Oh, well, enjoy for the moment, it may change in an hour or so.