You Sound Like a Broken Record!

[JRNYMAN]

Experienced a bona fide generation gap this evening and didn't even see it coming.

My cat has a specific whiny meow when he's hungry and with this giant tiger-striped tabby, he's hungry all the time. My youngest daughter (19 yrs. old) and I were in the kitchen cleaning up after dinner and Charlie, said cat, was at our feet and rubbing and incessantly meowing. Finally, I looked down at him and loudly said, "Geez, Charlie, you sound like a broken record!" and went back to what I was doing. About a minute went by without anyone saying anything - except Charlie, of course, and my daughter asks me, "What does that mean?" "What does what mean?" I asked her. She refers to the statement I made and had no clue what it meant, referred to, etc.
As I explained to her what it meant, I found myself being my dad when he would do the very same thing with me and the questions I would ask him.
She knew what records were and understood the basics of how they worked but couldn't get her head around the concept of the record working but being "broken" at the same time. This is the same child who, at about 7 or 8 yrs. old comes to me one day out of the blue and asks me, "Dad, what does 6 - 7 Central and Mountain mean?" Try explaining THAT one to a 7yr. old in a way that makes them understand what it actually means!

[Memorex]

My 17 year old daughter was calling a pizza place and she said, "I'm getting this weird beep beep beep sound." She tried this a few times and so then I called for her. It was a busy signal. She had not recalled ever hearing a busy signal and even asked, "What do you mean busy?" It dawned on me that for kids these days, they don't ever really get busy signals. Their world is cell phones with call waiting or call waiting in general.

[JRNYMAN]

My 17 year old daughter was calling a pizza place and she said, "I'm getting this weird beep beep beep sound." She tried this a few times and so then I called for her. It was a busy signal. She had not recalled ever hearing a busy signal and even asked, "What do you mean busy?" It dawned on me that for kids these days, they don't ever really get busy signals. Their world is cell phones with call waiting or call waiting in general.

And/or waiting for a call!

[The Sushi Hunter]

The only thing I've experienced sort of like this was when my daughers had their friends over to the house and were watching the movie called "Holes". Henry Winkler played a part in the movie as one of the kid's parents. The girls all thought he was a clown in the movie. I said to them: "Hey, that's the Fonz". They all asked what the Fonz is. So I told them about him and then went on youtube and pulled up a few Fonzie clips to show them.

[JRNYMAN]

My 17 year old daughter was calling a pizza place and she said, "I'm getting this weird beep beep beep sound." She tried this a few times and so then I called for her. It was a busy signal. She had not recalled ever hearing a busy signal and even asked, "What do you mean busy?" It dawned on me that for kids these days, they don't ever really get busy signals. Their world is cell phones with call waiting or call waiting in general.

Speaking of things they aren't familiar with... The Technological Age and all the things it has brought about has truly been awe inspiring when you consider how far we've come in such a short amount of time. I'm so glad I got to live at this particular point in the grand scheme of things. As with everything that has been invented, renewed or changed for the better by the hands of technology, everything is exponentially faster. That has produced a generation of ridiculously impatient individuals. They're so used to everything having an immediate response - specifically when it comes to anything related to their phones! Remember back in the day when you were making a long distance call? The further away the person was, the longer it took to connect initially due to the analog switching devices as well as having to hand off the signal to the various providers. If you were in LA and you were calling someone in Chicago, it might realistically take 30 seconds or more from the time you dialed the last digit until you actually heard the first ring. Our kids' heads would explode!
And calling someone long distance was a big deal back then too! One summer my high school sweetheart went on vacation with her family to Florida for a couple of weeks. I lived in the Bay Area. We were allowed one call per day for 10 mins - my mom actually set a God damned timer too! In addition to the allowed call, we were calling each other left and right and talking for an hour here and an hour there.... Everything was fine and we were golden until the phone bill came..... $150.00 in sneaked calls! Had to pay off every cent of that one!

[Memorex]

Oh man. I used to run up phone bills. But that's ok. My kids did it to me initially with cell phones. What comes around...

I tell my kids all the time - if I had the internet when I was their age, I would rule the world. But I'd probably just be lazy like them.

[The Sushi Hunter]

Popcorn is another one. When my kids have movie night over at our house, I usually make popcorn on the stove in a pot like my grandfather used to do when I was a little kid. My girl's friends trip the first time they see popcorn being made on the stove because all they know is it's purchased in those paper bags and made in the microwave.

Yeah and talk about cell phones. I remember my first cell phone in '95' was only for phone calls and was the very first one that had texting capabilities. I bought it for that and then realized that out of all my friends, no one else had a cell phone with that capability so I couldn't use it on my phone, doh. I still have that cell phone in the origianl box in a closet somewhere in the house. And back then almost the only cellular provider was CellularOne, which was .72 per minute during peak time (7am - 9pm) and .22 per minute during off peak hours (9pm to 7am) and roll-over minutes was not even a concept. My bills were always no less than $300 per month. That was an incredible amount to pay back then, even now that's steep.