Tales of the Lazy

 

 

What if technology is too smart for someone's brain?  Today's smartphones put all kinds of information within easy reach, but does that matter if you don't reach for it.  That old question of whether a tree falling in the forest makes any sound if there is no one to hear it kind of applies.  Having all the information has no effect if you don't ask the question.

Several of my students confided in me recently that they wouldn't have come here (Canada) to study if they had known what the weather was going to be like.  (Of course, we were working on third conditional sentences, so perhaps they were just making a joke....perhaps....honestly, their facial expressions conveyed that there was some truth to their sentences--but I digress)  Several students did, in fact, make this assertion.  This is nothing new to me because I hear it every year.  However, I paused to reflect because every single student has a smartphone.  Every student can find obscure bits of trivia rather quickly.  My only question was, why didn't they know about the weather?

When I went abroad, now almost twenty years ago, I was armed only with a Lonely Planet guidebook, a look at an atlas and a few pamphlets from the Japanese Consulate (which contained some fabulously out of date photos even then--imagine how old they look now) I didn't have the opportunity to look up anything on the internet.  I read that book (and those brochures) cover to cover.  The truth is, nothing can compare to being there, but I did the best I could.  The funny thing is, I think I was better prepared than my students, who seem surprised at so many things.

I keep forgetting to ask them how they prepared for their trip.  Maybe I am afraid that they will answer honestly, that is to say, they really didn't prepare.  I am reaching that conclusion on my own anyway.  They can find every variation of the Harlem Shake known to man, but couldn't find out that it snows in Canada in the winter?  Seems too unbelievable to be true.  Sadly, it is. 

If I had to guess, they probably don't look up anything until it is staring them in the face.  I have this image of my students landing at the airport, and then having to enter the following words in the search box.  "Toronto, white stuff on ground, cold" and seeing what Google tells them.  You'd think that some of that might have come up when packing.

If I have said it once, I've said it a thousand times.  Smartphones, don't make smart people.

Snowplow--More Priorities Out of Whack

Isn't it always the way.  You get all your winter crap on:  your boots, your gloves, your toque (winter hat, for all you non Canadians).  You get out there, work up a sweat (even worse sometimes, but I don't really want to joke a bout some poor old guy having a heart attack) and finally the driveway and sidewalk are clean.  Then, you hear that dreaded noise.

The snowplow.  Invaluable for making the roads clean, driveable and safe, and perhaps the most frustrating device ever created for the man or woman who has just finished plowing their driveway.  All that work gone for nought.

I have no idea  when the snow plow was invented.  I know they have been around since World War II at least.  I live in a country where they come in all shapes and sizes.  I've seen huge ones, and ones that fit onto an army jeep.  Someday, some half drunk backyard mechanical MacGyver wizard will probably rig one up to a bicycle. (I did a quick google search, and its already been done...I should have known)

Nevertheless, despite years of innovation, despite incredible engineering, the snow plow still manages to plow me into or out of my driveway.  Finish cleaning and it will come past my house and form a perfect barrier between me and the street.  Go out for a quick errand (maybe to the beer store) and come back to find that I have to shovel my way back onto my driveway (or try to ram myself through, and get stuck, and not get to drink the beer I just went out to get).

I have heard that there is an invention to prevent this, but I have never seen it.  If it exists, please tell me, or better yet tell the town council, how I can get this machine to plow my street.  We have superfast internet, but we I still face a mountain of snow  before I can go to work.  Once again, our priorities seem completely out of whack.

Goodbye Penny

 

 

I am not sure how I feel about it.  I understand the government's position, but at the same time, I don't understand it.  I use my pennies, and never had a problem using them.  Unlike a lot of people, I do not have a jar of pennies that I have been meaning to roll and take to the bank.

I have some pennies that I consider lucky, and probably wouldn't spend them even if I could.  I have probably found them on the ground while walking, or maybe the date was special... I don't know.  Since we are not talking millions, they will probably just sit in my drawer for the foreseeable future and beyond.

I haven't had my final total rounded up or rounded down yet, but I am sure that it will be weird the first time it happens. I certainly am not looking forward to it, but there really isn't anything I can do about it.

Goodbye penny, goodbye.