Post 55: Things We Used To Do!

I AM NOT A ROBOT ! 

I am not a robot; of this fact I am quite sure
I have to depend on my ancient connections
Which tend to wander off . . in all directions
My hard drive could do with a booster
And I have a much depleted poor app store

I promise that my text is not predictive
And it’s definitely not thought to be addictive
My memory bank does tend towards erratic
And my motor movement can be rather static
While my battery needs charging more and more

So I’m hoping for an update in the future
Which could boost my out of date technology
But until that distant promise of an upgrade
I will find my failing functions still of use
And regard their condemnation as abuse!

A little list of things we used to do:

Repair motor cars, change plugs, mend clothes, write things down, lock/unlock, open and shut things manually, read maps, know where North is, mend shoes, darn socks, buy stuff in local shops that you could try on. Obviously the list is endless!

I’m pretty sure that I’m not the only OAP who has fond memories of the ‘old days’; when everything seemed to work; and you could get through to people on the phone, who knew the answer to your query; and if they didn’t, they put you in touch with someone who did!

One ‘advance’ that I, and many of my age group are dreading, is the demise of the landline phone; which is predicted to be ‘phased out’ some time in the near future. We are told that ‘everything’ can be dealt with on line, or by smart phone. Putting aside the many users who have unreliable or no mobile signal, this ‘advance’ appears not to be designed to assist the customer with sorting out problems, but rather to make servicing the facility easier for the provider; and probably cheaper.

It seems to me that every day that passes throws up another barrier to the average human being having any say in dealing with the practicalities of life; be it a domestic or professional issue. I’m sure there are those of you reading this, who are raising your eyes to the sky at my outdated attitude to the advances of modern day living.

Well, let me give you a personal example. The other day our fourteen year old washing machine appeared to malfunction. Disaster! We had read of the difficulties and expense of replacing anything electrical and dreaded the upheaval of changing it. But our machine was old enough to have a removable plug, with a fuse; of which we had some spares. It was the work of minutes to replace the fuse and, hey presto, our machine washes again. Thus a minor problem was not turned into a major and expensive calamity.

Are you old enough to remember when you could ‘unlock’ your car manually? No fear of robbers accessing your motor by their mobile phone and nicking it off your driveway. And, as far as I know, electronics can’t ‘disable’ a crook lock; a security device of choice in days gone past.

Returning to the ‘in my day’ theme, I remember when most drivers had a rough idea how their car worked. Back in the seventies and eighties our vehicles of choice were usually Morris Travellers; upon which my hubby was able to undertake minor repairs. He spent many happy (?) hours sorting out gearboxes, usually on the kitchen table, with ball bearings pinging out around the room. While outside repairs usually attracted like minded amateur mechanics; who would think nothing of assisting Pete in his struggles; usually underneath the car!

The Horizon scandal that is playing out in our media right now is a glaring example of mismanagement of advances in the technological world. As we watched the ITV drama unfold, it struck me that Mr Bates verified the process of exposure of the disaster, by keeping up the regime of his own paper records, which he was able to compare with the electronic data; and discover the discrepancies.

Another personal example. Back in the mists of time we had an endowment mortgage; thrust upon us instead of an outright loan, by our bank. This was supposed to pay out roughly what we had paid in by the end of the term of the deal. When we finally moved down here, we cleared the outstanding balance due on the mortgage, but kept on the insurance side of the bargain, which would pay out the promised dividend at the end of term.

As the finishing line approached for payment, I phoned the bank to get an update as to amount due and date of same. To my horror they denied any knowledge of our mortgage; and appeared to have lost all records of it; having ‘sold’ it on to another finance firm. Luckily we had got paper records of all our statements, and I was able to furnish the date, and cheque number of our final payment on the mortgage. I have no doubt that without this cast iron record, we would have had a hard time being refunded our cash payout.

Don’t get me wrong. I yearn for the day when a cheap and reliable domestic robot will do all the tasks I am finding it increasingly more difficult to accomplish; and an all round garden robot would be great! I can even see the advantage of a drone, that could do that high up pruning; so dangerous for oldies up ladders! But, and there always is a but, I do ponder as to how the general populace would cope if our supporting technology was seriously undermined or damaged. We read of global forces with malign intent, suspicions of subterranean sabotage and the ilk.

My take on what I would like and expect to happen are suitably sized community based local initiatives; involving solar, wind and water that would be quick to put in place, cheap to run, and understandable to the common man or woman. Renewables lend themselves to this model. Instead of investing in mammoth projects that are hugely expensive and locally disruptive; while also eating up a large dollop of the capital available at the planning stage, we could utilise that same scaled down technology to provide most of our domestic energy needs.

I read somewhere that no area of the UK is more than seventy miles from the coast; a fact that could accommodate the use of our serendipidous supply of latent energy. And I’m not including any of the large scale stuff, necessary for industry and the like. So, I will end this post with an old ‘retro rant’ which I don’t think I’ve published on this blog before.

OAP TECHNOLOGY (2021)

As yet our appliances aren’t very bright
And don’t chat to each other during the night
The phone is just landline and cannot bestow
Anything more than basic info
The washing machine only knows how to clean
And the boiler still needs us to press stop and go
But we’re muddling through
With the brains we have left
Technology hasn’t left us bereft!