Tag: tecnology

Saturday’s Wandering Thoughts

My computer was struck by one of those scams that declare my computer was infected. Which was BS. Easy enough to spot them because they’re a phishing effort to get you to download something or call someone, and they put multiple popups up. Anyone who has dealt with a true anti-virus program and a real virus knows that’s not how these things go down.

Anyway, I use several browsers on my ‘puter. This one struck Chrome. That made it easier to get rid of. Just a quick and simple reset took care of that. Worse part of that was the time it took to reset, and it signed me out of everything. But those are small struggles compared to the annoyance of having those fake things trying to instill fear in me. See, that’s how they play: trying to make you afraid of what has happened.

Just like at a Trump rally.

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Sunday’s Wandering Thought

He needed to iron a shirt. Short sleeve. Cotton. Button up.

Been so long since he’d ironed a shirt. Used to do it almost every day in the military and quite often when he was in marketing. New materials and different work activities and standards had lessened requirements to iron.

He was still using their thirty-year-old iron. Why not? It works. He figured smart irons have finally arrived, though what a smart iron would do, he doesn’t know. Probably robot irons have arrived, too, just give it the shirt and it’ll know what to do. But he had to manually do it, setting up the little board and then plying seams, collar, yoke, sleeves, and most treacherous of all for him, the placket with steam and heat to make it all look unwrinkled.

After all that, he didn’t wear the shirt. Oh, well. It’d be ready for next time.

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The Goal

I’m swearing about modern technology again. It’s all so easy, so taken for granted, they have groomed me to complain.

Today’s target is my Fitbit. It needs recharged, again. Every few days, this takes place. I wear the thing almost 24/7, removing it only to save it from the showers. The rest of time finds it hugging my right wrist, monitoring my activity. Sure, it sends me an email when it needs recharged. That email arrives at 1:30 to 2:00 AM. I supposed, if I’m more rigorously disciplined and attentive, I can train myself to check it each night when I’ve reached my goal and see how much remains on the charge. Yeah, I could, but I’m lazy.

“It wouldn’t need to be recharged so much if you didn’t keep using it,” my wife observes.

A growl is given back. This is not time for humor. Charging the fitbit means removing it from my wrist and waiting while it charges. While it charges, I’m not collecting steps. My goal each day is twelve miles. It’s a new goal every morning, achieved every night. No, I haven’t walked it, didn’t run it, swim it, bike it; it’s an accumulation of twelve miles of activities, twelve miles achieved each day, something tangible.

Writing is different. I use word counts as mileposts but they don’t matter. I may have added words but the novel isn’t finished. I’m not certain how close to being done it is. I have guesses which makes sense, but I know, even when it’s ‘done’, it isn’t done. It needs revised and edited. Even then, it’s not done. It’s not published, not finalized in some concrete form. Until it reaches that final moment, it remains a work in progress. It’s like going from Earth to Mars; it’s gonna take a while.

So, I pursue my twelve miles every day, a goal established each morning, something achieved each night, something to make me feel good, damn it.

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Mysterious Ol’ Facebook

A small mid-morning rant, category: technology.

Facebook notifications won’t load/display this morning. After playin’ with it five minutes as I sipped coffee and doing a few searches for fixes, I shrugged it away and reported it. Not a big deal, really.

After reporting it and sending a screen shot, I noticed my FB support inbox was showing four new messages. I opened it.

None were new. One was over sixteen months old. They were all about my violations of their community standards. They’re a laugh.

One was a Bored Panda post I’d shared about people working from home and dealing with their dogs. This affronted Facebook’s spam standards.

Whaaat? They don’t want me to share humorous animal stories because they’re ‘spam’? Geez, I think I’ve been using FB wrong lo’ these many years.

Two others were messages updating me about my protests. They’d blocked two others because they violated their community standards. I’d appealed. These were notices that they were wrong, and had restored the posts. Well, good for me. Good for FB.

The fourth was an appeal I’d put in about another post they’d removed. They were reviewing it and would get back to me soon. Dated June 12, 2019, I figured their idea of ‘soon’ and mine doesn’t match.

Now, the most interesting thing is that the notifications that I can’t see on FB, I can see when I’m in my FB support inbox. Intrigued, I went back to FB and attempted to see the notifications through various feeds. No go. But the push notifications still pop up and load.

Well, it’s modern technology, innit? When it works, it’s great. When it fails, it’s a big friggin’ mystery. In the ol’ days, we’d clean the cache, or reboot, or sumpin’. I’m going to have more coffee, and see if that takes care of it.

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