Technology and elderly parents

Well needless to say I am already behind on the month of June daily challenge to blog which started here. But the good thing is I don't want to write if I really don't have anything to say or don't truly feel the need, so maybe I am not geared for these types of challenges. Anyway I do have some thoughts and questions.

I will be the first to admit that I am very fortunate to have both my parents still with us on this earth. Right before Christmas they moved back to Dallas and are only 1 mile from my house which is great. The other day my older brother went with them to meet one of my dad's younger sisters for lunch and she mentioned that she had an email address. This apparently got my dad's interest up as he mentioned to my older brother that he wouldn't mid learning some computer so as to be able to email. My mom on the other hand worked with technology for the public school system in Dallas and when she retired she said she never wanted to see another computer. Unfortunately at this stage she is suffering from the early stages of dementia.

This got me to thinking what kind of technologies could I help my dad obtain and use that would help us to help them and also to be something that my father would enjoy using? As I thought about it my dad tries not to spend any money at all so my first thought was I have an extra laptop. But then I thought about an iPad. Sure it is the latest thing on the market but I got to thinking that if we got him a 3G iPad, he could have a gmail account, a solid state drive, he could have apps to remind him of things he needed or wanted to do and he could email his younger sister.

Then I got to thinking, what other technologies would benefit an elderly couple and help their children to be a little more comfortable in some of the ways to monitor their aging parents. I hope you have some ideas to contribute. Let me know what you think.

So much to learn and so little time.