The only application that I haven’t been able to find is a decent check register that will sync with Quicken.

I had a terrible time trying to find an address app that will actually display the location, the physical address for snailmail. Where you might like to visit another human being in person. Turns out it was there all along (unsurprising). It’s called People.

I downloaded an app called Red Laser that reads barcodes. It looked up a book upc and found it at my local library – now that is useful!

I have both an English and French dictionary installed. And have added about a dozen different html and writing add-ons for Firefox. Today, I changed the character set, because I am sick to death of using the alt-character codes to make an é or anything else requiring an accent and the constant red highlights because I spelled voilá voila. So enter my netbook and not only will you get Firefox with a bunch of add-ons that only a writer and software geek could love, and open-source software in two languages. Your keyboard has gone to Europe.

Welcome.

My netbook has officially become DHs worst nightmare. Not that he has ever wanted to use my computers anyway. He’s been scarred for life by the discovery that the keyboard I had when we started dating had been so worn out that the letters and numbers had rubbed off the keys. I hadn’t noticed. But the look on the face of him and SS was quite amusing.

Since we’re talking multilingualism, my gmail is playing cache-cache aka hide-hide, or rather hide and seek. After a time, messages go missing. I’m absolutely certain that I did this to myself. Because, obviously, I mess around with my software and various settings all the time. Sometimes daily.

You should see what happens when DH or I call tech support for DSL or something. It’s all we can do not to yell instructions at the poor underpaid tech on the line. I want you to release and renew my ip address!

Two very obvious things have come to my attention this week, besides that next year I will turn 40. I can sew clothing for myself. A no-brainer I know. But really, I had hardly thought of it until recently.

And, I can speak French. Another eye-roll please. I had not actually thought of my French as being useful to anyone except myself and family. But actually, it appears that there is tutoring market. I just have to pass a knowledge test, no teaching certification required. I imagined that I could not possibly manage to pass the test. But I hopped over to the BBC language site and took a bunch of beginning and intermediate tests for practice and passed them all. So I speak better text-book French than I thought.

I should, in theory, be able to pass a skills test for tutors. I have a minor in French. But I can say for certain that chatting with Grandma, or getting directions in Quebec is about 100 times easier for me than taking a test and checking the right box when the choices are travailler and travail. That kind of similar but not the same stuff makes my head hurt when the whole test is in English.

And I won’t have my wacky netbook.

This is broccoli. It has nothing to do with the rest of the post.

I made a rookie move and forgot to check the bios right away.  So Windows plowed on as if it had only 1G.  I went back into the bios and voila, 2G.  Bah.

I’ve been calling the little guy Netbook all day.  So obviously, I name things like a pre-schooler.  And I forgot to take his picture.  Right, guess I’m not all that sentimental.

The mouse has a hair trigger, and doesn’t calibrate.  But I am getting used to it.  This morning tabs were closing and links were launching all over the place while I cursed the mouse as possessed.  But not so much after working all day.

It has been my practice to keep my fingernails very short when working on a small keyboard or laptop.  But I didn’t shorten them.  And typos have been minimal.  So apparently, that won’t be necessary.

The scrolling on the mouse was initially weird.  But then I actually looked at the instructions.  (Did I just lose my nerd card?)  And two finger are supposed to be used.  That really helps. 

The position of the function, home, end and question mark keys is an adjustment.  Twice I fired off messages and realized they should have had question marks in them.  But somehow, I manage to proofread articles acceptably.  Go figure.

StumbleUpon scolded me and suggested that my screen needs an upgrade.  Ha.  You try carrying around a big screen in your purse and a four year old. 

No wi-fi signal at the park.  Boo.  Great wi-fi on my porch.  Wee.

How do you like the frog?  I found him on the porch last night.  I took four pictures of him, mediocre at best, when the camera battery ran out.  Too bad.  I was hoping to keep trying until I got the shutter speed right.

I am completely nonthreatening to wild animals.  Then just observe me.  I must be in my natural habitat.

Oh yeah, the battery did last ten hours.  Usually, they just say that, but right out of the box it’s two.  But this one did the whole ten.

Related posts:

• Asus Eee Keyboard Screen Mouse Bag
• Asus Eee First Impressions

[Asus Eeee]

I finally chose the Asus, because all other things being equal, the HP cost over 100 dollars more, with near identical specs and came installed with Windows Vista, that I would have to downgrade.  The MSI Wind shipped with 2G of ram, and Windows XP installed, but does not have 802.11n.  The other two models do.  And yes, that matters in my world.

So, my Asus Eee will arrive black, with 1G of ram.  (Blue was sold out in some venues and a hefty premium in others.) And a chip will arrive separately.  In my opinion, it’s significantly less hassle to pop out 1G and pop in 2G, than to change the operating system.  But that’s just me.  And I must have XP for some of the work I do.

[asus ram]

Also, the HP 2140 has been discontinued, making it near impossible to find at this moment, since previous model discontinued and stock that is left is only available at one retailer.  And the new model has yet to be released. 

My very first thought was to purchase the Dell Mini 10.  But it doesn’t have a ram upgrade available, costs top dollar, and my own experiences with Dell have been mixed.  One person called me to rave about Dell.  And another called to warn me about them.  I thank you both.

I should mention that I stopped by Best Buy, who online carries these devices.  The store had many, many varieties of netbooks.  Though not a single one of them was any of the models mentioned above.  I touched the keyboards and looked at the screens.  They haven’t changed much.  I spent years carrying laptops through airports, years fixing them, returning them, loving them and cursing them:  I pretty much know what I want.

I know also:

• I have called the ThinkPad the StinkPad for years. You can brand them Lenovo.  But I still think they stink.
• Toshiba has beautiful screens.  And they’re built like tanks.  I don’t want to carry a tank in my purse.
• HP, Dell and Sony are fancy, expensive brand names.  But Hewlett and Packard were just a couple of guys from the South Bay.  I’m not paying $150 more just because they made it.

I asked DH to weigh in on several points.  His most honest commentary was that he cannot imagine purchasing anything so small with no room for expansion.  But the netbooks appear to suite my needs. 

Exactly.

My needs and wants are this:  small, highly portable, wi-fi connectivity, flash drives, XP.  DH, being a man who plays video games and doesn’t mind when his laptop and the zillion papers he piles around it weigh twenty pounds does not think that way.  I think that since I am already managing a 34 pound child, the weight of all other objects should be small or at the minimum negotiable.

One more thing to note for fellow geeks.  I run all sorts of client side dbms and cms software.  And I still never need the kind of space, power or processing speed that DH does to run his games.

Asus propaganda page linked below.

ASUSTeK Computer Inc.

Eee PC 1000HE

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“The Wire” All Prologue (2003) – Memorable quotes

Sergei ‘Serge’ Malatov: Family cannot be helped.
Proposition Joe Stewart: Who you tellin’? I got motherfuckin’ nephews and in-laws fucking all my shit up all the time and it ain’t like I can pop a cap in their ass and not hear about it Thanksgivin’ time. For real, I’m livin’ life with some burdensome niggers.

My pc is screwing up.  I hate purchasing certain things, most especially cars and computers.  This contributes to the fact that I typically have the most antiquated system in the household.  Though at present, DD’s is not only older, but doesn’t work.

The one I have now previously belonged to SS, but did not perform certain gaming functions.  So DH got him a new one – last year I think – and I inherited this one.  I have actually never purchased a computer.  Dozens of pdas, phones and other gadgets, and even approved the hardware to be appropriate for some corporate computers at one time, but not once my own pc.  At least not that I can remember.

HP Compaq mini 110-2 by louisvolant

I so hate the drama that is shopping for this netbook or laptop thing I need:

• How much ram is appropriate?
• How much disk space do I need?

Blah, blah, blah.

Of course I ask DH and he says the ones I like are too small with not enough memory.  This is okay.  But of course, DH plays games and is a man.  I mention that he’s a man, because he does not mind lugging a six pound object around with him.  I mind.  I am already minding a 34 pound child.  34 plus 6 is 40.  40 pounds is a lot.

Also, one does not require 4GB of disk space to write html, run a content management system (WordPress), Firefox, or Open Office.

Though… I won’t be able to upgrade it later.  I want the pdas to perform like computers/the computers to be the size of pdas.  That’s what I want.  I want to be small, really small.  I want it to fit in my purse, get wi-fi at the library, and still publish to my blog.

Ugh.

I feel the opposite about cars.  I want it to transport me reliably, and to be able to fit a tree in the back.

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