i {know} now

Last Friday I went to a class all about how to use your I-Pad in speech therapy.
How to make this tool useful in my job--that was the class's premise.
Mind you, I do not have an I-Pad.
There are a couple people at my work who do, and one of them let me take hers for the day.
It was not her personal one, rather it was one that our county bought.
So off I traipsed to G-boro.
I was really hoping, somewhere in my subconscious, that this class would finally tip the scales...convince me that this was a gadget I could not live without.
That is how I felt when I was first presented with a nook.  I knew--I just knew that this was something I would love--have all kinds of books..but not have to physically have the book!  get any book i could think of via the air any ole time!! SIGN ME UP I thought to myself...and I have been loving my Nook ever since...
So I thought...when I am convinced about the I-Pad...
Then, I could begin my lobbying to get one--at work.  I was dreaming of typing out IEPs on it, writing reports in front of the TV--instead of on the {back den} where I now sit, typing away.

After six hours of a little class.
I remain unconvinced.
I-Pads--well, they are expensive--and this is all relative, I know, but our county has ZERO MONEY.
WE can barely afford to keep people employed...so should we be buying I-pads?
My answer would be an emphatic "NO!"
Technology over people--not in "These hard economic times"--Is anyone else so sick of that phrase?  Who coined that one?--Talk about over-using something to death!!

Okay back to my point.
All the stuff that the I-Pad was doing in that class..was VERY COOL.  I was ooohing and ahhing...
But then, when I put on my critical thinking cap, I realized...ummm--you can do all that for free
with some paper and a pencil and all of the books that the county has bought alreday...
for free!!
Now, one part of the class was valuable.
The person teaching was from G-boro (or thereabouts) and she was telling us that many children with Autism or more involved communication needs have begun bringing their own I-Pad to school.
Their mama and daddy watched 60  mins...and they were convinced!! I-Pad technology--IT IS!!
So now the people at the school are using them, to facilitate the parents in attempts to draw out communication.
I won't agree or disagree with that, it is what it is.  I would oblige as well...

Sometimes I wonder is anyone stopping to think about the POINT of most of this mobile technology.
I do.
Lots.
Andy and I still only have the one little, wee little trac phone.
No plan, no data plan, no fancy {droid} or I--do hickey...and to be honest...
all of it seems pointless to me.
When I stop and think, critically about it, --nah...don't want it...
Do I love a gadget..um YES!!
I love them..but do I want to be CONSTANTLY ACCESSIBLE...
no.
Having a cell phone that could summon me whenever anyone felt like it, seems like
how some part of hell might end up being...

So, unless the rich folks at Apple want to send me a free one, or one falls out of the sky, or
I win one from the Pioneer Lady (who am I kidding--those odds are terrible! :)}--then I will not be getting and I-pad...

If you are still reading this, then God Bless you! hah!  this has been very rambly, and I am still half asleep!
:)