Oct 11, 2011

Ausgang


n. – exit

Notausgang

n. – emergency exit

These words are in German as you may notice and I discovered them a while ago when visiting my husband on a business trip in Munich. I have nothing much to say about this other than I just found it funny since the second word looks like it would mean “not” an exit vs. more importantly an emergency exit.

German words can be very long. I think it’s their way of being efficient with the language – why waste time separating words when you can string them together to make one giant one.

While living in Paris, I experienced being tri-lingual vis a vis computer keyboards. Mine had the English “qwerty” version, my husband’s work laptop had the German “qwertz” version and my in-laws’ home computer had the French ”azerty” version. It’s amazing how much difference one little key can make when it’s not where you’re used to having it.

I love my computer and I love to type on it. But I have a confession – I still like pens and paper. The other day, I brought out my ancient Filofax to write something down while meeting with someone and he looked at me as if I’d grown another head. Jokingly he asked if I would like a post-it note. I like those, too.

Don’t get me wrong, I can download, upgrade, re-start, log off and shutdown with the best of them, but there’s just something secure about writing on a piece of paper. Notebooks and I mean the ones made from trees, rarely spontaneously combust or disappear into thin air. Hard drives crash – I suppose they use the word crash since it’s a drive. If you haven’t backed it up on your second hard drive and it has to be restored or replaced, you lose everything. And what if the back-up drive crashes? I like to think of my back-up drive like an airplane’s black box, convincing myself that it will survive anything including a nuclear holocaust. Of course, I wouldn’t so it wouldn’t really matter. Paper doesn’t crash and it’s not as if a giant eraser will rub out everything you’ve written (that is if you write in pencil, which I don’t, so even that I don’t have to worry about.)

There’s a funny commercial (I forget what it’s for) where a man comes into an office meeting with his pad (again the kind made from trees) and pen, which has leaked in his pocket. His co-workers make fun of him as if he’s some sort of cave man and it’s funny. But I relate to that man.

Computers do cut down on paper waste, which is a good thing and you can’t get a paper cut from a keyboard, which is also a good thing. There’s no ink to smudge, leak or run out. Computers have changed the world for the better and will continue to amaze us in the years to come. So as long as my keyboard stays in “qwerty,” I’ll keep typing, but that paper and pen will always be around somewhere.

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