Second blog -- answers to an ocean of prompts |
Prompt: What are your rules for courteous phone use? -- To begin with, I hate talking on the phone. I’d rather talk to people face to face or communicate via other means. Then, I expect that whoever calls first takes leave first, unless he or she makes me hang up because of empty prattle. This is because talking on the phone is for sending and receiving messages. Not for socializing. Also, if the connection is bad (as is with some cellphone companies) and I tell the other person his/her voice is breaking, I expect a channel change from them or something like, “I’ll send you an email instead, since this connection isn’t working.” Above all, I expect politeness--from myself and others--in addressing, talking, language usage, and whatever else makes us decent human beings. Prompt: Make a Gratitude List. I don’t know if I can make a list because I am grateful for just about everything, even the things I sometimes complain about. A few decades ago, I used to write down in a notebook everyday, finding at least 10 things in each day to be grateful about. Nowadays, since my time is more limited than even when I used to work, I think of 10 things every night when I go to bed, after my in-bed reading is finished. If there is one specific thing I am really grateful about, after everything that I have and everyone that I love, is the electronic technology and its making so many books available to a whole lot of people. Tied to that is the number of people who are reading and who would possibly not read, had this technology weren’t so easily available. I don’t like it when people badmouth today’s technology. To me, it is manna from Heaven. If I hadn't tasted it, I would never imagine it could ever exist. |