The Tyranny of Technology

It was never my intention to buy a new computer, but suddenly the old one took sick and died. Luckily John was able to plug a little thigamajig into it and download my past. This endeavor was not without its problems. Armed with the little history gadget and a credit card we went to Staples to buy a new machine.

"Sorry", replied Staples, "we have no machine to sell to you."

We looked around and there appeared to be an abundance of computers, printers and monitors. All of which we would have to replace as the old ones would be incompatible. Microsoft was releasing Windows7 on Thursday and we would have to wait.

John was getting antsy as he had an appointment in the city and had not anticipated a long stay in the Berks waiting for a machine. But wait he did. The computer could not come home on Thursday as it needed to be updated and I was assured that if I did that at home on dial-up it would update itself for many, many hours. For sixty additional dollars Staples would keep the computer an extra day and do the updates at the store.

We returned on Friday picked up the computer and plugged it in at home. All the icons which had been visible at the store had disappeared from the screen. In essence I had a blank screen and no way to change it. John unplugged it and went back to Staples. They mumbled something about it being impossible for the icons to have gone away when they were very much present at the store; and oh yes, it was using 125 percent of the screen so with a click they changed the resolution to 100 percent and I was good to go. John by this time was growing increasingly bored sitting around waiting for the next computer crisis and went home.

I sat down and tried to send out an e-mail to find that Microsoft had not bundled the e-mail program into the Windows7 operating system. For about $100 I could buy one. "Would I like a tech to help me with installation et cetera?" The printer was still in the b ox so I thoughta tech might be a good thing. For about $200 plus $40 for expedited service a tech would come to the house and I would be a happy camper again.

When I went to the car to go on with my day it would not start. I went back inside and asked to use the phone. I had completely forgotten I had a phone in my handbag. AAA came in about 45 minutes.

The expedited service was a figment of someone's imagination but a vey nice tech did come two days later and make everything work. He informed me that my clicking finger was not a quality digit. The machine was very responsive and I needed to click with one hand holding the pointed mouse and the other doing the click or double click. If I continued in my old fashion pages would appear and disappear into the ether randomly.

Connie came to visit and determined that I needed high speed internet and she would make the phone calls to make that happen. Hughes could not come immediately but they would be there Wednesday to mount the new satellite dish. I now have three. I can beam up to the closest asteroid any time I wish.

The installer was very pleasant, but left me with incorrect information so I couldn't register the satellite. I assumed it was my fault or my faulty digits and decided to wait for Connie to come again. Thanksgiving week she came and put me out of my misery. She is infinitely patient and deals with "push one", "push two" better than I.

John kindly set up this blog as following Google's very simple rules made me break out in a rash. The last three days have been spent changing my e-mail address.