Gina Giles Technobio

Although I am not as technology savvy as I wish to be, I have had technology in my life for quite a while now. I grew up with a father who was a Baltimore SWAT team officer so I constantly had his radio, beeper, and cell phone going off. I started to become familiar with technology when my brother got a Nintendo 64. I liked playing it, but always got frustrated when he was better than me. I could never understand how he could get a new game one day and within the next hour have beaten every level.
I got my first computer when I was in seventh grade and thought it was the coolest thing ever. It had been an old computer at my dad’s work so we got to have it. I remember it took forever to load everything but still I would be on it for hours. Next I had the portable tape player, which I thought nothing could get any better, and then came the portable CD player and again I couldn’t think of anything being more “cool.” And along with those things, at first I had a VCR, and then a DVD player and I remember teaching my mom how to work both of those things.
Then, my family made the big step in buying a flat screen computer that was actually new and didn’t take an hour to get to the homepage. On this computer I learned how to upload pictures, download music, talk to my friends on AIM, and discovered the amazing invention of MySpace. Along with the computer, I was given my own digital camera as well as an IPod. It amazed me how easy it was for me to figure out how to work them and more importantly how well I was at teaching my mom how to work them. Every time she didn’t know how to do something on the computer, she called me and even though I explained it to her, the next day she would be asking the same question again.
As I got older, the need for a cell phone came into play. I had just gotten my license so my parents finally gave in and bought me a cell phone for Christmas. My dad had a Nextel for work so he got the phones for free, so lucky me I got a Nextel for my first phone. I remember it was as big as our TV remote, but just the same I was obsessed with it. After having that phone for about 2 years, I was able to get a new and improved phone which I loved because it was a “flip” phone. I had that phone until it broke and got another phone with Verizon which was so much better than Nextel in all aspects. Throughout this period of phone transitioning, I attempted to teach my mom how to text, which I am still teaching her today.
In my life now, I have a Voyager phone, an iTouch, a laptop, digital camera, a flat screen TV with a DVD player and an iHome for my iTouch. I would have to say that as technology becomes more advanced; I tend to keep up with it, even though some of it I just plain do not understand.