Progress Report

It is week two of installing and learning the ins and outs of my new computer, and I realize that I will not live long enough to learn it all. Between the iPhone, iMac, and all the supporting programs that make the machine useful to me I’ve lost my voice from screaming at them.

I began using a Grammarly program to punctuate better and write more clearly. It needed an update. I did the update, but it bonged me because the Word program I use also required updating. Excuse me? I clicked the link to take me there without any other recourse but to update Word. It is good that Bill Gates no longer works there and lives in a very private place with tons of security because I would be convicted of murder if he wasn’t protected. Why? I’ll tell you. Since I have regularly had to update my Word 365 program, I mistakenly clicked on re-register instead of as a new customer. Then, the fun began. I got into a circular argument about my wrong password or username. I chased and chased using every user name I usually use with every password I have ever used with Microsoft, and all of them failed. All I want to do is give you money for the privilege of using your valuable knowledge, and you give me shit about my passwords! Thank God, Lovely called me to have dinner. I left the room and did not return until this morning. The first thing on my list was to update my Word program so I could then update my brand new Grammarly program and maybe do something productive.

I went to Microsoft directly and used their online order system this time. I defied them by claiming to be a new customer, thinking their AI would treat me more kindly. It worked. I went through as a new customer using my old username without a password. One difference from yesterday was they quoted 69 dollars for WORD 365, but today it was $79.

My future is uncertain, as I look forward to learning how Microsoft has cleverly hidden all of its standard features behind new buttons on new pages to do the same old things. Only then will I finally be able to update Grammarly and attempt to master the wizardly world of English grammar as presented by Grammarly AI.

Hello, Pizza Hut?

Technology is Good?

Finally, after more than a week, I have my new computer working to a degree. No doubt, it will take me the rest of my lifetime to figure it out. Strangely, it has the same look and feel as the Iphone I use. That of course is purposeful. More people than ever are using their phones to do all of their business. My problem with computers is crime. The computer age has developed a new form of crime associated with people using them to do their personal business, and even their work related business. I am not one of those. It seems my work life came to an end about twenty years ago when the pocket computer age began ramping up.

Stand Your Ground: What if I shot my computer? | Cutler Bay Community News#

My biggest problem with understanding the new PC’s is the need for passwords. It won’t be long before we will need passwords between every word we type. Although I understand the need for password protection, I personally feel the companies are going about implementing security in the wrong direction. Instead of having to issue new usernames and passwords for each device and every new application you choose to use, the gurus of silicone should learn to use their own technology, so endearingly titled Artificial Intelligence, as a vehicle for keeping criminals out of our computers. Or, maybe they can’t do that because the Artifical Intelligence they so proudly proclaim will take over the world isn’t so intelligent after all.

For the past week I found myself chasing my tail like a whirling dervish on program after program trying to find a way to use this machine. They (I assume there are thousands of, bright young nerds residing within the machine) ask for a user name, then a password. Then, they reject one or the other without indicating which is the culprit. Out of desperation I click on “forgot password” and the next revolution of tail chasing begins. I finally ended the chase by dialing Apple and begging for help. An energetic young lady with a heavy Asian accent began issuing instructions. After relinquishing control of my computer screen to her, she was quickly able to direct me to the various buttons I needed to resolve the problem.

Having solved one problem, I directed her to another, and after the third problem, I noticed an impatience on her part to help. We finally parted ways and she told me to call again if I needed more help.

Today, I turned on the new computer fully intending to resolve any password issues on my own, only to be stopped in my tracks when the screen lit up. I touched the button to give it my fingerprint, and that triggered a response asking for a password. I proudly typed in the one password I had memorized for this machine and WHAT???? The gremlin within announced that either my username or password was incorrect.

GO TO HELL APPLE, THIS IS THE LAST COMPUTER I WILL EVER BUY FROM YOU!!!

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Aloneness

Dreams, dreams, dreams, what do they mean, and where do they come from? This morning, after my 6 a.m. pit stop and return to bed, I fell into a deep sleep that was not deep enough to black out dreams. In fact, that early morning second sleep seems to be conducive to dreaming wild ones. I haven’t worked for a living for twenty-two years, yet I saw myself doing what a Chief Engineer does: manage people, discuss solutions to technical problems, and create new products when they come to the desk. The level of my activity was intense.

Then, the dream fast-forwarded to a time when the company decided to move my division to another part of the world. I was no longer doing things a Chief Engineer normally does. I was doing nothing, except purging my paper files to reduce records to what would be necessary for the foreigners to operate, which is nothing in my experience. My staff was down to a secretary, and a few engineers left to manage the move of our stuff to Singapore.

I kept coming to work, and there was less to do each day and fewer people. I saw my desk with the PC atop, but the bookcase, and conference table with chairs were gone, as was the side chair to my desk. The wall was barren of the white board where I drew sketches on countless new projects and outlined myriads of projects, but the clean space was conspicuously still there. I sat staring at a computer, waiting for some emergency from the production floor to need my attention. Behind the wall, the production floor was empty for one lonely molding machine pushing out parts automatically without any human intervention. We had to build an inventory of this part number to cover the time that the machine and mold were on a six week fast boat to the Far East.

I came in the next morning, and my desk and PC were gone, and in the corner of the office lay a pile of miscellaneous clothes from the now-empty closet. I began to daydream about the forty years I spent in this space and all the seemingly important activities I had immersed myself in to feel important while neglecting my wife and kids in the name of making a living. I was all alone in an empty office, in an empty building, my wife dead long before, and my kids dispersed all about the country, earning a living for themselves. I was feeling sadness even though I was sleeping.

The dream didn’t end there. The sadness continued to overwhelm me, but time had moved on. I was now sitting in my car parked in front of the apartment building that I looked at for years from my office window. However, the office was no longer there. In its place stood a six-unit, three-story condo building. Behind this new apartment where the factory once took up 50 acres of land there was now streets and sewers, and power poles. There was not a shred of evidence that there once existed upon this land a living breathing factory that employed thousands of people twenty-fours hours a day to make simple electrical products used by electricians around the world. The sadness kept getting stronger and deeper, and my brain finally began to sense sounds coming from the house, water running, the aircon blower spinning, and I told myself to kill the sadness, get up, and take a walk.
Here I sit, mid-day still feeling blue about life in the past that I can’t change.

Commercial Suicide

The world has truly gone crazy. I have a very hard time believing that so many companies are being duped by governments around the planet. Their commitment to company suicide is admirable but assinine. It surprised me when I heard car company after car company climbing onto the bandwagon of switching to electric cars. Have they gone mad?

Actually, when Henry Ford began making cars, he had no idea where the gasoline would come from. There were no gas stations around the country to supply fuel to the suckers who jumped at the chance to buy a motorized wagon. In the movie Field of Dreams, there is a famous line “Build it and they will come.” I guess the entire world now operates on that philosophy. It is not a bad directive, but I would like to believe that there has to be a tiny bit more behind investing billions of dollars in a technology that is still years away from fruition. I give Elon Musk credit for sticking his neck out to build electric cars, but I don’t give GM, Ford, Chrysler, Mercedes, Volkswagen, and the many other car company’s any credit for rushing into this scheme built on the phenomenon of global warming being caused by humans. Yes, global warming can happen but it is far beyond our capabilities to make it so.

My intention with this post is to add to this fray of commercial suicide. I am proposing two of my designs for electric cars free to the world for use by humanity. Both are just as viable as the cars Musk and others are producing. In fact, these designs may be more reliable and cheaper to build than those in current production.

Design number one.

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