Newspapers and magazines

I'm really struggling with the whole idea of reading newspapers and magazines on the internet. Does that make me hopelessly outdated? And reading books on a computer screen? I don't think so. What's wrong with me?

I love holding a newspaper in my hands. I love the feel of the paper, the smell of the ink, and the sound of the pages when I turn them. I like to go back and re-read every section before I throw it out. And I like using the old newspapers for other things too. The same with magazines. I like cutting out recipes and dog-earring pages to come back to again and again.

I honestly don't even get the whole "kindle" thing. What pleasure is there in curling up with a good book if its displayed on a small screen? What's wrong with a book marker or a turned down corner turned to get you back to where you stopped? And how great is it to open a brand new book and hold it in your hand, turning page after page, hearing the crack of the binding and sometimes unsticking the pages, underlining things you want to remember, going back a chapter to remember who the characters are - and laying it down for a moment to answer the phone and then picking it up to hold in your hand again? I just don't see the same pleasure in a hard tablet you hold in your hand. I can see the value for someone who travels a lot or has no room to store books and magazines that still haven't been finished. But recycling a good book, passing it on to the next person, is a pleasure all its own.

I'm not anti-technology, I'm really not. I love my computer, and blogging, and searching the internet - and I couldn't live without my email! But I just can't seem to warm up to the idea of the print media suddenly being something else to read while sitting at a video screen. There's just too much pleasure to be missed in doing it the old-fashioned way. So I'll keep buying the newspapers and magazines and books until they're no longer available that way. I hope that never happens.