What is the most boomer thing ever?

books

On Quora, there are about four dozen responses to the question, “What is the most boomer thing ever?” I don’t even know what that means. But someone named Christine J. Jones, who I do not know, answered.

Here are some of her responses.

I wear a wristwatch every day, and it’s an analog watch (not digital). Not every day, but when I was taking my daughter to colleges in Manhattan and Long Island, the watch was quite handy.

I have a flip phone and I use it to call people. That’s right folks, I call people on my phone!  I miss my flip phone, which I lost in NYC about five years ago. And I’ve never taken to the three replacements I’ve had.
I have a landline phone in my house, which costs $10/month. Yup.

I wear glasses and I always wear my mask when venturing out. Yup, especially indoors. I was on a CDTA bus this month, and the ONE person not wearing a mask was the only one with runny eyes and was sneezing. It could have been seasonal allergies. Still, I gave him the evil eye, though I doubt he noticed.
My sunglasses fit over the top of my other glasses. Yes, and they’re damn cheap!

I use a desktop computer and do not own a laptop or tablet or smartphone. My desktop died, alas, so I have a laptop and also a tablet.
I carry a purse or a wallet. Wallet.

Shopping list

I have a paper notebook hanging on my fridge where we list any groceries that we need from the store. Once a week, I go shopping, using my LIST. This is the system of my younger, barely Boomer wife.
All my slacks are “stretchy” material, and I don’t wear blue jeans (ever). Mostly true.
I park my car as far away from the front door as possible when shopping and I carry reusable bags in my car because I refuse to pay for plastic bags. My wife parks far away, for exercise reasons. She does carry reusable bags. I have a backpack.

I cut and color my own hair because I think paying $30–$80 for a haircut is highway robbery.  I LIKE getting a haircut. During COVID, both my wife and daughter have cut my hair. Now I may go to a barbershop, but wearing a mask and getting one’s beard trimmed are at odds.
I am pretty feisty on Quora, so don’t let my Motherly face fool you. I can spar with the best of them, so… Bring It On ! Arguing online is largely pointless.

Other viewpoints

Mary Ann Besser uses debit or cash. I’ve increasingly found cash actually not acceptable, most recently on the food car on an Amtrak train. And debit cards don’t provide the protection of a credit card.

I occasionally actually make a trip to the library to find a book I’m interested in (yes, I use their computer to find it and not a card catalog). I still prefer a real book with pages and I do understand the Dewey Decimal system.  Well, yeah.
I refuse to use personal assistants like Alexa”, SIRI, Bixby, or Cortana. I read “1984”. There is no way “Big Brother will be watching me.” It’s less Big Brother, more I need my brain to keep working.

Some other person ranted: “America has this invasion/ infestation of second and third world lifetime welfare recipients/parasites, we are their intravenous feeding. They do NOT live like us, think like us, they do NOT like America, they make America into a second and third world country, they do NOT assimilate.” Well, obviously I TOTALLY disagree, but I’m, again, not getting into an online debate.

Quora answers, some by me

Why don’t you blog on sites where you can be blocked, censored or ostracized?

quoraQuora is a “question-and-answer website where questions are asked, answered, edited, and organized by its community of users in the form of opinions.” It began in June 2009, though I’d only been aware of it for the past couple years.

I’ve answered a handful of Quora questions, even some directed to me. Some of the ones I have NOT answered I did not think were questions that the person really wanted to know, just codifying their POV, such as “Why isn’t Hillary in jail yet?”

How do I add clickable links to my blog page?
Both Blogspot and WordPress have a LINK button when in post-writing mode which you can click on. That said, I tend to add links with simple code.

Why don’t you blog on sites where you can be blocked, censored or ostracized?
I HAVE been on a blog site where I have been, if not ostracized, then worked over pretty well. But if the intent of a blog is self-expression, WHY would I WANT to be on a site where I can be blocked?

Here are my replies to Why do bloggers blog other than for money? and Should I pre – make blog posts before going live with the site?

How large is the Library of Congress? According to the Library of Congress, a very reliable source, it has over 168 million items

Dustbury tends to address the Quora grifters.

How can I use my debit card if I don’t have it with me?
“You don’t have a debit card, Bunkie. What you have is a whole lot of greed and not a whole lot of smarts. Now quit trying to steal from the honest people out here”

Also: How can I get a fake credit card? and Where can I get a totally free, no sign up no credit card psychic reading which is accurate? and the bizarre If I create an email address with a domain I do not own, can the owner of the domain do anything to my email?

He’s got a bunch of replies, including How many women sleep nude?

My friend Allie responded to a query about giving money to street people:

“When my pastor is asked this he gives the answer he was given by a fellow man of the cloth-

“If you give and they do not need it it is on them but if you do not give and they are in need then that is on you

“Do as your conscience bids and keep Matthew 25 in mind.”

For ABC Wednesday

Long live the personal essay!

“…writers being encouraged to not simply mine personal feelings for a quick click, but to make connections between the personal and the political more explicit.”

For reasons currently lost on me, I have put up a profile on the Quora site. Quora is a user-based site that where questions are asked and answered.

As is the case in human interactions online, some are sincere queries, while others, usually political in nature, and often about Obama and that guy after him. “If liberals hate Trump so much, why don’t they just leave?” Some kind souls answered that one, but not me.

For some reason, maybe because I’ve been doing it for 12.5 years, I’ve answered questions about blogging. But not all of them. One directed to me that I ignored: “Which blog content would make more money, diet and exercise or drawing and graphic design?”

Some months ago the New Yorker noted that the personal essay boom is over. A key sentence: “Personal essays cry out for identification and connection; what their authors often got was distancing and shame.”

In response, Salon posted The “personal essay boom” is dead. Long live the personal essay! “What we are instead experiencing is an evolution — of writers being encouraged to not simply mine personal feelings for a quick click, but to make connections between the personal and the political more explicit.”

Both of these pieces talk about blogs from women, and describe posts that are far more high profile than mine. Still, the discussion made me want to continue to do whatever the heck that I do each day. I didn’t get into this for money or fame. And a good thing too, because then I’d be REALLY disappointed!

I do it because makes me feel just a little less powerless. It grounds my thought process by having to write it down in sentences than to just say, “Daylight Saving Times SUCKS!” (It does, BTW.)

My Quora pieces generally have said, “Write because you have to.” Every once in a while, I check in with myself and realize, “Yup, still need to do this thing.”

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