Alex: Maybe it's because I grew up in a kind of late-19th early 20th-century world (in lots of aspects) that though I find modern technology convenient - it is still a kind of secondary thought. I can check my pocket money bank account on-line - of course - but I enjoy the two km walk to the bank itself. I could drive the car - but walking appeals - viewing gardens and bush tracks - hearing bellbirds piping, the lash of the whip-bird or nowadays the thrumming of cicadas and a hint of their "gossamer rain" on my arms - can't be experienced otherwise. Sighting goannas even... In the early 1950s I recall sitting up on my Parkes-born grandfather's horse-and-cart. He was a gold-fossicker (two of his older brothers had a gold-mine in fact) and he would disappear with his horse-and-cart for weeks at a time - to the relief of his family - he was also a Great War-damaged soul. I grew up living in a pre-sewerage era house - sticky-tapes hanging in the kitchen to trap flies (pre-insect screens-on-windows days, hot water bottles in beds heavy with "Army blankets" in the winters - and though my step-father was a PMG technician - installing telephones - we never had the phone at home - and in fact TV did not arrive at the family home till I was well away at university. To call Uber-eats or its equivalent would never occur to me. I was always a letter-writer or a sender of postcards - now I write such only to my mother when I do not call her on the telephone - otherwise as I am doing here - on-line - which makes replies almost instantaneous - especially should someone call me via Skype or similar. After which there is usually no record. Maybe that's what I like - the record of the communication. Jim
Alex: Maybe it's because I grew up in a kind of late-19th early 20th-century world (in lots of aspects) that though I find modern technology convenient - it is still a kind of secondary thought. I can check my pocket money bank account on-line - of course - but I enjoy the two km walk to the bank itself. I could drive the car - but walking appeals - viewing gardens and bush tracks - hearing bellbirds piping, the lash of the whip-bird or nowadays the thrumming of cicadas and a hint of their "gossamer rain" on my arms - can't be experienced otherwise. Sighting goannas even... In the early 1950s I recall sitting up on my Parkes-born grandfather's horse-and-cart. He was a gold-fossicker (two of his older brothers had a gold-mine in fact) and he would disappear with his horse-and-cart for weeks at a time - to the relief of his family - he was also a Great War-damaged soul. I grew up living in a pre-sewerage era house - sticky-tapes hanging in the kitchen to trap flies (pre-insect screens-on-windows days, hot water bottles in beds heavy with "Army blankets" in the winters - and though my step-father was a PMG technician - installing telephones - we never had the phone at home - and in fact TV did not arrive at the family home till I was well away at university. To call Uber-eats or its equivalent would never occur to me. I was always a letter-writer or a sender of postcards - now I write such only to my mother when I do not call her on the telephone - otherwise as I am doing here - on-line - which makes replies almost instantaneous - especially should someone call me via Skype or similar. After which there is usually no record. Maybe that's what I like - the record of the communication. Jim