Reading

I can stop harping on about the internet and the Mac now. All fixed. It’s time to retire off the old PC and get to love the Mac.

I’ve been reading my first draft. I made the gargantuan mistake of reading Kate Atkinson’s One Good Turn at the same time. Not simultaneously, obviously, because that would be impossible. During the day when I was working I read my draft and then when I’d stopped work I’d read One Good Turn. Talk about inferiority complex. I got quite depressed.

When I finished One Good Turn (particularly loved the opening scenes) I started Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. This is a futuristic, YA novel set in a dystopian US, way out of my genre but one of the blogs I read (I’m sorry I don’t know which one) recommended it as a good example of tension on every page. Son had read it and I like to keep up a bit with what he enjoys so I put it on my pile to read, not really thinking I’d get around to it. Yesterday, I picked it up and started it but it was so… well, not my thing that after a few pages I thought I’d just read a bit to have a look at the way Collins had achieved the tension … and do you know only a few pages later, before I knew it, I couldn’t put it down.

Isn't it funny how a book can creep up on you like that?

Internet fairies fail to show up

I declared yesterday ‘sorting out internet day.’

I’ve scanned the internet and there seem to be a number of Apple Macs falling off the internet but no apparent diagnosis. Because I have a PC sitting next to it, which ISN’T falling off the wifi I know it’s the Mac. Both our January visitors had Macs which did the same thing.

I was home all day for engineers to call so I put the problem in the hands of the management office who have a contract with the service provider – and after all, who we are paying for ‘internet service.’ As a result ‘sorting out internet day’ flew by; nobody called and I still have no internet on my Mac. Lots of lovely wifi airwaves whirling around in the air but none of them attaching themselves to the new computer.

While I was in the management office, I picked up a parcel. It was a garganuan pile of post from our house in the UK and was posted on 9th December! While I waited for the internet fairies to come I got all of that post dealt with. After five years of living in Bangkok, I finally got around to changing my address at the UK bank. I’m a firm believe that if you leave your paperwork in a ‘To Do’ pile for long enough, much of it can be put straight in the bin when you finally get around to dealing with it.

Today I woke and in a Groundhog kind of way, declared the day ‘sorting out internet day.’ Then I had a stroke of genius – they don’t happen often – and googled the name of the wifi repeater we have. Doh; they only work on Window OS. I still don’t have internet, but at least now I know why.

"Could do better"

I’m all cackhanded.

I haven’t been able to make a total switch the new MacBook Pro because I’m inept I hadn’t got the right software on it.

I am a bit ham-fisted too. I only have enough brain power either to write or use the Mac. Now that the four travel articles have been done and it’s only the edits I’m dealing with – which are going well – it’s crunch time.

I’ve got Scrivener installed – almost my sole reason for wanting a Mac – and yesterday I got all the other essential software organised. I need Microsoft Office because the children use it and we’re constantly passing work back and forwards. Most important though was Photoshop. I learned it so that I could prepare photos for the website I worked on. Honestly, the website software, Dreamweaver, left me likely to commit heinous crimes, but Photoshop? I fell in love. This 2007 example of my procrastination Photoshop skills is one of my all time favourites.

So all I need to do now is transfer the files from PC to Mac and work out why Mac keeps falling off the internet while PC doesn’t.

And then *gulp* it’s Mac time only.

Uhming and Ahhing

The first computer I ever had was an Amstrad. Boyfriend (now Husband) knew that buying the Amstrad was a mistake; he was using Apple Macs in the laboratories, but they weren't offering students interest free loans to buy Macs. I think lovingly of that Amstrad because I typed my dissertation on it. This was a lot less work for me than it was for my peers because I could type. I had learned to type in a gap year between school and university.

My Amstrad further endeared itself to me by having a primitive spell check. You couldn't add anything to its dictionary, but I didn't know other computers could do that so I was none the wiser. I forget the title, but my dissertation was about the Jason and Medea myth, so there were plenty of Greek names that got highlighted. Every time it checked my spelling it would pick up the word Argonauts and ask if I wanted it changed to Arsonists. Oh, I laughed every time.

I got a job using an Amstrad immediately after University but fairly swiftly moved onto PCs. I used them for years with word processing packages like Word Perfect, Microsoft Works and finally MS Word. At home we had a PC but it was boyfriend/Husband's since I couldn't see for the life of me what anyone would do with a computer.

Finally I went to work at a university where I discovered Macs. Reader, I fell in love. But we couldn't afford a Mac and anyway Boyf/Husb had a PC and they couldn't talk to each other in those days so it would have been daft. We stayed with PCs because they were cheaper and easy to build and upgrade. I'd kinda got used to them.

Until recently.

Both our January guests had Macs. In that mad 21st century way in the evenings we sat in our 'family room' with our laptops on our … well, our laps; and talked, showed each other youtube funnies, listened to inspiring TED talks, updated our blogs and facebook and emailed our friends. We saw the Apples in use. God, they are so sexy.

Husband and I began to think about buying a Mac. My current laptop was showing signs of wear and tear. We ahhmed and ahhed; I emailed my computer guru, Andrew, and to my surprise he said 'yes, but it must be a macbook pro' so I said 'let's do it' and then I'd look up some reviews on the internet, think of the reality and say 'No! Don't.' I went through that process over and over and then finally said, 'Oh FI, let's just do it.'

So here I am. I reckon this is how my mum feels every time we try to teach her to use a computer. I'm confused, cack-handed and struggling. I have two left feet and am all fingers and thumbs. I can hardly do anything. I had to buy a book 'Apple Macs for Very Slow People' which is helping a tiny bit.

I played with the Mac, whooshing my fingers up and down the tracker pad, watching those sexy icons do their dance but whenever I wanted to do something I had to use the PC. I had to think so hard about what I was doing on the Mac, that I hadn't got enough brain space left to think about the task I was trying to do. *Sigh* Eventually I realised I would never get comfortable with the Mac unless I actually started using it and now, step by infinitesimal step, I am getting there.