I Want My MTV

Today, J wanted me to sit and figure out our new mini digital video camera. He needed one of the videos burned to a dvd and I need to figure out how to compress and upload videos to share. Tech stuff makes my eyes glaze over. I used to have a big fear of all things techie. I have come a long way in combatting that fear. Hey, I am making progress with the facing my fear of baking and fear of technology. If I give myself a long enough period of time, I always figure this stuff out. Would it be easier if I read a manual? Yes. Would it be easier if I didn't try to jump right to the middle of the process? Yes. But, for some reason, my brain shuts down the minute I have to open a written manual. The words start to swim, my brain gets bored and I begin planning my next signature cocktail for my next soiree. (Aka a hootenanny, according to our old friend, BC)

In my ever changing moods, too much information and too much techie stuff makes me long for a simpler time. A time when MTV had just hit the airwaves and all we had to worry about was finding a house with the very high tech cable tv. Gone are the days of close and play record players, tape recorders, landline phones and movie cameras that used film for the family home movies. I remember the large movie screen that would be pulled out for family movie night of the million reels of film footage from 1964 to whatever the present time was that we were still using the movie screen. I miss press and play machines. I miss sitting at a stereo and timing every song, perfectly, for mix tapes. I miss mix party tapes. I remember taking a computer class in college and I think I dropped it because I didn't understand it. At all. I was sure that computers were only set up for the ultimate geekdom of fun. I was a journalism minor and our electric typewriters worked just fine. I remember the one year our department got the first computer installed. We all just stood around it and stared. Nobody knew what to do with it. Our prof was even a bit confused. It sat and collected dust, that year.

I know that all of the advances in technology make our lives easier but sometimes, the information overload is too much for my head. I mean, we are a family that likes their electronics and yes, I would be lost without my cell phone, Ipod, netbook and PC but at the same time, it is fun to once and a while let my mind drift back to the first simple days of MTV. The days when it was all music, all day. There were no reality shows and it was fun to see which VJ was hosting that day. Now, they have TJs..I miss the founding VJs. I miss Martha Quinn.

I do seem to plow through and get the tech stuff figured out but it would just be so nice, for one day, to revisit the feel of a rotary phone, to not be connected to everyone in the universe, to only have three networks to choose from on tv and instead of downloading songs on Itunes, sit in front of a stereo with a cassette deck and make a good old fashioned mix tape. Kids, today, will never know the coolness of the mixed tape.

I did burn the dvd that J wanted and I think I have figured out the new camera but now I have an obsession with tracking down my old Polaroid that spit out instant pictures. Now that was high tech back in the day...