I just bought myself a NOOK. Cousin to the Kindle. I couldn’t wait to hold it in my hands, to turn it on and start reading.

The first book I downloaded was Jude Deveraux’s, Lavendar Morning. The second book I downloaded was Jude Deveraux’s, Days of Gold.

Sense a pattern?

I was concerned about purchasing the NOOK. Well, not about purchasing it, but about using it to read my books. I love cuddling up in the corner of my sofa with a cup of tea and a great read. Would I feel as connected to the story with an e-Reader? How could I? You can’t bury your face into it, you can’t smell the pages and you can’t fan through them either.

But so many of my friends are E-published and I wanted more than anything to take their books with me wherever I went so I could snuggle up and read. The NOOK surprised me. It’s not at all like reading a book via my laptop. That’s like working. The NOOK is the size of a book. I bought a case for it that opens like a book and I can hold it in my hands JUST LIKE A BOOK.

I have since downloaded… uploaded? …E-books I’ve previously purchased and stored on my computer. Now, I can proudly scan through the covers of my friend’s books. I can choose which one to read. Again. And best of all, I can carry all of those books with me wherever I go. They’re all neatly stored in a tiny file somewhere on my lovely little NOOK.

No. I can’t smell the pages, but I can flip through them. I can snuggle up and connect with the story the same as if I held a paperback in my hands. I will never give up my hardcopy books, but I’ve already fallen in love with my e-Reader.

Oh. And the case I bought for it contains a wonderful quote by G.K. Chesterton that sums it all up –
Literature is a luxury;
fiction is a necessity.

I used to play The Sims. Loved it. I loved being in the virtual world where I could create characters and control their lives… kinda like writing fiction.

I always treated my Sims fairly and never purposely caused them distress. Once, however, things went terribly wrong. My Sim character had just stepped out of the shower and dressed. Now, I don’t know about you. but I can’t dress after a shower unless I’m completely dry. Completely dry. Apparently that’s not so for The Sims. He left the bathroom and entered the living room where a lightbulb had burned out. And so, assuming he was dry, I had him change that bulb. And he was electrocuted.

Zapped! Fried! Burned and reduced to ashes! This horrible crackling sound came from his virtual living room. I sat stunned, my arms tingling with shock the same as my character tingled and trembled with an electrical current coursing through his tiny computer-generated physique. He turned from a ‘live’ being to a glowing skeleton to a pile of dust to an urn. An URN! In seconds it was over. A life I’d created instantly snuffed out by the apparent incompatibility of virtual water and virtual electricity. It was awful. His Sims wife sobbed by his urn… 

…and I sat there staring at the screen, feeling sick to my stomach and wondering why I’d chosen to play that stupid, addictive game in the first place.

I killed a Sim.

But I was never arrested for murder.

A woman in Japan, however, was not so lucky.

She, apparently, enjoyed virtual games the same as I. Her first mistake, however, was not playing privately but rather joining an online virtual community. Her second mistake was letting her virtual character in that community marry another virtual character.

It seems, at some point, her virtual DH decided he was done with her. Without warning, she went to her happy virtual home only to learn her character was no longer a married woman but a divorcee!

Furious, she used some pillow talk against her V-DH. He’d told her his secrets. Shared private and personal information with her. What did he share? Well… the virtual world’s equivalent of a social security number.

He shared his username and password!

Perfectly bringing ‘life’ to the expression hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, she logged in as him, took control of his character – her ex – and killed him.  Killed. Him.

The gory details were not made public, but suffice it to say, HE was stunned when he logged on and discovered his character was dead.

The woman was arrested and held without bond.

In fairness, I have to say she wasn’t arrested for murder, she was arrested for identity theft. Still, I’m willing to bet neither of them will take another virtual mate any time soon.

What a strange, strange world we live in.

It’s 8AM. Do you know where your virtual identities are?

You have to check it out. Google Maps has updated their ‘satellite view’ to see at street level. In fact, they now call it, ‘street view’. It’s a fascinating new way to map things but let me tell you, I found it a bit disturbing to see my own car in my own driveway that up close and personal on an globally accessible website.

Check it out. Google Maps. Put in an address of interest to you – your own, perhaps? – and see what comes up. The option for street view isn’t everywhere – YET – but there’s certainly plenty to see.

Aside from the creepy feeling of seeing my own home at street level, I did find pleasure in touring my country.

I visited Alaska, LA, Orlando and the New Orleans’ French Quarter. Honestly, touring New Orleans this way was very sad. I started off on Bourbon Street and checked out the buildings and imagined the scent and sound of the place. And then I skipped around and found homes still boarded up from Katrina’s wrath, assorted trailers and piles of debris at curb-sides. Very sad.

But also quite amazing. There I was sitting in my living room, daughter at my side, checking out the devastation – and the beauty – of a place hundreds of miles away. As if that were not amazing enough, I also toured France, Japan and Australia.

Google Maps street view. I’ve yet to make up my mind on this one. I’ve a feeling a love/hate relationship is on the horizon.

Go. Check it out… then let me know what you think.

I’ve had Yahoo as my homepage for ages. I’ve customized it to the T – with the colors I like, the content I want to see and the order in which I want to see it. My mail, local weather, lottery numbers and traffic reports are all right there at a glance. The news is there, too – front and center. World news, local news, political news and odd news. You name it, it’s there.

Until today, apparently.

Now, I’m all for keeping up with the times. I’d hate for anyone to be left in the dust as the world around us goes blooey on technology and such. However… when keeping up with the times means revamping everything I’m comfy-cozy with… well… that just pisses me off.

Yahoo? You’ve pissed me off. Royally.

They’ve revamped the entire page. Yes, I can customize it – but not to my specs. To theirs. With all the crap going on in the world, you’d think this ‘upgrade’ and ‘enhancement’ would be a trivial matter. Ah, but to me, having this constant, this simple place to visit each morning as a start to my day, was a comfort. A sign that at least something in the world was unchanged and familiar.

Alas… the unchanged and familiar is no longer so. Yahoo’s new homepage is busy with graphics, displaced modules, and advertisements. Instead of slowly waking to Yahoo news and other features of my pretty purple homepage, I’m greeted with a blitz of visual noise and confusion. So, how did I solve this problem? Well, I’ve reset my homepage from Yahoo’s main page to my inbox page. Yup. Yahoo mail is now my home page. Granted, I can’t see the news or other features but at least when I first go online, I’m not hit with that weapon of mass confusion.

I should probably make this blog my homepage… and in fact, if you soon see a Google search button somewhere over there to the right… well… you’ll know that’s just what I did.

Change? Yeah. Change is good. To a point. I expect at least some say in what that change might be and how it will affect me. I want options. I want choice. Yup. I suppose that sums it up. I’m simply a pro-choice kinda gal. 

Sorry Yahoo. You lose.

I wanted to blog about writing again today but I was almost unable to do anything online at all… in fact, my computer refused to boot up this morning. It took three attempts – two force shut-downs, three reboots with system scans and one final automatic system restore in order to get my computer going.

Here’s what’s been going on -

The night before last, a bunch of pop-ups took over my screen. They were all the same – blank web pages with “about:blank” in the address bar. Apparently, “about-blank” is a virus, adware, spyware or other hijacking program that somehow weaseled it’s way into my system. Even when I was off-line, the popups would pop up. Tens of them at first, then what seemed like hundreds.

I disconnected from the internet – shut down the wi-fi – and did all the scans I could think to do to rid my system of whatever bugs it had. Nothing seemed to work.

Yesterday, I downloaded some anti-spyware programs from the web – and yes, I was concerned that some of them might actually feed the virus rather than destroy it. I downloaded StopZilla, AdwareAway and Spyware Terminator (I hear Spyware Blaster is a good one to run, too). I ran all of those plus McAfee, Spybot and Adaware. Each program deleted something it called a “high” or “critical” threat. Done. I thought.

Then I had to take my cat to the vet – he’s been losing weight and there’s no explanation for it. He lost a pound at the last check up last week and another ounce and a half by yesterday. He has another appointment for next week to be weighed but was given one of his vaccinations yesterday. I took him home and he had a terrible reaction to it – never happened before and he’s now 11 years old. He was itchy. Itchy like you would not believe. Rolling, scratching, rippling his muscles looking like his skin was crawling. I rushed him back to the vet and he was given an antihistamine that should have knocked him out. It had the opposite affect. He started mewing and throwing up all over the place. And then he turned very aggressive. My sweet, affection kitty turned into the Looney Tunes version of the Tasmanian devil! He was panting and bolting through the house. His body got all puffed up like when a cat is ready to kill. And then he went after my smallest cat – Lady. He was biting and hitting her and she just fell to the floor in surrender. I had to fight to get him off of her. Finally, finally – about an hour later – he calmed and was my sweet, skittish boy again.

With all that, I didn’t even think about my computer. Or… about backing up my work. If you’re hearing the death march, I’m not surprised. The last time I backed up my work was about two weeks ago. If that.

This morning, the computer wouldn’t start and I thought for sure I’d lost everything. I don’t know to what point my system has been restored but it’s working now and I’m about to back up everything. Every. Thing. Then, I’m going to call the vet and tell him what happened to my cat last night. And THEN, I’m going to run all the scans I can run on my system and maybe even call in a pro.

“about:blank”. If you see it back up EVERYTHING and call someone who knows about computers. Don’t wait. Don’t try to fix it yourself. It’s sneaky. It hides in various files, renaming itself so your anti-virus or spyware detection programs cannot find it. It’s nasty and will make your life hell. I know this first hand.

We are at war in this house – the rebel MAC user vs. the stable PC user. Daughter is like a scout – a double agent – working both sides. Well, that’s how she started. Now, however, after being shown the evidence, she is wearing PC colors and fighting on the RIGHT side – the PC user’s side. 

And guess who uses the PC in this house.

Yes. That would be me.

Hubby, however, believes everyone should use a mac. I believe if everyone uses a mac, soon no one will use their brains because they’ll all turn to mush since using a MAC can drive you mad with very little effort. I know this because I’ve spent the past week trying to balance my NEED to use a MAC with my ease of using a PC, and ‘mad’ isn’t a strong enough word to describe its affect on me.

Daughter performed in a play last Friday at our end-of-year picnic with the homeschoolers. Hubby filmed the play and we promised to deliver copies of the film in a couple of days. Hubby had no idea I wanted to edit said video but thought we’d just copy the tape as is and send it on. Not a problem, really. He’s a professional photographer, so the unedited tape was good. My thought was to put titles and music on it just to make it fun, ya know?

Fun?

I have Microsoft Movie Maker in my PC. I used it for the first time a couple of weeks ago when I made a book trailer for my WIP. Do I need a book trailer? Certainly not, my book isn’t even close to completion let alone publication. But I had a blast making the trailer. It was amazingly easy and made me feel creative. Fun stuff.

I figured if I can do that, I can edit a simple play. Not so, said the Sony Video Cam that didn’t come with the proper cord to transfer video tape to my computer. So… we transferred the film onto hubby’s MAC - and that, like Fort Sumter, started the war.

After days and hours – in fact, nearly a week – of trying to work with MAC’s iMovie, I can honestly say I question the sanity of those who use it regularly. The ease of use with Microsoft Movie Maker is only enhanced by the options and quality of the final product.

After using a PC for more than a decade, switching to MAC is like moving to some distant galaxy. Yeah, life form there has to eat and breathe, but nothing else there is the same. So it is with MAC. I kept closing the program when I wanted to enlarge it – yes the buttons are in reverse. There is no desktop view – all the open ‘windows’ disappear until you run the mouse close to the bottom of the screen, then they pop up and wave around – it’s a visual display that’ll seer spin your eyes.  The program it’s self needs time to acknowledge each and every change you make – and you must manually make every change. In PC’s Movie Maker, you can drop an image into the area you want then stretch it to fit just so. Done. Transitions can be added the very same way – drag and drop. With iMovie, each action must be ‘rendered’ before another action can be performed. And if you want to add a transition, then you must first adjust the images before and after – and each step requires rendering. If you’ve made a mistake, you must redo the entire adjust, wait, snore, and test process before going on.

The video is done and it’s nice. BUT for all the hours spent and f-bombs dropped, the end does not justify the means. I will never yell at my PC again – not for freezing up. Not for flashing ‘not responding’ when I’m trying to save an hour’s worth of typing. Not for shutting down unexpectedly. Now that I realize how hard I work my machine and just how much I demand of it, I will appreciate what it does for me and snicker inside when someone else says they own a MAC. See… from personal experience, I know that Apple Mac is really Bill Gates’ creation. It’s his way of eliminating the traitors – those who will not use a PC because they want balance in the market. It’s a brilliant idea, actually, but I do believe PC users should be handed this warning with every new upgrade they download so they never venture into forbidden and dangerous territory.

So… if you are a MAC user, take heed. Though you might believe it is an easier machine to use, beware the evil within.

<sigh>

And because you’ve stuck with me this far, reading all these words, I’m attaching a link to the book trailer I made on my PC, as some visual relief.

Just click on the photo below.

As  a homeschooling family, we’re always looking for new and exciting ways to teach and learn. My daughter is 12 ½ (can’t forget the ½!) and we’ve just finished studying the world wars and are now onto Vietnam. Especially with things as they are today, how do you teach a child the horrors of war without horrifying or scarring them to their souls?   Well, wouldn’t you know it? There’s actually a fun way to close out lessons on war, so some of the heaviness is lifted but the impact of it all remains.  

It’s a food fight. Of sorts. One ingenious wizard of animation designed a synopsis of the world’s wars in which America has played a part. There’s a ‘cheat sheet’ that explains which food comes from which country so that when you watch the ‘food wars’ you can keep up. Honestly, this was the BEST pop quiz I’ve ever given to my daughter.

Check out the ”Cheat Sheet” if you’d like to familiarize yourself with the players before (or after) you watch this incredible video… which, btw, got my daughter interested in graphics, web design, and all that cool stuff.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/v/e-yldqNkGfo&hl=en]

This past June, my parents moved halfway across the country and they took my 93 year old grandmother with them. They are absolutely in love with their new home and with their new location. I’m thrilled for them, but have to admit, there’s a big difference being one hour away with traffic and being 4 hours away by plane. How do you cut through that time and space? Why, the internet of course!

My mom is new to the world of computing so emailing was an adventure for her. Once the newness of that wore a bit, I introduced her to instant messaging. Wow!! She LOVED it. She could ‘talk’ to me or to my daughter (her one and only grandchild, btw) as often and as long as she liked. The best part for me, was when Daughter was doing her schoolwork and would suddenly say, “Grandma’s online!” The next thing I knew, they were chatting away. Too cool.

We weren’t done yet, though. We tried emailing and instant messaging…. but there was more. How about computer-to-computer calling? Well. One evening, I’m ‘chatting’ with my mom and typed that I was going to call her computer. She got nervous, typed frantically, asking what I needed her to do. I told her, just click on ‘answer’. She did and the giddy sound in her voice when she realized we were actually communicating verbally with just our computers made my day.

We chat regularly now. Sometimes via email, sometimes via IM. Sometimes we actually use a land line, believe it or not. But mostly, we now make computer-to-computer phone calls.

Up next? Web-cams!