Day 40: Conversations I have with my computer

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 40: Conversations I have with my computer

Do you talk to your computer? Don’t be too quick to roll your eyes and say “No”. I did the same thing.  Someone asked me the other day if I ever talk to my computer and I laughed “Of course not”. 

I admit, I talk to my cats and on one or two occasions I’ve talked to plants, but talking to my computer … I haven’t completely lost my marbles. But then I started paying attention and to my horror, I discovered that I do talk to my computer – quite a lot actually.

It starts in the morning. I press the “on” button and drum my fingers waiting for the machine to be ready for action. If it takes too long, I say “Jeez, but you’re slow today”. When the opening scene of Windows pops up I greet it with a “Finally”.

The first thing I do is open my Gmail account. “Fifty-three messages! You’ve got to be kidding me!” Most of them are spam and they swiftly get deleted.

Next, I open Facebook and have a look who did what. Got to stay up to date, right?

And then I open MS-Word and prepare for a day of writing. Most of the time Word cooperates, but every now and then things go wrong and that’s when the conversations start.

When I try to open a file and the computer tells me “File cannot be found” I reply with “What’d you mean file cannot be found? I worked on it yesterday. Oh, don’t tell me you lost it!”  After a few more futile attempts I let the computer have it ... “You stupid machine. You know this never happened when I worked with a typewriter. Whatever I wrote was there. He never lost a file.”

Sometimes when I want to open a particular document I get the message “File cannot be opened”, to which my reaction is ... “And why not?”  Sooner or later I find out the reason and then crawl into my shell with an ... “Oh”.

Moving on. Say I want to find a certain word.  I click the “Find” button and type in what word I’m looking for. Before long I get the message “Word not found”. I fly off the handle again ... “Word not found ... Word not found! I know I put it in there. How can you not find it?  Oh wait a minute, maybe it was another file.”

Where it comes to saving files I recently got into trouble. I clicked “Save as” and accidentally saved over a file I didn’t want to save over. Of course, the computer got it.  “You stupid machine!  I didn’t want to save over that file. Why didn’t you give me a warning? Why didn’t you ask ‘Are you sure?’ Oh, now I have to start all over again.”

After I’ve done some work, I return to my Gmail account to reply to messages.  While typing it has happened that I accidentally hit the wrong key and the message gets sent. Uh oh, now the computer is really in trouble. “What did you do that for? That message wasn’t ready to be sent. Oh, what have you done!”

It’s a good thing a computer can’t talk back, because after all the abuse my computer takes, I think I would get an earful along with “Language Conny, language!”

On days like that, I miss my typewriter.  It might have been slower, but it was so much safer.  Much as I love my computer (yes I do) I still think he deserves his name ... F.R.E.D.  (Fucking Rotten Electronic Device).

Day 32: How to have a good day

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 32: How to have a good day

Today was my lucky day. 

I went to the mailroom to pick up some documents from the printer. Nothing was printed as there was no paper in the machine. I opened a new ream of paper, placed the sheets in the printer drawer and was about to throw away the wrapping paper of the printing paper when I noticed something in the bin … a book entitled ‘How to Have a Good Day’ by Caroline Webb.

Well somebody was quite obviously not having a good day as he/she threw the book away. Personally, I have never done such a thing. Okay, I’m lying, there is one book I threw in the garbage bag but the extremely well-known authors shall remain nameless. If and when I don’t like a book I give it away or leave it somewhere for others to find.

Even though I never read self-help books, I intend to give ‘How to Have a Good Day’ a go. Heaven knows I can do with some tools to have better days and if I find something interesting or useful, I’ll be sure to share it with you.

But speaking of losing and finding … yesterday I most definitely did not have a good day.

I got a man at my desk looking for his new cellphone and laptop. I checked the room where the company keeps all incoming packages and with little or no effort, I found the cellphone. As for the laptop … that I couldn’t find anywhere.

I checked the top of the table, under the table, on the floor, on cabinets … there was no laptop for the man. Since he was looking at me questionably, I invited him into the storage room and together we went through all the packages. No laptop. I promised him if and when the laptop showed up, I would give him a call.

This missing computer kept bothering me though. How could a package just disappear? Nobody but Elizabeth (not her real name), Frank (not his real name), the building management and I have access to this storage room. Elizabeth wasn’t there, she was on vacation, so who could have taken that laptop?

Eventually, I went to check the room again. I meticulously went through all the packages and checked every name. No, no laptop. By then it was close to home time, so I packed up and left. 

This morning though, I had to put a package away and while I was in the room I decided to have another look. And there the laptop was, in a rather big brown box. How I could have missed it I’ll never know. I checked that room and its content three times, the recipient of the laptop had checked the packages with me and neither of us had found what we were looking for. And now, boom, within five seconds I had located the box.

As for looking for things … lately I ‘lose’ all sort of stuff: my cellphone, keys, lipstick, and other small stuff regularly go missing. It’s gotten to the point that I’m considering getting a Golden Retriever to find my things.

It not really a case of losing things but rather misplacing them. For instance …

The other day I couldn’t find my reading glasses. I looked everywhere … I went around the house checking the living room, my bedroom, Dieter’s room, even the bathroom … no glasses.

Thinking that perhaps the cats had played with them, I checked under the coffee table, under the dining room table, even checked under the lounge chairs, thinking that my glasses might have skidded under there. But no, no glasses there either.

Feeling hungry I decided to make myself a sandwich. Maybe, while eating, it would come to where I left them. I opened the fridge to get the butter and … hello, what were my glasses doing in the fridge! I suppose it’s a question that will remain unanswered.

Anyway, let me take a look at that book ‘How to Have a Better Day’. Since tomorrow is Friday, winning the Lotto Max jackpot would definitely make for a better day and all day to follow. Fingers crossed.

Day 2: Choosing a laptop

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 2: Choosing a laptop

Yesterday I mentioned that I had purchased a new laptop. Today I would like to tell you how that purchase came about.

My old laptop was getting really slow. Whether it was starting up, shutting down or opening programs, it took forever. After a few weeks, I got so fed up that it became clear that my laptop’s days were numbered.

While I was downtown Toronto I dropped by Best Buy and had a look at their laptop section. Oh my goodness and what a joy, there were so many models I flitted from one laptop to another like a butterfly flutters from flower to flower.

It soon became clear though that not all laptops were suitable. Some were too small, others too expensive, while with others still, I didn’t like the keyboard.

The keyboard of a laptop is very important to me. I insist on soft touch. So when I saw a computer I liked I pretended to type something, to feel the softness of the keys. People who watched me must have wondered what on earth I was up to.

When my son joined me in the store and learned which laptop I liked the best he said not to buy at Best Buy, he had seen that very same laptop at Costco for $100 less.

At Costco the choice in laptops was limited, but since I already had a preference the purchase was made within minutes. Or so I thought. As it turned out, Costco didn’t have that particular model in stock but they did have another model, for $50 more. Fine I would pay the extra $50.

Pleased with my purchase I returned home. My new found joy didn’t last long though. Once the laptop had gone through its formatting and I started typing, the cursor jumped all over the page due to constant contact with the touchpad. I tried to fix it, I tried to disable the touchpad, I even chatted with someone from the Hewlett Packard support team, but the touchpad wouldn’t be beaten. To cut a long story short, I returned the laptop and got a refund.

Back at square one, I went online in search of a computer. After a lot of browsing, I ended up at the Best Buy website where an Acer laptop was on special with a $150 discount. Wow, what a stroke of luck. My current laptop was an Acer and I had been very happy with his service. So why not go again with an Acer?

I placed the order and three days later the laptop arrived, neatly wrapped in protective paper and a firm cardboard box. While the cats checked out the box, the computer was duly formatted for use. 

It took a long, long time for the machine to be ready and when it finally was … what a disappointment. Not only was the new laptop slow, slower than my old machine, but the keyboard was horrible. Horrible with a capital H. It was like typing on an old fashioned typewriter. Not tik, tik, tik, but tok, tok, tok.

I wondered what to do and always came to the same conclusion … the laptop would have to go. If this was something I would use for a day, a week or even a month it wouldn’t have bothered me, but a laptop is good for a few years, and considering the amount of money I spend, I felt that I deserved satisfaction. So, off I went again to return a laptop.

This time I went to a different Best Buy though, one in Scarborough. When I entered the store I thought I had died and gone to computer heaven … so many computers, this store had even more laptops than the one downtown.

Before we could make an exchange though we had to visit the Geek Squad who had to check the laptop. They gave it their seal of approval and now we could go to the customer service counter. 

And would you believe it, we encountered a self-important little bitch (pardon my French). She told us that if we bought another Acer laptop she would agree to an exchange, but if we went for another make of laptop she would not. I tried to reason with her, but the 5 feet something 20 something-year-old would not budge.

Well, we would see about that. She might be a little bitch but I can be a big bitch and this slip of a girl had nothing on me.

At the laptop section of Best Buy I once again flitted around from one model to another. “Too slow,” my son said when I indicated a machine a liked. “Not enough memory,” son dear said when I selected another. 

Eventually, a very nice Indian chap joined us who was of great assistance. So that’s how I eventually selected my dear Fred, a 15” Lenovo with enough memory, suitable speed and a keyboard so soft it feels like typing on marshmallows.

Dieter also liked the machine and decided to get one for himself. So now the nice Indian chap had not made one sale but two. Off he went to find two Lenovo laptops from the storage facility and we waited on one of the couches.

As I sat there and looked around, I wondered why there are only black and silver laptops? Why not blue, or lilac, or even a cheerful yellow. “Because guys won’t buy a colorful computer,” Dieter said. Well, what kind of reasoning was that? Women buy computers too and I’m sure they would prefer a nice color versus a boring black.

Yes, I know, Apple has beautiful white laptops, but an Apple was not in my budget. I looked at one and was on the verge of falling in love when I noticed the price tag … good Lord, did this machine come with a matching printer and desk!

When our nice Indian man returned he had a smile on his face and two boxes in his hands … our Lenovo laptops. Once again off we went to the customer service desk to trade in the Acer laptops and pay for the Lenovo laptops. I wondered what would happen … would the bitchy girl accept the exchange?

Fortunately, the girl was nowhere to be seen and a young man had taken her place. Ah, things were looking up. The man didn’t even blink. He accepted the Acer laptops, prepared payment for the Lenovo laptops and …

Just as the sale was about to be finalized, the bitchy girl made an appearance. She slithered over like a snake and hissed something in the young man’s ear. There was a brief discussion during which I held my breath. If she was about to make trouble, I was prepared to go into battle. She may be head of the customer service, but I was a customer and as we all know, the customer is king (and I felt like a queen). Mentally I put on my boxing gloves ... bring it on little girl.

As things turned out, I didn’t have to say or do anything. The nice young man send her off with a flea in her ear, she made a quick retreat and we walked out with our laptops.

Ah, sometimes life is good.

http://connymanero.weebly.com/blog/day-1-resolutions

Day 1: Resolutions

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 1: Resolutions

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Fred, my new laptop. Together we’ll try to bring you daily stories. I do say ‘try’ because I might be busy, tired or just have nothing to say.

For a while I had a project going named ‘365 Creative Writing Prompts’ but there was nothing creative about it. To me, creative writing is fictional, and my posts were anything but. So, I’ve said goodbye to that project and I’m starting something new. This new project is called ‘Between you, me and the lamppost’ but that can change. If you can think of something better, I’m all ears.

Anyway, getting a new computer seemed like the perfect time to start a new project and along with this new machine come three resolutions.

First resolution:

I said goodbye to social media. That mainly means I will no longer look at the home feed of Facebook. I will occasionally post something and still play Bingo and Gin Rummy, but I will no longer look at what other people post. Why? Because I’ve had it with seeing pictures of animal abuse.

Whether it’s a cat or a dog, a bunny or a horse, seeing animal abuse makes me so mad I could throw my computer across the room. So, for the sake of my laptop, I rather don’t look anymore.

Second Resolution:

I’m letting go of the past. For far too long events of the past have dragged me down and giving me sleepless nights. Well, no more. From now on, when memories haunt me, I’m going to push them away, I’m done with them. As someone told me ... Visualize an open box, put memories into that box, close it, put the box in a safe and lock the safe. This is my way of locking away those memories.

Third Resolution:

Recently I started a new manuscript and I intend to work on it every day. In the past, my manuscripts have gathered dust and I eventually abandoned them. Starting a new story is easy, but keeping the story going is a lot harder than some people think.

That’s not the only reason I got discouraged with writing though.

Many years ago, self-publishing was a respected business. Proof of that is John Grisham who self-published his first book ‘A Time to Kill’ and was consequently contracted by a mainstream publishing house.

Ever since that success everyone and his auntie have been self-publishing books. Some are good, some are bad, some are downright ridiculous. I read of a woman who’s 6-year-old son published a ‘book’. The book in question counted only 5 pages. 

Fact is, with so many people publishing their works, self-publishing has lost its value. More than that, self-publishing has gained a bad reputation. Far too many people when they see that a book is self-published withdraw and move on to something else.

Still, I won’t let this get me down. I’ve started a new manuscript, the first 18 chapters are done in the first draft, and I fully intent to keep going.

In conclusion … I’ll try to post something every day, but I can’t guarantee it. Some post will be funny, some venting about this or that, some will be animal stories and with some, you might laugh out loud.

Don’t miss out. Near the top of the page, you'll see 'Follow by email', fill in your email address and have updates delivered right to your inbox. Thank you for reading.

Day 26: Writing - Easy ways to make time to write

My Project: 365 Creative Writing Prompts

Day 26: Writing – Give advice to writers

Easy ways to make time to write

Writers are notorious procrastinators.  Those with a full-time job might argue that they don’t have much time to write, while those who stay at home might find that there are too many distractions. Productive writers have one thing in common, they make time to write.

One of the first things to do is to know what keeps you from writing.  It could be that you would like to spend more time writing but that you, in the name of research, get easily distracted by everything that’s available on the Net.  Maybe you prefer reading over writing.  It could be that you watch too much television or that you are a notorious napper.

If you get easily distracted, you need to set goals for yourself. If you can write one or two articles per day, great, that’s thirty-one or sixty-two articles per month and that’s nothing to sneeze at. By setting goals for yourself that you can actually achieve, you encourage yourself to do more, rather than facing disappointment by setting your goals too high.

Keep a notebook and pen handy.  Inspiration can come anytime, any place, but unless you can jot something down, an idea, phrase or impression might quickly disappear. Preference should be given to a book over scraps of paper as those might easily get lost.

A fast and easy way to help you in your writing is a Dictaphone. This tiny tape recorder can be used in the car, in a coffee shop, in the park, or any other place where you might find inspiration.  While dictating you don’t have to worry about typos or correct grammar, you can just talk and type up your ideas later.  Someone else can even do the typing for you. Your spouse or children might welcome such a project to practice their typing speed and accuracy.

You will know best whether you are a morning or an evening person. If you are at your most productive in the wee hours of the morning, try to get up an hour early to write.  If you’re more of a night owl, wait until everyone has gone to bed and the house is quiet to devote some time to write. If you have a full-time job, use your lunchtime to write. 

You can use your laptop and run off battery power; your iPad loaded with a writing programme such as ‘Pages’ or use pen and paper. Writing longhand may actually be beneficial to your writing.  Many writers claim that typing influences their creativity and they write better using a pen. 

Leo Tolstoy used to write sitting in the market square. If it worked for him it might work for you.

Feel free to comment. I'd love to hear from you.

www.connymanero.weebly.com

Day 13: Letters - Make reference to a famous letter

My Project: 365 Creative Writing Prompts

Day 13: Letters. Make reference to a famous letter

Because of the internet, people today enjoy instant communication. Someone writes an email and within seconds can expect a reply. Or contact someone via chat and create an instant conversation.

While this is a very convenient way of interaction, very few people today know the pleasure of writing a letter and the joyful anticipation of a reply.

When I was a teenager I had several pen pals and waited for the mailman every morning. Sitting by the window, I saw him push his bike up the street and almost from door slip something in the mailbox. Would he have something for me? When I heard a thud in our mailbox I knew something had arrived.

I used to rush through the house, open the small wooden door of the mailbox and fish out whatever was just delivered.

More sweet anticipation followed as I sifted through the envelopes looking for those addressed to me.

Responding to those letters was just as enjoyable. Sitting at the dining room table, a block of crisp white lined paper in front of me and a fountain pen on the side. I use to love the feel of that silky paper and the sound of the pen scratching as it formed letters and words.

I wonder if Napoleon felt the same when he wrote:

My Dearest Josephine, I wake filled with thoughts of you. Your portrait and the intoxicating evening which we spent yesterday have left my senses in turmoil. Sweet, incomparable Josephine, what a strange effect you have on my heart!

Poor man, who knows how long it took for his letters to be delivered and how long he had to wait for a response. I wonder how Josephine felt. Each time Napoleon went off to battle she must have wondered if she'd ever see him again, and a letter would have been a sign of life.

In due time, I moved on from pen and paper to a typewriter. I admired those machines the way my friends admired shoes, boots, and handbags. From behind the showroom window, they beckoned for me to come closer, enticing me with their shiny black, white, mint green or powder blue cases, detailed with black or white keyboards. Side by side they stood, fighting for my attention.

A whole year I saved up part of my pocket money so I could have one of those machines for my very own. Do kids still do that today, save up for something?

I’ll never forget the day when I brought my ‘baby’ home. Using two fingers I could now hammer out letters to my pen pals at a fraction of the time it used to take me.

Over the years my little typewriter was replaced by a much more sophisticated electric machine, followed by several desktop computers and finally laptops.

Does anyone these days still use typewriters or write letters for that matter?

Feel free to comment, I'd love to hear from you.

www.connymanero.weebly.com

Conversations I have with my computer

Do you talk to your computer?  Don’t be too quick to roll your eyes and so “No”.  I did the same thing.  Someone asked me the other day if I ever talk to my computer and I laughed and said “Of course not”. 

I admit, I talk to my cats and on one or two occasions I’ve talked to plants, but talking to my computer … I haven’t completely lost my marbles.  But then I started paying attention and to my horror I discovered that I do talk to my computer – quite a lot at that.

It starts in the morning.  I press the “on” button on the driver and the monitor and drum my fingers on the desk waiting for the machine to be ready for action.  If it takes too long I say “Jeez, but you’re slow today”.  When the opening scene of Windows pops up I greet it with a “Finally”.

The first thing I do is open my gmail account.  “53 messages!  You’ve got to be kidding me!”  Most of them are spam and they swiftly get deleted.

Next I open Facebook and have a look who did what.  Got to stay up to date, right?

And then I open MS-Word and prepare for a day of writing.  

Most of the time Word cooperates, but every now and then things go wrong and that’s when the conversations start.

When I try to open a file and the computer tells me “File cannot be found” I reply with “What’d you mean file cannot be found?  I worked on it yesterday.  Oh don’t tell me you lost it!”  After a few more futile attempts I let the computer have it ... “You stupid machine.  You know this never happened when I worked with a typewriter.  Whatever I wrote was there.  He never lost a file.”

Sometimes when I want to open a particular document I get the message “File cannot be opened”, to which my reaction is ... “And why not?”  Sooner or later I find out the reason and then crawl into my shell with a ... “Oh”.

Moving on to another file and let’s say I want to find a particular word.  I click the “Find” button and type in what word I’m looking for.  Before long I get the message “Word not found”.  I fly off the handle again ... “Word not found ... Word not found!  I know I put it in there.  How can you not find it?  Oh wait a minute, maybe it was another file.”

Where it comes to saving files I recently got into trouble.  I clicked “Save as” and accidentally saved over a file I didn’t want to save over.  Of course, the computer got it.  “You stupid machine!  I didn’t want to save over that file.  Why didn’t you give me a warning?  Why didn’t you ask Are you sure?  Oh, now I have to start all over again.”

After I’ve done some work, I return to my gmail account to reply to messages.  While typing it has happened that I accidentally hit the wrong key and the message gets send.  Oh oh, now the computer is really in trouble.  “What did you do that for?  That message wasn’t ready to be send.  Oh what have you done!”

Then worst of all ... power outage.  One moment I’m happily typing away, the next that horrible moment when the screen goes black and the only sound from the machine is a sickening .... phewwwww.  You should hear me then.  “What happened?  What did you do?  Oh nooooooooo!”

It’s a good thing a computer can’t talk back, because after all the abuse my computer takes, I think I would get an earful along with “Language Conny, language!”

On days like that, I miss my typewriter.  It might have been slower, but it was so much safer.  Much as I love my computer (yes I do) I still think he deserves his name ... F.R.E.D.  (Fucking Rotten Electronic Device).

As Raymond says ... “That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.”

On the balcony

Aah this is the life. For a change this is not written under the Toronto sun, but under the Toronto moon and stars.

Although it has cooled off tonight and we have three fans going, it is still stifling warm inside.

While watering the flowers on the balcony, I felt how nice and cool it was outside, so I decided to move to the balcony with my laptop. It is so much better here.
Nice view too.

On my left are two neighboring buildings where it seems most of the occupants have gone to sleep as windows are dark. Here and there, there still are some lit up windows though.

In front of me is the building’s park, now completely deserted. Beyond the park is a pond, also deserted. There used to be ducks and geese, but I haven’t seen or heard them in a long long time. Beyond the pond is a residential area, now covered in darkness but dotted here and there with white and orange lights. Street lights I presume.

On my right is a railway, a townhouse complex, a bingo hall and a soccer field. And beyond that, some 25 miles away, the skyline of Toronto with the CN tower as the most noticeable light beacon.

Aah it’s so peaceful and quiet here, this balcony would be the perfect place to sleep.