The experiment is now at an end.
It is too much for a man of my age and limited brain capacity
to attempt such a feat. I hereby resolve to leave demonstrations of electronic strength and prowess to the younger, hipper crowd.
Besides, Mrs. RWP wants to use the computer.
We are a one-computer family.
We have entered the 21st century, but just barely. We do not text. We do not have an iPad or an iPhone, and we do not listen to iTunes. We do not own anything containing the words Bluetooth or Tivo. We have satellite TV, but we don’t subscribe to any any of the premium channels. We have a page on Facebook, but we don’t Twitter or Tweet or whatever it is the young folks do (I have a feeling they’re doing a lot more than Twittering and Tweeting, but that’s just me).
What I really like to do is curl up with a good book.
Not a Kindle or that other thing. A book.
You remember books. Here’s one printed in 1455:
According to Wikipedia, “The Gutenberg Bible (also known as the 42-line Bible, the Mazarin Bible or the B42) was the first major book printed with movable type in the west and the first major book produced on a printing press anywhere in the world. It marked the start of the Gutenberg Revolution and the age of the printed book in the west. Widely praised for its high aesthetic and artistic qualities, the book has an iconic status. It is an edition of the Vulgate, printed by Johannes Gutenberg, in Mainz, Germany, in the 1450s. Forty-eight copies, or substantial portions of copies, survive, and they are considered by many sources to be the most valuable books in the world.” The copy above has resided in the New York Public Library since 1847.
Compared to the Gutenberg Bible, all subsequently-printed publications are, to use a word Madonna Louise Ciccone used yesterday to describe Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, reductive.
Speaking of reductive, neither one of them will ever hold a candle to Norma Jean Baker (4:49).
