Welcome to my blog, or should I say to the ramblings of an old man. I doubt that my ramblings are of much value, but at least I have an opportunity to share them.  So, please be kind and humor me. If nothing else of value stands out in these thoughts, I hope that you at least sense the value I place on a daily walk with the Lord.  That walk is what has provided me with motivation and a sense of purpose throughout my lifetime.  My prayer is that you, too, are experiencing this direction and joy in daily living which is available to everyone who puts his trust in Christ.  So, thanks again for joining me.  Please don't go without leaving some comments here so I can get to know you better as our paths intersect today in this blog.

Monday, September 13, 2010

Frustration

I love doing things with computers. If I were 50 years younger I think I would become a computer major and maybe be a programmer or web designer. But that is another story. Sometimes computers can also create frustration. When I retired I bought a laptop and a desktop computer - the laptop is over five years old and my desktop is older. They have worked well without any problems all of these years. I used a special piece of software on both to keep records of individual contributions at church. I have about 400 individual accounts stored in the software. It has worked very well and is easy to use. Unfortunately, a few years ago, Apple updated its chips and operating systems and the old Classic system needed for my software will not work on the new computers. Also, the software is not available for the new operating system. In the meantime, I was saving for new computers since I feared that one day my old ones would crash because they were getting old and were used very hard. In July I went ahead and purchased a new modern laptop and a new modern desktop. My plan was to keep the older two computers and use them just for the church software and backups. Good plan. But, a week after my purchase, the old desktop crashed and needed a new logic board. I felt that I had to have it repaired to maintain my ability to have a back-up. I bit the bullet and shelled out $650. Then, while at Pinebrook, my printer died. I was able to purchase a compatible refurbished printer on the internet only to find that while it would print out my church reports, it printed them so slowly that it would probably take me many weeks to print out the final individual reports for the year. So I went on ebay and bid on a used model like the one that had died. I won and I was excited when my $40 purchase came, only to find that it was defective. I finally was able to return it and get my $40 back, but it cost me $20 to send it back. Then I went shopping again and finally found a new one on ebay at a cost of $120. It works and is great. Problem solved - not really. Now my old laptop has begun crashing. I've had it to Apple twice to be diagnosed and they can't find the problem. Today they suggested reloading all of my system software to see if that might solve the problem. I guess I need to do that, but right now I am afraid to try it. I just might just mess everything up and be in a worse situation. So far, just to keep being able to use the church software, I have shelled out "only" $800 and the problem still isn't corrected. Then add to that the cost of my two new computers and a printer - I really don't want to think about it. Actually, if I could start all over, for about $700 I could have just purchased new software. And with all the time I've spent on solving this problem, I probably could have entered the 400 records and giving information for eight months in the new software. Well, maybe not. As I said, I love doing things with computers ... except for spending money to keep them going. But on the bright side, I have learned quite a bit in this little adventure. But did I really want to learn it?

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