the deal is

I can't remember names. Without the internet, it'd be impossible to look them up. Several actors, writers, and movie titles came up for me this weekend. I couldn't remember Della Reese's name, and I've known her forever. I watched part of a movie, the name of which just escapes me, of course, with Queen Latifa and Alicia Silverstone, and Sheri Sheppard and others, Beautyshop maybe, and couldn't remember Alicia's last name for sure and Della Reece's name at all. But I could remember Touched by an Angel and Cluesess so could look them up.

An actor last week mentioned Mamet and I didn't know if I'd seen anything he'd done or not. The actor, another one everybody knows and I can't remember his name, played the husband in Fargo and I loved that movie and is also married to an actor on Desperate Housewives you all know who's name is slipping around Huffman? One of them? Maybe?

Mamet, it turns out, has several movies as well as plays, and yes, I've seen a couple. He also has a fabulous title, Speed the Plow, which I don't know. Haven't seen any plays for years and never have tried to keep up with theater or movies. Mamet did Wag the Dog, another good title, but angry somehow. I saw 2 Mamet movies, Glengary, Glen Ross and The Verdict. Not that I remember them much. That's not the point, however. The point is that the internet gives me a way to look up verb agreement.

It's not enough. It's not good enough. It's not for a real education. Any site can be totally wrong. It doesn't teach.

Send kids to the library and make them learn how to do research. Teach them to read maps and do long division by hand. Fox Friends on Sunday were talking about cursive and handwriting being phased out with the computer ease and usage. This is so wrong. People should always learn how to do things.


But really, that assumes that people will all have computers and always have access to them. And that they were phasing out handwriting for second graders. I wonder how good second graders are at typing. People learn things they have to do. Kid's will learn the alphabet by writing it over and over. How many times do people just want to jot a note, add to a running list. Does everyone really want to keep their shopping list online or in the pc? It can awkard and cumbersome. Of course there's all the handheld thingies. Do second graders have them? Do people loose them? It's so wrong to limit skills like that. And what about filling in forms? Not many people handwrite for a living, but many people use a pen or pencil here and there for personal and work needs.

Electronics can't be the core of a sensible life. Kids already aren't learning how to do things and what things are.