TECHNO MELTDOWN - THE SEQUEL

BEWARE! YOU ARE ABOUT TO ENTER TECHNO HELL - PART 1 - APRIL 13 

There are days when its probably better to take a hint that you are about to enter a day of Techno Hell. Today seems to have begun this way for me. I am going to pay attention and take a break from my computer, unplug various devices and appliances and hope that later in the day, things return to normal.

Last night I didn't have a television signal. I had been moving the t.v. stand, DVD players etc. and had unplugged and replugged most of the cords to try and untangle some of the spaghetti wires which had looped around each other. Therefore, I thought I'd either forgotten to plug something back in or the cable company line was down. The latter was a distinct possibility because of the way the cable box was reacting.

Naturally, since I am the type of person who will only read the instructions of a manual as a last resort - these being translated from Chinese or Japanese anyway - trial and error and a call to a number of techno. wizards in my family, usually helps me to solve whatever technical freakiness I encounter.

This morning, I decided to try again, by myself and amazingly on my first try, by moving one plug and taking a lucky guess about where to plug it into another spot on the back of the television, I had a t.v. again.

I next tried to tackle the email pileup and write back to someone in the U.S.
I thought I'd reply with a brief note and then attach a note about some things going on here. This, which should have been pretty simple, since I am not that advanced anyway in techno. things, was not. In a couple of minutes I had reduced the entire text to 10% of the size it should be.

I am happy to say that I do learn from my mistakes and although this was a new techno. mess and differed slightly in that I had never reduced things to such a small size, I tried expanding the text size and was back to normal fairly soon.

People pass on words of wisdom. Should you find yourself having trouble with your computer, cell phone, ipod or any other devices, call up your niece or nephew. Whether they are 8 or 18, they will wrack their brains to visualize the model of your ancient machine and walk you through verbally to a fix. Rarely will they tell you to call a service man or have to rush down to physically soothe your, or your computers frazzled nerves.

Meanwhile, if you recognize you are entering techno. hell and suspect that your boffins are busy and won't be available if you get into trouble, it is wise to take a break and spare yourself an extra visit to hours of guaranteed frustration.

P.S. By the way, after a long break doing other things and upon writing a lot more, I was only reducing the text to 25% of its size, once or twice. It could have been worse.

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TECHNO MELTDOWN - THE SEQUEL - PART 2 - Mid May 2013

It seems I didn't know when I had it good. Also about a month of fairly normal computer operation had lured me into a false sense of security. I should have been more careful. April's techno. troubles were just a small blip compared to this week.

First, my wireless headset through which I listen to music and watch t.v. in the middle of the night decided to die, even after a new cord was connected between the t.v. and the remote transmitting thing. The now ancient headset already half shot, naturally continued to work anyway, as is often the case.

Shortly after my computer screen looked like seismic waves had taken over. Naturally my cable company could not help but suggested a new media card might be needed. When my technical help arrived, of course, it temporarily worked perfectly. This gave us a chance to backup the computer contents onto a USB, and switch to using the laptop for most things.

The actual computer died a couple of days later and a new one is coming to replace it. I was given a new wireless keyboard and mouse too.

This pretty well was a four day set of breakdowns culminating with a router dying, fifteen minutes before a final bid on an eBay auction, naturally after midnight, was due for something my young niece really wanted. This latter means right now the modem is hooked up to the laptop.

In short, I needed a new a new wireless headset which I bought, and I finally bought a new laserjet printer (which I had been doing without after one gift after another and a new one had not worked, last year).
 
Thank God I have a technical genius available for such techno meltdowns and he can make himself available in a reasonable time.