I often have elderly patients tell me, with all due gravity, that the government (the current government, that is - you know, the commie, Muslim sympathetic one) is planning to put microchips in all of us to 'keep tabs' on us. (Of all of the symptoms of old age that I don't want, paranoia is high on the list). While I have no interest in having a reverse GPS in my head, I'd be up for a Google chip.
I seriously heart Google. I cannot tell you how many times I 'Google' a word, a person, a map when I am at the computer. Google images gives me some of the wonderful pictures that I post on here. Google finds the thesaurus for me so that I don't use the word "wonderful" twenty times in one paragraph. It helps me nail down facts and dates so that I don't look like a big dummy (or at least not as big of a dummy). At work, I Google medications that neither my patient nor I can spell and if I get close, Google will say, "did you mean amlodipine?" (I forgive the snarky tone in gratitude). Some book I was reading mentioned the Blue Grotto on Capri. I Googled pictures and was rewarded with views of unearthly beauty. Google makes my writing better, decisions easier, reading more fulfilling and simply makes my life better.
Alas, Google is only available when I'm online. Just riding in the car or walking down the street I am still liable to say something idiotic. Or, I'm so afraid of sounding idiotic that I just keep my mouth shut. As a young person I was quite the wit - I was the past mistress of the quick comeback. But that was when my mind was agile. Now it is torpid (thesaurus.com!), not to mention as distractable as a two year old. The words that I want to use are just zipping around my head like no-see-ums. I hesitate to make arguments, because the supporting data is just not accessible. I told Mr. Kim the other day (during one of my regular laments about my sad lack of brain power) that I wanted to be the kind of person who remembered what they read, who understood and could make references to classical literature and put things in historical context. I'll be reading something and the author will refer to 1066 country. Well, I know they mean English history. But then I'm lost...I mean WILDLY lost - the Magna Carta? the Norman invasion? D Day (just kidding)? And since I AM so distractable, if I have to start up the computer and look it up, half the time I forget what I'm looking for...and get lost in the fascination that is Google (when I think of myself as Homeric, I'm not referring to that Greek fella). When I finally DO pick up the book again and get to the same spot, it all starts over again. It's very discouraging.
So I'm thinking that if I had a Google implant, it could basically function as my brain. And as long as it worked as fast as our new computer at home and NOT as slowly as the moribund (me, not thesaurus.com) one at work, I would be smart and culturally astute and the quips would just FLOW! I would find the GoogleKim much more interesting and I'm sure that everyone else would welcome conversations with me that did not include such words(?) as "thingy", "y'know" and "I just had it". Now, I realize that you can use most any search engine for all of these riches, but Google is the one that I prefer. It is also the only one that sounds reasonable used as a verb: 'to Google' sounds just fine. 'To Bing' just sounds peculiar to me.
So I'm ready for my chip anytime. I hope Anthem covers it.
Too funny!!!
ReplyDeleteGoogle can make you feel like you don't know very much. But you do have to know a lot of stuff to find the things you're looking for.
As for all those people who can quote the classics? They read them and re-read them and sometimes study them and teach them. I bet most of 'em don't know the Oz books!
There are specialized things I know from my profession that you don't know and you don't need to know. I bet there are things about yours that you know that would escape me totally.
But I do love doing searches on Google, they make life easier and they save time and money, and keep me from buying more books I don't really need or have room for. Especially cookbooks!!!
You're a smart lady who writes with great heat- so what if you're head is not densely packed with retrievable facts. Facts can be looked up!
I meant to type:
ReplyDelete"You're a smart lady who writes with great HEART!"
Although you do write with great warmth.
Thank you for the kind words! Well, yes, I do know specialized things due to my job, but not many people want to know about prostates and UTI's in my personal life ;^) .
ReplyDeleteAnd yes!! to what you said about using Google to avoid having to buy cookbooks. I have WAY too many cookbooks already and am trying to limit the new ones to ones that I really, really want and have actually seen. I usually try to get them from the library to see how many recipes I really think that I will make. I tend to think of cookbooks as resources for special occasions and for when I have extra time. My daily episodes of the home version of 'Chopped' (what can I do with pork steaks, hoisin and a can of corn?) send me Googling.
Hey, Sweetpea!!
ReplyDeleteI've commented on this twice, and have no idea what happened, though I may have just imagined it. Or forgotten.
I LOVE your writing, and am blown away by your smarts, every time. Whatever you look up, it's either worth knowin' and you hang onto it, or it's not, so who cares anyway? I just today looked up my favorite author from my teenage years, thinking that since she wrote of pioneer days and turn of the century, she must have been from long ago, and found that she lived until 1982!!! I could have written her a letter to tell her how much they meant to me.
So I say HOORAY for looking up stuff.
I'm lining up with you for The Chip; just let me know when the line forms. I'll bring the lawn chairs.
Rachel – thank you, thank you, my friend! I know exactly what you mean about your author – I was astounded when I learned that Agatha Christie died just before I graduated from HS. I’d been reading her for years already and assumed that she’d died before I was born.
ReplyDeleteBut worthy or not, I ‘hang on’ to VERY little. I just don’t have ‘sticky’ brains, I think. If I don’t use knowledge every day it is GONE!
Smarts...something I am definitely missing but no need. I have all of you. Do you think by the time the chip comes out it won't matter at all? Gosh, I hate to leave never having had one! I wanna be "smart" just once. :) Does anyone have a cot I can borrow when it happens...for waiting in the line I mean...for the "chip?" Actually, a walker will do ..with one of those little fold down seats? :)
ReplyDeleteMona - I've always wanted a real English shooting stick, but the seats look a little too small for my bottom!
ReplyDelete