Both figuratively AND literally, as it turns out.

I have a deep-seated belief/suspicion/world view I’ve been testing out lately: one of the keys of staying young (at least at heart) is to stay on top of technology. When a new operating system comes out, learn it, even if it’s stupid Windows 8. Learn how to use an xBox and know what’s on Netflix and why Amazon Prime is good and learn a new software as often as you can, even if it’s like pulling teeth.

Because the day you say, “Oh, the heck with it” and let some new gadget or tool wash over you and not bother to learn it…that’s the day you start turning old.

I’m living that advice, by the way. One of the hot contenders for yesterday’s Besst was the part where I needed to make a Gantt chart for a project I’m working on and Excel is stupid for that and I don’t have Visio anymore and I didn’t want to bug someone who did so I downloaded a free add-in for PowerPoint called Timeline that is just boss. So boss, in fact, that my boss said the word ‘fantastic’ in direct conjunction with work I produced.

So yes: new software.

A few years ago I had set up a Twitter account, mostly to follow someone I knew who had a Twitter account. They never posted anything, I quit looking at it, never posted anything, and pretty much forgot about it until a few days ago when I realized that I had been tweeting in fluent Russian for a while.

As I know absolutely no Russian, I cleverly deduced that I had been hacked, so I shut that down and decided: New software! Stay young! At heart, at least!

And a new Twitter account flits about the earth, as of this afternoon: @BesstMom.

I promise not to be a pain about it. One tweet a day, and maybe once more if I have a clever thought that survives five minutes rattling around in my memory. If you’re doing twittery things, I’ll twitter back atcha.

And never in Russian, or as they like to say in Minsk: И никогда на русском языке.

© E. Stocking Evans 2014