Getting old and grumpy

[NoFakie 45]

I don't want to pay for my kids either, but it's hard to go against it if it's the done thing. Round here, many folks start paying at senior high school time, either for busfares to or lodging at Nagano or somewhere down Matsumoto way. The local shs is seen as a last resort.

 

Done thing or not, my kids won't be allowed to feel it's an entitlement, as I suspect my missus and her generation did when she was younger. Parents round here can't save that kind of money, so it's going to be the bank of gramps and grandma paying in many cases.

[Alexander L 80]

Insurance policies already into the six year for his college fees. It will only get more expensive.

[Alexander L 80]

And just a Bachelors won't be enough. At least a Masters or higher.

[Go Native 70]

Only if career is important to you Thursday. Point of my post above is that it isn't for everyone. Never has been for me and isn't for most of the people on here who live in Japan. Very few are actually career teachers.

[Alexander L 80]

Absolutely. But seeing as the nipper will be taken care of by some trusts we've set up for him, we'll allow him the option to choose between travelling and bumming for a coupla years after postgrad studies or go straight into earning money mode.

[JA2340 16]

Can see the point Thursday, but ... I didn't have spare funds to do anything like setting up a trust for my kids. So, they just had to do whatever they could manage (2 gorls gained scholarships. One to a teaching degree and the other to a performing arts degree). They are now respectively in UK (teaching infants kids and married) and Chile (last i heard, and props manager for Cirque de Soleil, having worked in UK, Spain, Portugal, Japan, Canada, US - and probably some other places I haven't been told about!)

 

Son, OTOH, is in US, working in air-cond, and has got there all by hisself - left Aus without telling anyone here (and left a bloody mess of a flat behind for me to clean up as well - the bastard!) and turned up in the states. Made no contact with anyone here until I managed to track him through a gaming website he was a member of.

 

Kids made it all on their own - they are independent (and always have been) and email their grandparents much more regularly than their dad! I'm happy with that, at least I hear what they are up to that way.

[7-11 2]

OTOH?

[Chriselle 158]

Starts with "On"....ends with "hand"....

[JA2340 16]

Yeah, 7-11 ... please try to keep up

 

I didn't name him Otoh ... that would have been weirder that his real name!

[Alexander L 80]

Otoh is a cool name. Much better than LOL

[7-11 2]

Can't you just type the words out? They're not that long.

[JA2340 16]

Geeeze, 7-11! Get with the program, man! it's the "almost last century" new text speak!

 

In fact, most of these started when the internet was text ONLY, no graphics - most of you youngsters cannot remember the internet before the www - but it DID exist, and for quite a while too! - and the ONLY way to show emotion was to use "emoticons" such as ;^) for a wink, for sad, etc.

These are the origins of WOFTAM, LOL, OTOH, etc

 

Yeah, I know, old and grumpy! Care factor approximates zero!

[Alexander L 80]

Newsgroups. Bulletin Boards.

[muikabochi 208]

I prefer little smiley thingies

[JA2340 16]

Back in the day, though, muika - there were no "little smiley thingies" there was no graphical interface to the internet it was all text and ONLY text - so only characters that you could type on the keyboard and nothing more!

So, inventive people got clever with acronyms etc, and emoticons. Besides, because you were limited by speed, the fewer characters you could type, the faster your message got through. And, since I was paying trunk call rates for long-distance phone calls, I wanted the fastest possible send time!

 

Thurs has been around, and knows of these things - newsgroups were the forerunner of twitter and facestalk.

[frannyo 2]

I can't get my head round why people use twitter.

News, celebs, musicians etc, yes...normal peeps, why?

[Alexander L 80]

Perhaps they want to follow like sheep the News, celebs, musicians etc.

[Alexander L 80]

I truly think it's for twatts though.

[TheSkiingWombat 0]

Back to the original, I'm happy that my parents are still very much not grumpy even as they get older. Rather they are really positive about things and like to get out and about enjoying themselves. Perhaps that's part of it.

[Alexander L 80]

I prefer little smiley thingies

 

in the bad old days we used to have to tilt our heads 90 degrees for ": D" or ";D"

[Metabo Oyaji 71]

I prefer little smiley thingies

 

in the bad old days we used to have to tilt our heads 90 degrees for ": D" or ";D"

 

In the days of yore on Usenet, I despised emoticons and eschewed them with a passion. I've mellowed considerably since.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FUGzwUTN80

[kokodoko 67]

Geeeze, 7-11! Get with the program, man! it's the "almost last century" new text speak!

 

In fact, most of these started when the internet was text ONLY, no graphics - most of you youngsters cannot remember the internet before the www - but it DID exist, and for quite a while too! - and the ONLY way to show emotion was to use "emoticons" such as ;^) for a wink, for sad, etc.

These are the origins of WOFTAM, LOL, OTOH, etc

 

Yeah, I know, old and grumpy! Care factor approximates zero!

 

What about FIGJAM ?

[Nisoko 6]

I prefer strawberry jam.

[Chriselle 158]

Orange Marmalade..... I win..!!

[Tubby Beaver 209]

Marmalade!! That's my home city's "famous for" thing!