Old Dog, New Tricks

This is Tiger Leaping Gorge. I am goiing to mix metaphors -- tigers are, of course grander than old dogs, it's nicer to compare onself to a foolish, over-confident tiger than a mangy old dog. The tiger tried to leap the river which is only barely visible at the bottom {a very early part of the Yantze} -- he didn't make it. An island in the river marks where he fell.

So what am I talking about? Last week I installed MSWord on this Apple computer since the text edit program is very limited - doesn't even number pages. I am not a stranger to Word, it's the program I've used at work for a long time but I've never had to do the formating or learn the meaning of all the icons, etc. It's not so much a WHOLE new thing as an intricacy I have to learn -- and I will gradually as I need to do different functions. I've delayed several days, as is my habit with something new. But I've just written a document that will need serious editing so I'll learn more about cutting and pasting and so on.

New tricks in a way, or being a tiger and thinking I'm fully capable of jumping across that river ... maybe I am. That's to be seen. Once people "of a certain age" could settle into their old familiar ways, fall asleep in the rocking chair and do nothing more challenging than bouncing grand or great-grand children on their knees. That's almost impossible today nor do most of us want to ... there are things to learn, challenges to face, gorges to leap ... it helps if we've learned to swim -- many of use can, in fact, take very good care of ourselve.

Genius

Well, what a pain! I just wrote a perfectly nice post, had it all done and then got curious and clicked the little "more" at the bottom of this screen. My post disappeared because I hadn't published it -- wanted to find out what the "more" might tell me ... This is an example of why I need the "genius" i talked to today. He was in his 20s, dark haired, patient and helpful, he was at the chic Apple store in Soho. {really neat architecture!]

I have a Procare contract for a year of tutoring, once a week. It got interrupted with the China trip and then the hip fiasco. But today I had some big needs [to purchase Word so I can get back to writng about TCB in a format that allows editing as the kindergarten Apple Script/Text Edit does not.] And to find out more about the intricacies of this blog program. As he answered my questions and deftly, quickly, adroitly clicked on the proper things and knew the lingo and labels, I realized something finally: I fundamentally believe machines are all dumb. It's the kick the Coke machine if it takes your money and doesn't drop down a Coke. But, in fact, all computers today are smart enough to tell you what to do IF you read their messages and symbols and actually expect there to be messages. I fail at both. I don't scan the screen for the messages, hints and so on because I don't expect them to be there. So I've got to keep in mind that the computer is working WITH me -- a fundamental difference.

I may eventually have a list of links in the sidebar, which I think I'm learning to do ... not tonight ... I can only process so much technical info at one time. I think I understand it. I'll experiment in the next day or two ... I fundamentally don't like to rush into such things. To young people it's like playing around, to me it's like practicing scales as I learn to sing, since I have a deep belief that I have a horrible singing voice even the scales are terribly daunting. This is a woman whose first ATM card expired before I got around to seeing how it worked in the machine ... however, I now do 90% of my banking with an ATM card. I CAN change, it just takes time.