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Once again it is time to get off the computer and put the phone away

By Chuck Hunt - Editor | Apr 28, 2024

It has gotten worse, not better. I have gotten worse, not better.

The world has gotten worse, not better.

What is “it,” you may be asking?

Our reliance upon electronic devices, and the amount of time we have to spend on them. I know, I know. I have railed about this in the past, several times, but the truth is my complaining has not made a difference, and, like I said, it is getting worse.

Take our office at the Faribault County Register for example.

I now have two Mac computers on my desk. My old one, and a new one. I use them both, pretty much every day. We no longer have a phone on our desk, as we have a Zoom phone system, so our “phones” are our computers, and our cell phones are also our work phones.

Most of us here at the Register have two computers on our desk. Actually three if you add in our laptops which we do have on our desks from time to time. Publisher Lori Nauman has three computers on her desk, two Macs and a PC. Add in her laptop and, well you get the picture.

I have two computers at home, a Mac and a PC. Plus an iPad, a couple of cell phones and a couple of iWatches.

I am really connected to the world, or so one would think.

It seems like I spend more and more of my work time and my home time trying to stay caught up. And that is just with email, text messages and, well, I am sure you know what I mean. But as an editor I get at least 100 to 200 – or more – emails a day. And the number is growing.

Yeah, really. I feel like some days I have to spend half my time going through all of them.

Lots of people have that problem these days. Besides email, they have to check their Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and yes, TikTok accounts. Although with the threat of TikTok being shut down by the government, that would be one less thing folks will have to check each day.

Truthfully, I can’t see that happening. But I am not so sure it would not be a good thing.

I just don’t have time to check all kinds of social media. Or maybe it is that I lack the desire to spend the time to check all the social media.

I have apologized before, in this very space, about being poor at responding to all my mail, messages, etc. The truth is, I spend so much time on email, I don’t always get around to responding to everything.

Again, my deepest apologies for that. (Did that sound sincere?) But, it takes so much time to just get through it all, that I might not remember to respond to all the ones I should.

I think an awful lot of folks spend an awful lot of their time on an electronic device looking at a screen. Especially young people. But old people like me are also forced to accept this as a new reality.

Luckily, for me anyway, there is hope for a cure on the horizon. This week we have May Day, the first of May. May is the month we open up our camper and campground. We will get to the camp as much as we can for the next four months or so.

I have no computers at camp. No tablets or pads. No television. Not even a radio.

I try to leave my phone in the car, and only take it out to use it as a camera. Even the watch goes away. I generally don’t care what time it is at camp anyway. It is either daylight or nighttime.

It will be summer soon. We can be outside, doing outdoorsy things, whether it is camping or some other activity, which does not include a screen to look at. There is boating, hiking, golfing, fishing and a whole big outdoor world out there. So many things you can do outside in the next few months.

I hope there are times that you, too, can escape the electronic world we live in. Are there times you don’t have to always be on your smart phone, or checking a computer or watching TV?

Doesn’t that feel good?

I know there are some folks, particularly younger ones, who can’t even imagine a whole day without their phone. But I hope they also can go out and do some things without having to once look at it.

Oh well. I know the world is different now than when I was a kid.

For better or worse, it is a brave new electronic world.

Now, I have to go fire up my two computers and do my part to get this issue of the Faribault County Register sent off to be printed.

Then I am going to go through a whole lot of email.

Some of it I might actually want to read…and maybe even, dare I say it, respond to in a timely manner…