Old Friends

Recently, old friends and I have reconnected. An old friend of mine that I know from my Firefighter days sent a letter. He had a partial address, but the letter still eventually made it to me -forwarded from NH to FL. Now we have our e-mail addresses, so that's good..

Also got in phone contact with another friend who I haven't seen in over a year. We had a crazy year of mismatching schedules, plus he's had some serious health issues. However, talking to him on the phone it's like we just saw each other yesterday.

Another buddy of mine sent me a photo from his home in KY. They got buried by a recent snowstorm. He jury rigged an old door to the front of a Korean War era jeep and plowed his driveway with it. We'd hoped to connect with him and his wife, but decided to go directly south this year to get out of the cold.
Maybe we'll be able to meet up on our way back.

I've been e-mailing and calling a lot of my friends lately. It takes a little effort to keep in touch, but if you don't the years zip on by and all contact is lost. Way back in the 70s I was hand writing letters to stay in touch with people. I'm glad I did. I think I should do that again, for old times sake if nothing else.

I'm not a big fan of High School reunions. The main attraction is to reconnect with people you haven't seen in years. I've pretty much kept in touch with those I want to keep in touch with. Some folks I'm perfectly happy losing touch with.

There's an old saying: friends help you move. Good friends help you move bodies..

It's good to have friends.

-Sixbears

Phone it in

My lovely wife and I love to travel. Some years ago we started spending winters traveling the south, living out of a tent. It's amazing how things have changed. One example: pay phones. Working pay phones are rare as hen's teeth these days, but it used to be our main way of communicating. We kept a few pre-paid calling cards on us and ran our affairs over pay phones.

Back in those dark days having a cell phone didn't mean much in some of the remote campgrounds we loved to stay at. There were a lot fewer cell phone towers, and even fewer in the countryside. People who needed to make a phone call would use one of the handful of pay phones at the campground.

At the time, I was the main editor of an on-line magazine. Story submissions were e-mailed to the zine -hundreds of them every month. Most people, including me, were still using dial-up. A few campgrounds let you jack into their phone lines. Some had no allowances for e-mail at all. Sounds like the dark ages.

How would I get e-mail then? Late at night, when no one was likely to need a pay phone, I'd set my laptop on top of the pay phone and get to work. First I'd call an 800 number Internet service that I subscribed to. Once the machine noise started, I'd strap an acoustic coupler to the receiver of the pay phone. It looked like a phone receiver with big rubber cups. The coupler would change sound tones to electrical signals, and electrical signals to sound. They were incredibly slow. Often it would take a half hour or more to download my text only e-mails. The best thing that could be said about it was that while slow as death, it worked.

Later, I purchased a wifi card for my computer, even though I didn't have wifi at home. There were enough places on the road that started to provide it that it was worth the expense. Back then there was a pretty good chance that people's residential wifi was unprotected. A few times I must admit to borrowing an open signal to download mail.

The next time my lovely wife and I go on a long trip I suppose I'll have one of those smarter than me phones that can be used a wifi hotspot. Technology changes so fast that I'll probably wait until the last minute to get one. That way I'll only be a generation or two behind.

Funny thing is, I still miss pay phones.

-Sixbears

Free government backup service

The NSA probably has copies of all our e-mails.

Now many people may think of this as a huge invasion of privacy. Isn’t that silly? The government would never do anything to infringe on our rights.

Obviously they are providing a free backup service. How many times we’ve lost e-mails, thinking they were gone forever? Fortunately, the NSA has thoughtfully saved copies of all those e-mails.

Isn’t it nice to know our tax money is going for something good? Now since we’ve funded the NSA, and the government works for its citizens, a simple request should produce copies of all those e-mails.

Keep up the good work NSA.

-Sixbears

Tech Support

Apparently I’m my dad’s computer tech support. I just helped him sort out an e-mail problem that’s been vexing him for 3 months. Then we fixed his wifi system. The list goes on and on. On the bright side, one of his friends put on some decent virus protection. It could have been worse.

Of course, I made sure the Skype system was up and running. We got to talk to one of my daughters and granddaughter, so it’s doing what we need.

-Sixbears

Meat Space

Meat Space: where flesh and blood people meet up. Social media is fine, if you are into that sort of thing. It’s no substitute for real face time.

In face to face communication much of the information exchange is nonverbal. The expression on someone’s face, the way they hold their hands, the look in their eye, their posture -there are many levels to physical communication.

When we talk on the phone the physical clues are gone, but there are still things like the tone of voice, pauses in the conversation, changes in pitch -verbal clues that deepen the meaning beyond the words being said.

Communication by text requires attention to detail to get meaning across with a minimum of misunderstandings. It’s a skill set not everyone has mastered.

I’ve two friends who no longer communicate though e-mail. When they meet in person, they communicate just fine and get along. When limited to text, they constantly misinterpret what the other tries to say. Feelings are hurt. Finally, one of them figured it out and no longer exchanges e-mails with the other person. They truly need the nonverbal clues to successfully communicate with each other.

One good thing about this time of year is that people make an effort to get together. For me, it’s a real treat, because there’s a lot of person to person face time. I come from a culture where people talk with their hands and I still do that. Being able to use body language is like having a vastly increased vocabulary.

Meat Space: the social media for real people.

-Sixbears

Good Friends

I’ve got good friends -some go back to my boyhood. The thing with old friends is that they’ve been around you long enough to know all your faults, and still like you anyway. That’s worth something.

After high school, most of my friends left my home town to find work and pursue careers. It was harder to stay in contact those days. Long distance phone calls were pricey. I actually wrote letters -on paper, with ink. A bit later I got a portable manual typewriter and wrote my letters on that. Not many guys took typing class back in the 70s. Out of a class of 40, there were only 2 guys. I thought it’d be a useful skill to have. Since was handwriting wasn’t all that great, being able to type letters to friends was a huge time savings.

Now it’s easier than ever to keep in touch. Long distance is cheap. Skype is basically free, as is e-mail. It’s easier to keep in touch with your friends.

While modern communication is great, it’s still no replacement for physically getting together. That what’s often missing in today’s world. It takes a higher level of commitment to physically get together. You can’t just zip off a e-mail or a Facebook comment, or lord forbid, a tweet.

It takes effort to coordinate schedules. People have to travel. You’ve got to put your pants on before leaving the house. There are all kinds of hindrances to being in another person’s physical presence.

It’s worth it though. Once you’ve been around the block a few times, you know who your real friends are. Friendships that survive the ups and downs of life are true treasures. It’s one thing to have friends when you are up, but to still have friends when you are down and out is a rare and wonderful thing.

-Sixbears

Should I have been more paranoid?

Sometimes I don't think my tinfoil hat is on tight enough. Friday the 13th, I get up, put the coffee on and fire up the computer. The first thing I notice is that my Blog is down. The second thing I notice is that my e-mail server is down.

Then I shrugged and made myself a cup of coffee. What was I thinking? At that point, I should have broken out the 30-06 and scanned the sky for black helicopters.

Just kidding. I'm not that paranoid. Maybe I should be, as we all know there are weirdos out to get us.

I soon discovered the rest of the Internet was up and running. Nothing major appeared to be happening.

I do like to check in on the world. You never know when some disaster might be going down. Stuff happens. Just ask the Japanese. If my Internet connection is down, I'll turn on the FM radio and see if the stations are up and running. Should my local station go down, (it has happened during ice storms) then I'll see what I can pick up on my shortwave. Should everything be off-line, I'd have some serious concerns.

Today, it appears the end of the world was postponed once more. My wife and I took my daughter, granddaughter, and a bottle of wine for a leisurely sail. Might as well, as the jack booted thugs weren't coming for me after all.


-Sixbears