Talk about your upgrades
Did you miss me?
I had a good excuse. I bought a new computer
and had the flu. I know. You get the latter, but not the former.
It's like this. Ever get a new motorcycle?
Or a power mower? Or a really gorgeous girlfriend? Then you know
my problem: too much power, not enough skill. I was completely
overwhelmed by this new supercomputer, yet I couldn't keep my
hands off my mouse.
I ordered it on a Thursday and it arrived
the next day in two large boxes delivered from the UPS guy at
10 a.m. I had everything assembled by 11 a.m. By noon, I crashed
the system. I didn't get the "sad Mac" face or the
"chimes of death" or even the "cherry bomb"
system error. I got the "hand with the middle finger upraised."
My computer told me to get fucked.
No problem. Just reinstall the system.
Which I did. Three times that day. Twice the next day. And once
a day the next three days. I tried system 7.5, system 7.5.3,
system 7.5.5 and finally system 7.6.1. And each system gave me
the same response: fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.
I was waiting for a message to flash on
the screen: YOU ARE TOO FUCKING STUPID TO OWN A COMPUTER!
Then I got the flu. That was Tuesday.
It got worse on Wednesday. I felt better on Thursday, but still
bad enough to use it as an excuse to miss my column deadline.
On Friday, I felt great. Good enough to
call the Apple support line.
"I think my floppy drive's out."
"Sure. We'll try a few things. Could
you hold a minute?"
He put me on hold and I got the opportunity
to listen to the Dave Matthews Band. I think I heard him talking
to some other Apple techie in the background. I think he said,
"This guy's too fucking stupid to own a computer,"
but I might be wrong.
He got back on the phone and asked me
to perform some contortions on the keyboard.
"Okay, reboot, but this time hold
down the command key, the P key, and the R key."
Sure, I can do that. Would you like me
to speak pig Latin in Chinese?
It didn't work. My floppy drive was still
out.
"Hold on and I'll connect you with
a technician."
"Sure," I said. Now I get a
technician? What was he, a therapist?
Another voice got on the phone.
"Well, Mr. Jasper, we're going to
have an Austin technician give you a call in a while." Then
he hung up.
I'll give it a week, I thought, then I'll
call them back. After all, only my floppy drive is broken. The
rest of my computer is humming along fine. Who needs a floppy
drive anyway? It's like ordering cable and finding out you can't
get the local access channels. It'd be nice, but it's HBO I want.
Amazingly, I got a call ten minutes later.
The guy said he could come out Monday and fix my floppy drive.
We were on for 11 a.m. at MY place.
So he shows up on Monday and I'm wondering
what this is going to cost me?
"You have on-site service through
your Apple warranty," he says.
Great. I show him the computer, and he
cracks it open like a walnut.
"So you believe me?" I asked.
"I mean... you don't think it might be a system problem,
do you?"
He gave me a look. Do I have to tell you
what I thought he was thinking?
"No, if the floppy drive isn't reading
your disks, it's busted. I'll just replace it."
Fifteen minutes later, it's all fixed.
And now here I am, writing my column at three in the morning
on the shiny new machine, barely making my deadline... just like
when I used my old black & white Mac Classic II.
But I ain't got no Classic II no more
-- I've got power!
I am now the proud owner of a new Macintosh
8600 with 200 MHz, 32MB ram, 2MB VRam, a 17-inch Sony monitor
(I was thinking about a 20-incher, but I was afraid I'd hurt
myself), 12X CD Rom, 2GB hard drive and a 100 MB Zip Drive.
I feel like Tim Allen.
After the computer technician left, I
spent the next hour opening and closing applications. It's amazing.
PageMaker used to take 90 seconds to open on my Classic II. Now
I can pull it up in six seconds flat. MS Word, six seconds, Netscape
Navigator 3.1 in four seconds, Aldus Freehand, five seconds.
I've timed it. Several times.
I got on Netscape and cruised the web.
First, I looked at my website. Did you know that it was mostly
black and white?
Not any more. I've added blue. And off-white.
And a little magenta.
If it were socially acceptable, I'd use
nothing but magenta.
Don't worry. I have no intention of becoming
a graphics guru on the web. I'm still going to cater to the poor
schmuck who owns a Mac Classic II. The pages will come up fast
and look good on black and white.
Besides, I'm not an artist. I'm a writer.
Still... tonight I got entranced by the
colors of the web. Blues and greens and magenta, loads of magenta.
I saw websites that featured sounds and animation. I sent America
On Line e-mail with green backgrounds and gold handwriting. I...
was... so... gauche. I downloaded games. I downloaded utilities.
I downloaded sounds. I downloaded graphics. I downloaded pictures
of horses. I downloaded pictures of naked women. I downloaded
pictures of naked women with horses (they must have been horses).
Then it struck me... I'd like to download
a pizza and a pint of Newcastle. Why not? You can download my
column, print it out, and kablamo -- you got the real thing.
My words on the printed page. So why can't I download beer and
a pizza? We need better peripherals. Something that's a cross
between a printer and a microwave. Is this too much to ask? I
think not.
Limitations. Always limitations. And it's
not just with technology, it's with me. Here I am, clicking away
on a new extended keyboard and it's now 3:30 a.m. Tomorrow's
Turkey Day and I'm late, late, late. Technology isn't my problem.
I am my problem.
I need to upgrade my brain.
I did it once before. In the mid-eighties
I upgraded my entire system with the SSU English Degree 3.7 (SSU
stands for Sonoma State University, but I think Microsoft bought
them out last year.) That worked all right for a while, but some
of my system extensions conflicted, particularly Pot Enabler
1.0.1. Sure, Pot Enabler enhanced my multi-media capabilities,
but it slowed the system way down. I needed more speed. The new
source I was using, Java In The Morning, helped, but I needed
more power. So in the mid-80s, after college and during what
I like to call my income-producing-years, I inserted a Cocaine
Accelerator.
I know what you're thinking. Sure, it
gives the system a kick, but what about the expense? What about
the maintenance? Not to mention the conflicts with the Penis
Extension, which is one extension you just can't throw in the
trash. (Some system administrators have simply cut it off, but
then it wasn't their hardware was it?)
My ram is good. I can call up a lot of
applications at the same time. I can run Writer Guy 2.2, Singer-Songwriter
44.0, and even funzy things like Lover 6.9 and Cigar Smoke Plus,
but damn, my hard drive is shot. I go to get my work from storage
and I got to tell you... it's not all there. It needs, what,
an optimizer? I can definitely use a faster CPU and I don't even
want to talk about my Zip Drive in public.
Thank god my floppy drive still works.
* * *
STANDARD DISCLAIMER: This column aims to be funny. If you can read anything else into it, you're on your own. Copyright 1997 by Mike Jasper.
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