H.I.T.S.
I’m glad to report this week all that’s happened lately in my personal world of high-tech has been positive — and it’s been a welcome change from recent events. One of the best things was finding another childhood friend from England via Friends Reunited at a href=”http://www.friendsreunited.co.uk/ http://www.friendsreunited.co.uk/ end
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A chance email with an ad in it for finding out all about your family tree led me to the Friends Reunited site.
I had originally found it about four years ago and had been a member for a year.
Going back to the site this week, I found I had two emails addressed to my “profile,” both from the brother of a childhood friend of mine from Blackburn, the town where I grew up in England.
It required rejoining to reply to his email, so I did. It cost about $20 and, after the few minutes it took to electronically reactivate my account, I fired off an email to my friend’s brother, Mike.
At this point in my excitement, I’d missed the dates on the two emails (the last one being May of ’05).
Even so, I received an email within about a half-hour from my friend, Shaun, who is Mike’s brother.
He told me that he and his mom had finally moved last year from the street I lived on as a child to live closer to his sister and her family.
The part that I find most amazing in all of this is the time frame needed for all of this to occur — it would have to please even the most ardent supporter of immediacy. And it was all due to a computer and the Internet. Oh, and $20, of course.
But, seriously, now I’m back in touch with an old friend. Actually, more than one because even though his brother is older (if possible) than both Shaun and me, I still knew and remembered him, as well.
Then, I contacted another familiar name that I saw. This time, it was a girl I used to date, who now lives in Ireland. It’s amazing to read all about someone who you knew so long ago and about all the various twists and turns their lives have taken.
I used to think that coming to live in America in 1978 was a pretty dramatic move, but when you hear the stories from some of the people I knew, I realize my life has been pretty low-key in comparison.
It’s fascinating to be able catch up with old friends, especially when they’re 3,000 miles away.
I also had the added bonus of finding out that someone from my old grade school had posted scanned-in pics of some of the class photos from various years, and I quickly saved these to my computer.
It was great to look at and remember some of the faces I’d seen as a kid in England and try to put names alongside them. I also saw pictures of some of the teachers, making it a total nostalgia fest for me.
Even though people berate the Internet for its negative aspects (which I cannot deny), I think that it still has just as many positives, especially in the area of reconnecting friends and loved ones. I encourage you to join one of these online organizations and give it a try.
Last week, we filmed a new H.I.T.S. show, with a special guest. Among other things, we featured all kinds of tips and tricks about eBay. I’m sure you’ll find it interesting and informative. I know that I learned a lot about many new features on the online auction site. I’m amazed at how many people I meet who use eBay on a regular basis. Be sure to watch the new show and enter our usual give-away contest at the end.
Finally, another positive aspect of the Internet can be found at www.vmk.com
, the website for Virtual Magic Kingdom. A special thanks to Alyson (one of my students) for filling me in on all of the features of this great site for kids. Any of you out there who have children should direct them to this URL, if they don’t already know about it. It’s a Disney site, of course, and, although there are a lot of good kids’ sites out there, Alyson told me that this one is one of the best, so give it a visit.
Please keep the emails coming-all the nice comments are greatly appreciated.
Joe Gudac, from the Macintosh users group, asked me to remind everyone that their club will meet on Friday at 7 p.m. at the Uniontown Amateur Radio Club on Old Pittsburgh Road. Although they normally meet every second Friday of the month, they’ve changed it this month, due to the Easter holiday.
Enjoy the warmer weather.