Feeling like a walking dinosaur.

fuzzybuddy

fuzzybuddy

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Location
The Sticks, Northeast PA.
I've always wondered about Japanese Emperor Hirohito, as to his culpability in WWII. I got off my duff and went to the library to get a book on him. I haven't been in a library in 60 years. They don't have those card catalogs anymore. So I asked this nice 20+ about a book on "Hirohito". She never heard of him. I said, "Ya know, the Emperor of Japan-WWII?". She asked was it a play? I had to spell 'Hirohito' out for her. The computer cranked out a number.
I can't tell you how I felt like a living dinosaur. It was before she was born, and to be honest, I don't know who fought in the Boar War, either. It just hit me that she had a whole new frame of reference than me.
 

fuzzybuddy said:
I've always wondered about Japanese Emperor Hirohito, as to his culpability in WWII. I got off my duff and went to the library to get a book on him. I haven't been in a library in 60 years. They don't have those card catalogs anymore. So I asked this nice 20+ about a book on "Hirohito". She never heard of him. I said, "Ya know, the Emperor of Japan-WWII?". She asked was it a play? I had to spell 'Hirohito' out for her. The computer cranked out a number.
I can't tell you how I felt like a living dinosaur. It was before she was born, and to be honest, I don't know who fought in the Boar War, either. It just hit me that she had a whole new frame of reference than me.
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His status was regarded as being holy in Japan I seem to remember, and he was left in place after the war to prevent an uprising by the people.
 
I remember feeling equally antiquated when I commented to my then-teenage daughter about the neighbor’s cat being a “carbon copy” of another feline

She asked, “what’s a carbon copy?”
 

In the 1930s my father worked for a company that manufactured paper mill machinery. He told me that a carbon paper factory is the dirtyest place on this earth.
 
fuzzybuddy said:
I've always wondered about Japanese Emperor Hirohito, as to his culpability in WWII. I got off my duff and went to the library to get a book on him. I haven't been in a library in 60 years. They don't have those card catalogs anymore. So I asked this nice 20+ about a book on "Hirohito". She never heard of him. I said, "Ya know, the Emperor of Japan-WWII?". She asked was it a play? I had to spell 'Hirohito' out for her. The computer cranked out a number.
I can't tell you how I felt like a living dinosaur. It was before she was born, and to be honest, I don't know who fought in the Boar War, either. It just hit me that she had a whole new frame of reference than me.
Click to expand...
Lucky you did not ask her about Tojo!
 
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For 20 years after WII, there were war movies, TV programs, books, etc. Now, to those born 60 years after WWII, all they know comes out of dry history books, which no teenager is eager to read. The librarians lack of knowledge is understandable, ( I don't know who fought in which old wars) but it cemented the era I come from.
 

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