Apps

Super Villain Secret Signal

We often talk of the advantages we have when it comes to making friends via technology. While the Internet is a vast playground, replete with bullies and thieves, it offers us many advantages. Lizzie and I were discussing the pros and cons of digital life, when the discussion turned to apps. Want to eavesdrop? Little V can give you lessons.

Being a CrackBerry BlackBerry owner, most of my tele apps are all business and productivity. Then, we got the PlayBook. The world of apps blew up. Man Cub is a sucker for an ad saying, “Buy this upgraded app!” Getting him back to whatever he was doing has taught me there are loads and loads of apps.

I hear there’s an app for just about everything these days.  I hear it everywhere I go, “Oh Hun, there’s as app for that.”

I believe it too.  I have found some pretty wonky apps on days I find myself bored, mind wandering aimlessly.  I pick up my smart phone, hit the Market app thingy ma hoo-ha on the screen and in the search bar type a random word or a subject that I have thought about.  I am instantly  (or not, depending on what apps are running in the back round) transported to a mind-boggling selection some free, some for a fee, some useful, many ridiculous, apps to keep your life in order and your mind engaged.

Tree House CastleIt is not all that different from when we were children… except we had to do it with sticks and rocks, bicycles and ramps, trees and tree houses, slingshots and catapults. What? We were great at creating advanced weaponry and reconnaissance. Our imaginations invented loads of things, fun and devious. I truly do not ever remember being bored.

I don’t think my imagination has been compromised, but I worry about my kids.  It would seem with the advent of apps, boredom has become obsolete.

My concern is because when I was a kid, boredom was the mother of invention and usually the predecessor of my imagination running wild.  I have lots of cool stories that started with being bored.  Games invented, trouble I got into, books I read,art created, fun I had.  There was no platform, no parameters, no limitations due to low available memory.  No app. My mind ran free.

My kids get bored, and they have an app for that.  A bunch of them.  Where’s the need to be creative?  Scary really.

You know I am not to that point yet. Well, that is not entirely true. My younger children are using apps to create. Drawing. Writing. Animating.

My older children grew up on the sticks and rocks model until they were old enough for iPhone. Still, about half of them are doing the organizational thing to remember birthdays and appointments.

I do admit that some of them make life more manageable.  Calendars, organizers, pill reminders, shopping and to do lists to name a very few of them.  The Locator App is pretty cool so you don’t lose your kids.  I’m not sure how my mom survived our childhood, without losing her marbles, without it.

What if?

See, how unfair is that? When I talked about wanting to know where all my children were all the time to reduce worry, I was a Nazi. Now, GPS for children is not all that uncommon any more. Can you imagine how different our lives would have been?

Most assuredly if apps had been around when I was younger my life may have taken some different turns.  The ones that track your cycle and warn you indicate you may be ovulating, might just have been helpful.  I don’t dwell on it much because that would mean one or more of my kids might not be present today.  But every once in a while I find myself to the point of mumbling under my breath after a particularly frustrating interaction, “Why the flippin’ hell did I not have an app for that?”

Harmless.  Just a what if.

It is inevitable.

Surely, the apps available are evidence that imagination is alive and well and now if you can think it, you can have an app for it.

I’ve just been thinking since apps are most likely here to stay I have a few that would make my life better, and I hope that someone will be able to create soon.

You know I want to develop an app for the children to communicate better using touch tech. I use plenty for school work to make it more palatable.

I also want to make one with Blue Tooth to write my stinking grocery list, so I cannot leave it at home. What would you like an app to do?

I would like to have an app to:

  • Lock down my phone when I get into power text mode. (Put it under psychology, emotional health and/or bipolar.  It would be popular I am sure.)
  • Mend my broken heart.
  • Make breakfast for the kids when they get up too early on a Saturday.
  • Find the other sock for all those socks.
  • Predict rate at which we will run out of TP, and then set a reminder 2 days prior that tells me every 10 minutes to buy some. It would have to have an alarm only disarmed  by scanning in a receipt.
  • Last 5 min do-over.  For those times I speak before I think…
  • Considering my current single status, maybe a personal vibrating massager (For my shoulders, you know. I can’t quite hit that spot.)
Silly Monkey

Silly Monkey’s Uncle

Oh wait. Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle.  Wow! I am amused  amazed. There IS an app for that.

No, really.

See, your imagination is not hindered in the slightest! The first one already exists, despite protests throttling is illegal in most countries, and the second to last one would be the most popular thing ever. Back in the sticks and rocks days, we all wanted a rod and reel which would reel the words back.

I am going to have to think about what I would want my app to do. Hmm…


If you could build an app, what would it do? Which app would you like to see disappear from devices the world over?

© Red Dwyer 2013
Adaptation of original post
© Running Naked With Scissors and Lizzie Cracked
Silly Monkey © Liz Campbell
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48 Comments

  1. I think I have been wise to not start on the road to apps. I am already in over my head not understanding what I am doing on my technical contraptions any way. I appreciate the technology and love it’s advantages. There are just some things about life that I don’t want to see change. Some people can mix the two with great benefits. Some people seem to lose something in the transition. But with or without technology that happened as well!
    Chatter Master recently posted..I’ll Call Him RalphMy Profile

    Reply
    • I really think you are correct about it happening anyway. Some did not need to confusion of tech to lose their place 😉 Off the top of my head I could probably name a dozen apps you would love 😛 xxx

      Reply
      • Haha! That makes me curious to what you would suggest! 🙂
        C. Brown recently posted..I’ll Call Him RalphMy Profile

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        • Noteminder: For those stray thoughts you do not have time to write right this minute.
          Bikemap: Biking trail finder which adjusts when you move around the country.
          Bike Repair: Nearest shop with parts for your bike.
          Cyclepedia: Top 100 bikes in the world with stats and pictures.
          There are loads more…

          Reply
          • Red, you are AWESOME!

            I did put a note app on my phone! 🙂 It has come in handy today already.

            The bike ones I will look in to. We are pretty familiar with our home state maps. But, if we ever think of venturing out of state we are always looking for a trail.

            I’m heading over to Cyclepedia! 🙂

            YOU are my favorite today just because you knew these things would make me happy.

            And….(continued on the latest post of yours….)
            C. Brown recently posted..Gratitudes And UrinalsMy Profile

          • Glad you like the idea 😉 I hope you will try the map one. It would be cool to already know where you are going 🙂

  2. An app a day keeps the world at play.
    Noeleen recently posted..A Decision, Two Lives and a ConsequenceMy Profile

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  3. “Surely, the apps available are evidence that imagination is alive and well and now if you can think it, you can have an app for it.”

    So, is there an app to go buy and deliver TP (and keep roll filled, while I’m at it)? Or one to go into that netherworld of “lost” (but not forgotten) socks and retrieve them?
    I mentioned somewhere recently, I have a dumb phone, not a smart phone. Then I realized the phone is smart enough, thank you very much, it’s just that I keep it away from the black holes of communication apps and apps to play games (like I have time to play games)!! I feel that once you open that door, my phone will be sucked like a vacuum into a phantasmagoria of apps that don’t really do what I want them to do, but supposedly help me to do the things I don’t want to do!
    What I like is the vocab that has arisen from new tech: there’s gotta be an app for that. I need another app to do that! I need an app to keep all my other apps in control… it goes on…
    lovely discussion, ladies!!!
    I never did like chat rooms or live messaging – people are often rude there too… ask you a question, then suddenly they are gone and you don’t see them for hours or better – without even saying goodbye!!
    cheers and over and out…

    🙂
    BuddhaKat recently posted..Frequently oFF the Wall, Friendly Fractals Forever…My Profile

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