I really don't mind change, but - like most other unemployable people of my age - I hate change for change's sake.
I have just left a comment which has started me thinking about the whole Brexit thing all over again, again.
Being a fully paid-up member of the E.U. did not stop the Italians from sitting at a restaurant table at lunchtime drinking a delicious coffee. It did not stop the Germans from finding any excuse to drink beer and eat sausage. It did not stop the French from drinking wine at lunchtime... almost.
On the other side of the Channel, we drink coffee from paper cups as we walk down the street and photograph our meals at restaurants, then send the photo to Facebook.
Today a man who ought to know, blamed Britain's fall in productivity on our obsession with social media. He speculated that the drop in output of every single company was due to workers - or employees - stopping every few minutes to check their mobile phones, then taking 25 minutes to get back into the right state of mind to concentrate on the task they paused in order to check.
Those two lads who are running close to spoiling my design in stone, use the time when I am showing them how to carve something to catch up on Facebook. They say, "You just do one and we will copy it." Just saying that shows that they have not yet even begun to understand what it takes to be a carver, let alone sculptor.
Maybe they should - as Italy has done - force the servers to bring optic fibre to every public and private building in the land. The government seems to subsidise every other privately-run service as standard anyway, so maybe investing in fibre optic would help the deficit. That might speed things up.
Respect for regional foods and drink has never been taught in this country and so we just slob along with a paper cup and an Americano. Cheese is cheese and bread is a white cut loaf. Headteachers who want to ban smart phones in the classroom are mobbed by parents who talk of their children sobbing in the playground at the deprivation. Is it any wonder that your boys think it fine to catch up on Facebook when you are trying to talk to them.
ReplyDeleteWe have never grown coffee in this country as far as I know, but have been sitting down to drink it for about 300 years. The cheese and bread you talk about are eaten by the lower orders, I would think. Phones cover all levels of society - they have to to broaden the market.
DeleteI have heard that intricate designs can be copied on stone by using high pressure water machine. Might this be what one of your lads was silently referring to or doesn't he have the brains for that ?
ReplyDeleteThey are not stupid. They are very intelligent. It is just that they have never done any free carving before. This job is a lot to ask of them, but I didn't ask them in the first place.
DeleteWhat can one not do with a smart phone, other than have sex of course?
ReplyDeleteThere is an app which comes with a vibrator for that.
DeleteWhere's that hidden Tom ? [says a new iPone user]
DeletePhone
DeleteIt's an optional extra.
DeleteSad you have no authority over the two young fools assigned to you. I know no solution short of sacking them and hiring someone who cared.
ReplyDeleteI do not want to dishearten them too much. There would be no point. They need to be proud of the results, and this is how I am approaching it. It is not their fault that they were offered the work by someone with just as little experience than them. It is complicated.
DeleteSo, you have a little more faith in their rising to your expectations than you are letting on.
DeleteNo, I have more faith in my own ability to save the situation.
DeleteI agree with you on my walks on the prom I often see others walking with mobile, head down, ok they occasionally use it to take a photo or selfies more often, in cafes everyone is looking at the phone not at each other. Sad world, but we do have the choice and choose not to be part of it. My mobile phone is for emergencies only. Thats all it does, makes calls and receives them.
ReplyDeleteWell I have been drawn into using mine for on-site research, but I do not do Facebook or Twitter.
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