Just when I should be screaming "no more computers," I buy another one. But, you see, I had no servicable laptop. Don't you see?

I thought FFP might say that we'd do OK without one on the trip we will make soon. We would have, too. I happily went to Berlin last year and to Denver without one. We did fine in New York after the VERY old one I tried to make into a Ethernet-ready IE machine (nothing more) lost its hard drive on the trip up. I did fine getting on my relative's computers in Denver and doing without on the drives and the visit to the heart of sandness in W. Texas. Sometimes, though, FFP wants to have easy access to e-mail to resolve work stuff. I'd even checked out our providers ability to auto-reply and the location of Internet cafe places. Our hotel would probably have had an arrangement or claimed to have. But I also told FFP that I could buy an adequate refurb machine for $775 and it would include a CD burner, 256MB memory, a 10 gig hard drive and a license for WIN2K as well as a NIC. With free PCMCIA (the NIC is on a mini-PCMCIA) slots so a wireless card could be added.

"Do it," was his answer. My thought was that I really wanted a light laptop with a DVD player and USB 2.0 (this one does have a USB 1 and it's perfectly adequate for my camera). I kept shopping for laptops and then thinking the price was too hight for something that the security people were probably going to knock around. I considered buying one with a massive hard drive instead of the desktop machine that I bought recently. (My idea of the ultimate downsizing is to have only laptops with perhaps large flat panel displays added for home.)

Mr. Notebook is a local joint that has all kinds of used and refurbed stuff. They give you 90 days on parts and labor and will work on the thing as long as you own it. It's a hole-in-the-wall place near campus with sparce parking. There are stacks of computers in for repairs, stacks of old miscellaneous accesories. A couple of counters with the machines they sell running. The nerds there can spout a ton of techo-talk at you. I'm not very competent with all this stuff. I just didn't want to pay $1000 plus. When, really, if we could get access to the WEB, we could do most of what we wanted.

I went by the place after my workout, before lunch. A guy named Jeremy helped me. I went back after lunch and asked for him, figuring they might work on commission. He fixed me up and tested everything. Good thing because the mini-PCMCIA was just a modem and the price promised the NIC which was essential to me. He replaced it and even showed me the IPCONFIG on their network before turning it over.

So, anyway, I ended up installing some other software and my camera setup and all because, well, the hard drive was there. We use Netscape for mail (to dodge the viruses that afflict Outlook and because we are used to it). So I downloaded the latest Netscape. I loaded up Dreamweaver/Fireworks Studio V4 from a license I no longer use. I configured FTP info and mail stuff.

That's all I really do, isn't it? Configure stuff. Install stuff. Set up network sharing. Test stuff. Back up stuff. I never write. Or for that matter, work on graphics projects, write programs, surf the WEB for information, create WEB pages or do online learning. Never is too strong, of course. I do this journal. But that's hardly worthy of all the money spent, is it? Of course, FFP does use the equipment to some degree and he makes money thereby. We charge off some bit of it to the company.

But it's funny how dependent we become on computers. Needing our e-mail, our WEB searches, desperate to put our thoughts into WEB ether, or to write a Microsoft Word doc or to check our bank or credit card balances. But they are such demanding children.

 

 

 

 

 

.

Buying computer stuff gives me a knot in my gut, but otherwise OK. Physically, I'm fine.