The Norman Transcript

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January 1, 2013

Let’s live life unplugged more often

By Jay Cronley The Norman Transcript

NORMAN — It’s sort of a shame that people who don’t know enough are so sweet.

Since it’s not their fault that they don’t know enough, you can’t get upset with them. You have to put forward what you know to be the truth and move on to the next misunderstanding.

They don’t know enough because they haven’t read enough.

I have just finished telephone conversations with a worker and a supervisor and was told that the policy written on the website did not seem to be exactly what they had meant in the first place. Believe stuff at your own risk and expense.

There’s little doubt that the latest in electronic gear is responsible for all the denseness. They should follow the decrease in good sense on a map, like an epidemic. Portions of the lower heartland would be buried under the cloud of buffoonery.

Maybe it’s not that people are actually stupider.

Perhaps things seem more confusing because so many people on the dull side have positions in the public eye and ear.

Customers frequently wind up helping the employees.

Where have all the smart people gone — home, to be self-employed?

Book smarts: The lack of sharpness in the world today can be traced to what we read and to what we think about.

What is read and thought about the most are text messages and Tweets.

The wonderful world of text messaging has many positives. The best benefit is that goofballs no longer talk to you in airports.

But the No. 1 gift of spoiled children this season was a smartphone or pad. Ten-year-olds carry cell phones to school. To share an intellectual landscape with an 11-year-old is a warning sign that your reading habits could stand improvement.

What are you doing with all those Kindles — using them as coasters?

We must mix in some books, people.

Unplugged: Novels and biographies have come to look out of place at airport waiting areas. While reading a paperback in the St. Louis airport last week, a kid asked what happened. Did my smartphone break down?

I said no, my $9.95 flop-open cell phone had been dropped in the dog’s water bowl again and was home in a drawer with the hammers and nails. I had chosen to travel unplugged for the calmness and thoughtfulness of it all.

This appeared to frighten the boy, who spoke no more.

Published books reek of intelligence and discipline.

Perhaps this is why there’s a video game on the Kindle.

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