Monthly Archives: June 2012

Hanna And Her Uncles

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I am sure you have heard of Woody Allen’s movie, Hannah And Her Sisters. Now I present to you Hanna And Her Uncles. It is all about my 13 year old cousin Hanna who celebrated her Bat Mitzvah this weekend at
Temple Judea and Braemar Country Club, both in Tarzana, CA.

Hanna is extremely fortunate to have four dedicated and devoted uncles who along with her parents, Beth and Jeff Young, absolutely took joy in her development from infancy to the woman she is today. Not only did they participate in her religious ceremony yesterday morning, but they acted as her escorts all during the party last night. It was like being on a date with four men at once.

Look at the special dance they did for her in the video below.

Check out this video on YouTube:

How lucky can a girl get? She also has four grandparents doting and kvelling on her every move. Hanna is living proof that you can be spoiled and idealized and still turn out grounded and giving. It was a pleasure witnessing this during the celebratory weekend.

My message to everyone… don’t miss a minute documenting memories. I never leave home without my iPhone which has a camera for both stills and video. Every smartphone has that. Or take a small digital camera on all of your journeys, even to the supermarket. You never know when or where the action will be.

Instead of sitting passively this weekend, I was shooting like mad trying to capture moments we can all share together. My daughter and three of my New York cousins also flew out to LA to join in the festivities. I took photos and videos of them that depict what family is really all about. The professional photographers that were hired for the event are not going to capture my personal choices. They probably won’t even present their photos and videos for weeks or maybe months. And while they may the quintessential shots, mine came first.

If the videos can’t be accessed here, go to lwhitman on YouTube.

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Check out this video on YouTube:

And this one too

Check out this video on YouTube:

The Secret Source

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If you want to know where many of the retirees of Los Angeles are, visit the J. Paul Getty Museum. You’ll find them out in force volunteering their time.

From the minute you leave the tram that takes you from the parking lot to all of the exhibits on the museum campus, you are warmly greeted by seniors with big smiles on their face who are genuinely happy to see you. They point you in the right direction, provide thorough explanations about the exhibits, answer detailed questions about the museum and act as security for those who misbehave.

While I watched much of the 65-plus crowd in action, it bothered me that this is the same enthusiastic and experienced group of people the workforce of America no longer has any use for. This is especially true in the digital age where 40 is already considered old.

When Eliot and I approached the main information desk, the volunteer that was prepared to answer all of our questions turned out to be our old friend Julie Feir, one of the most dynamic manufacturer’s representatives in the consumer electronics industry for many years. I suddenly flashed back to 1974 when I first met him. Julie was the brother of S.David Feir, probably one of my closest and dearest friends also from the consumer electronics industry, who died in 1990 at the young age of 72 from a blood disorder. At some point I will tell S.David Feir stories because his spirit and work ethic needs to be documented.

David and Julie looked so much alike that when I was standing in front of Julie, I felt as if I was talking to David again. Oddly enough, Julie who is now 78, looks a lot younger than his years. He also had a sparkle about him that exuded a lot of positive energy.

We only talked for a few minutes because Julie couldn’t take time away from his commitment in the center of things. In that short discussion I learned that he had been volunteering at The Getty for 15 years and is also very active in the community business of Sherman Oaks. He showed us pictures of his beautiful family and quickly reminisced about the experiences we shared together.

We all promised each other that we would get together on our next trip to LA. Eliot and I proceeded to the Herb Ritts exhibit to see the amazing photos of one of the most creative fashion photographers who ever lived. All I could see were the glowing faces of the volunteers in each of the rooms and wondered what they were thinking.

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Check out this video on YouTube:

When Technology Fails

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Tonki

We were in Kardashian country last night when the lights went out. Eliot and I drove from Sherman Oaks, CA to Westlake Village to have dinner with close friends, Sheri and Larry Lesser and daughter Julie. They took us to a fabulous Italian restaurant, Grissini’s, where we shared stories about family, work, compared iPhone notes and heard all about their recent house renovations. Larry works for The Milken Family Foundation, Sheri is an artist, and Julie is a self taught tech wiz who I talked about in earlier posts.

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Sheri Lesser

It was a just a beautiful night. We were really happy to be catching up.,We left our rental car at Sheri and Larry’s house so we all drove back together. As we are entered their neighborhood Larry remarked that all the streets were dark. Then we saw flashing lights, repair trucks, and the police. Something blew big time.

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Larry Lesser

We didn’t get all of details but we did learn a valuable lesson. Sheri and Larry’s house is totally automated. They have key pads and remote controls to enter through front gates and garage doors. There is no such thing as carrying keys in the wild west. The Lesser’s totally locked up before dinner so there was no chance of re-entry without electricity. Apparently this has never happened to them before because they were as dumbfounded as we were.

Julie Lesser

The option of just driving away and checking in to a hotel in a neighboring town was never considered. The Lesser’s own a cat and dog that were trapped inside without A/C. The cat would have been okay but the Pomeraniannamed Tonki, who is somewhat of a celebrity, would freak if left alone for too long. Tonki’s image appears on all of Sheri’s signature creations.

Luckily, the electricity was restored a few hours later. Julie was not so lucky. She lives less than a mile away. Her electricity was out till the next day. But being the techie she is, she had one secret backup…..a manual key.

 

 

 

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Blogging On A Jet Plane

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Sarah and Max

I am 38,000 feet up in the air on my way to LA from NY. The wifi service on the plane has made this trip so much easier than ever before. While it is expensive at $17.99, I tell myself I would have wasted the same amount on something else. I am not a great flyer…even though I’m on an airplane at least once a month.

By the time I read a few newspapers on my iPad, answer a dozen or so emails, check in with Facebook and Twitter, write this blog, drink, eat, go to the bathroom and do my safe walk around the plane twice, the wheels of this bird will have hit the ground at LAX.

I am looking around the airplane and see virtually every passenger using some sort of electronic equipment. I chuckle to myself. What a modern world we live in.

Some people hate what technology has done to society. I love it. I get what the 50-plus crowd is saying about the lack of conversation and socialization that exists today between young people. To that I say, “I don’t think the conversations between most seniors and their children are that stimulating either. They are usually just inquisitions by the parents who want to know their kids every move so they can control, judge, and pass along the information in their own social circles.”

And to those who claim that kids can’t write an English sentence because of texting, my response is, “They are probably the same group of people who couldn’t write an English sentence themselves years ago. At least smartphones and ebooks have more people reading today than in recent times.”

Call me crazy but my most glorious moment on this flight just came a half hour ago when I met Sarah from Prospect Park, Brooklyn.  Her infant son Max was on her lap and her laptop was on top of  both of them. That picture was worth thousands and I’ve posted it here. If you are reading this blog post on an email alert and the picture is not showing please go to http://www.digidame.com to see it.

I introduced myself to Sarah and promised that I would not identify both of them. Many parents today are fearful of Internet exposure. Sarah wasn’t worried. It turns out that she is a  mommy blogger and a publicist.  Max has his own Facebook page and Twitter account. I gave Sarah my business card.  I just got back to my seat and Sarah has already sent me a cute email with her contact info. I guess she has wifi too.

I am sitting in my seat now just beaming. This couldn’t have happened a year or two ago. I just met a modern day mama, had a fascinating 10-minute conversation and we connected forever on email.

I don’t know about you, but these tech situations are so awesome to me. I feel so fortunate to be alive, experiencing them firsthand.

Follow The Breadcrumbs

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Before you go any further, be sure to read yesterday’s post about finding lost people, pets, and objects. Today’s topic is all about retracing your own footsteps. How many times have you walked into a room without the foggiest notion why you went in there in the first place? Kind of scary but it happens to people all the time. It gets scarier as we get older.

Just this morning a friend of mine over 50 couldn’t find his cell phone in my apartment. He couldn’t remember what room he was in and where he might have left it. He went into a complete panic mode even though Eliot and I were immediately looking for it. When we couldn’t find it, we simply dialed his cell from the house phone (Yes, we still have a landline) and it began ringing in his carry-on bag. He said he always puts his cell phone in his pocket so he was dumbfounded how it got in his mini luggage.

It is times like this that we all need to take a deep breath and retrace our footsteps to find out how we mindlessly misplaced something. It just takes a few seconds to forget what we were doing. If we could just drop a few breadcrumbs we could figure out where we were and where we are supposed to be going.

That is why I am introducing you to the Magellan eXplorist 110. . The GPS receiver is really for outdoor navigation when you want to repeatedly go to a specific spot when fishing, hiking, hunting, and biking.

However, some of my friends have resorted to hanging the GPS unit around their neck as if it was a mini compass. It records their every move with a series of digital breadcrumbs. They now can easily retrace their steps. No more threat of memory loss.
While this may be silly to some, to others it is a very serious solution to a nagging problem.

It retails for $129.99.

Lost And Found

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The more we travel, the more we hear about luggage being lost by the airlines for a day or two. I have had that happen to me a few times. I get to a destination only to find out that my luggage didn’t make it. It happened on a business trip to Taiwan 35 years ago, when we traveled to Eastern Europe five years ago and then just last year when we returned from India.

It is such a terrible, empty feeling. The older we get, the more nervous we get about the whereabouts of our luggage. I never pack my meds, extra eye glasses, jewelry, laptop, iPad, Kindle, chargers, and important papers. All that is in my carry on.

Tomorrow we leave for LA for a few days. This trip things will be a little different. I am using the PocketFinder Personal Locator.

 Wait to you hear about this. 

The PocketFinder is a personal GPS. It fits in the palm of your hand. You can use it to track people, pets, vehicles and in my case luggage from the web, the iPhone or Android mobile devices. It’s available for $149.00 and a small monthly charge for the service.

I am going to put one of the personal GPS locators in my luggage. When I get on the airplane tomorrow I will make sure the luggage makes it just by turning on my iPhone.  The mobile PocketFinder GPS mapping application pinpoints the location of the device that will be in my suitcase. 

Just think about the possibilities of tracking a person with dementia or your child, grandchild or even pets. Users can customize the map application by establishing zones that automatically send alerts if a loved one enters or leaves a zone on foot or in a vehicle. In addition, speed alerts can be set that notify users if a vehicle exceeds set speed limits. Alerts are sent instantly via email, SMS text, and push notification.

The devices are as easy to recharge as a cell phone.

PocketFinder’s GPS Vehicle Locator attaches to automobiles, recreational vehicles, motorcycles, boats, snowmobiles, jet skis – virtually any powered vehicle. It allows users to pinpoint the location of the vehicles as well as their speeds – capabilities especially welcomed by parents of teenage drivers. The compact GPS Vehicle Locator can also help authorities to quickly find a lost or stolen vehicle.

Don’t tell me that you don’t find this mind bloggling? Who ever thought there would be a day that we could track people and things from our telephone? What an unbelievable time to be alive!

Back To The Future With Polaroid

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Here is a scoop. A company in New Jersey that licensed the name Polaroid is about to introduce a new digital camera that also prints pictures. It should sell around $149.00. Yes, it is both a digital and instant print camera.
How weird is that?

I was a little confused when I first heard about this camera. I asked a company executive “Who would want a camera in this day and age that prints photos?”

Apparently there is a sizeable audience who wants printed pictures on-the-spot. Some of them could be music fans who want artists to immediately autograph their photos. Others are birthday party planners who like to post pictures on the walls during events. Another possibility are exercise or sports instructors who use instantaneous photos for coaching purposes.

This dual purpose camera may not
have made sense to me at first but it
does now. It hasn’t been introduced to the world yet. It debuts next week.
I have included a spec sheet below
for a closer look.

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Happy Father’s Day

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Love, The DigiDame
With Eliot Hess, Steve Greenberg, and
Russ Rowland

Make This Holiday A Digital One.

Go into the app store, type in Greeting Cards in search, pick from 15 selections, and send someone a digital card.

I thank you, a tree thanks you and Al Gore thanks you

Card | justWink Cards & Mobile Apps

https://www.just-wink.com/pickup/4615402795267?source=jw999&rr=y

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Help Me To Help You

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I am reaching out to the DigiDame audience because I know that some of you have access to information I need that will help all of us when we might be incapacitated. I want to turn the iPad into a resource that will help us with mental and motor skills.

I am starting this project for my client Senior Nannies, an elder care company in South Florida along with Project Tiki, a company that creates and finances mobile and web applications.

We are looking for programs that will help rehabilitate, challenge, stimulate, and encourage the elderly when they are in the care of others. Instead of wasting time watching TV or staring into space,
we want to create applications that will provide hours of hope and joy.

The iPad is the ultimate tool to accomplish this.

Claudia Wechter, Founder of Senior Nannies, along with her associate Gary Loffredo, want to pioneer the possibility of having their caregivers offer mental and physical iPad programs to their clients. “The majority of our caregivers can easily be trained to operate the programs,” said Wechter. “It is a win-win situation for everyone involved. There are just too many idle hours where nothing happens. If we had iPad programs that could offer a new, positive atmosphere for those who feel hopeless than we could turn dark days into lives worth living.”

John Hobson, a founding partner in Project Tiki, said that another reason why this project is so important is because “every eight minutes someone else is turning 65 on the planet Earth. I refer to it as a ‘Senior Tsunami.’ It has already been proven that seniors are the biggest audiences for iPads. They seem to operate them better than any other age group. We are witnessing the birth of a whole new revolution in digital technology.”

You can be a part of this exciting development. If you know of anyone who can contribute ideas, programs, content, finances and other resources, please contact us. This could turn this into the most rewarding and productive time for all of us.

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Rx For Severe Panic Attacks— Use “Find My iPhone” or “Where’s My Droid”

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If you own a smart phone you’ve had to suffer several of those gut wrenching panic attacks that make you feel like you are going into cardiac arrest. I am sure everyone reading this post knows the feeling of despair that I am talking about. It comes about when you can’t find your iPhone or Android. Did you lose it or was it stolen? 

This has happened to me several times when my iPhone had fallen into some mysterious dark hole in my handbag or I left it in my bathroom on a stack of towels while charging it. 

I have had many panic attacks in my lifetime, especially when I am on a bumpy airplane or waiting to hear results from my doctor. However, nothing beats the emptiness and life threatening hysterics you get when everything you worked for and every detail of your life is now missing. My head is screaming, “What did I do with that iPhone? Dear G-d, if you give me back the iPhone, I swear I will never let it out of my sight. I promise never to eat chocolate again.” 

Our lives depend on these handy little gadgets. As seniors, we have been taught for the last few years to get rid of all the paper and digitize everything. But no one has prepared us for what we do if we lose these little contraptions. 

Do not wait another minute. If you have an iPhone, enable “Find My iPhone” in the settings menu under iCloud.  If you have an Android phone go get “Where’s My Droid” from the Google Play Store.   Both of these apps will help you locate the missing device and protect your data. You will be able locate your device on a map and lock or erase the information. All of this is can be done from another smart phone or the web using the Find My iPhone App or iCloud.com website for iOS or the Where’s My Droid website for Android. If you feel your phone was stolen you call the police and they will retrieve the unit for you. 

Both apps must be enabled in order for them to work. 

This is probably the best advice I can ever give you. Use these apps on your phones, your MP3 Players, your tablets, and your laptops. 

Many people already know about these apps, but have been too lazy to download them. These are the same people who know about the shingles and pneumonia shots and do nothing. All of these offerings are a blessing in disguise. Get them. You don’t need the stress of an attack.