Technology,Computers and Me

I had to put this story under "Humor" because AC has no "Sad and Depressing story" section. And they wouldn't, they think of us as cheerful and especially into the 21 Century, up to date with the latest technology. And this is exactly what my story is about, and why this is a sad story, because out of all the thousands of writers there is one who doesn't get it. That's me. This is how it happened.

My parents, who handed out the genes, gave me the artistic ones (the ones that will not make you rich, but give you a lot of fun) and my brother was handed the technical genes (which will make him rich and he also has fun). And so it began. I tried to get him into painting and he tried to make me into a more technical person. I must admit that his powers of persuasion are a lot better than mine, because 2 years ago he decided that I needed a computer. Up to that point I was quite happy to write people letters on real paper and trot off to the Post office to send them away. It also gave me a chance to socialize while waiting.

But one day the computer arrived. My brother had a big grin on his face, finally his sister was no embarrassment anymore. My brother set to work and after a couple of hours it was installed. I must admit, it looked very professional in my office. He realized that I was a complete ignorant as far as computers go and recommended to get either books from the Library or do a night-course for" dummies." I did not take kindly to the word "dummies" and told him I was a very intelligent person and I could easily work it out myself. Surely it couldn't be more difficult than a TV-remote-control? ( he doesn't know I'm still trying to work that thing out ). And so I started the "on" button. Ah yes, all the lights started flashing so that was okay. And I set to work.

Of course I worked out the bit where I can do some emailing, and I can find the Internet. The real problems started about 2 weeks ago. When I wanted to log off it said that there were 2 people still logged on. Who was trying to steal my articles? My vivid mind went in overdrive. I could see bad dark men sitting in caves reading my stories, machine-guns put aside for the moment, spies not on the look-out for the safety of their countries, but giggling while reading my stories, presidents of countries not making any decisions anymore because of me and my silly stories. I panicked.

So, since I don't know what was going on, I rang an expert. I explained my problem and he fiddled with the innards of my PC for 90 minutes. I was impressed; he installed all sorts of things and my system was "closed and safe". I paid him the equivalent of the price of a cruise liner and he went. But at least my stories were safe.

So on Sunday I went back to writing my articles, as you do when you are a dedicated writer, and the first thing I noticed, when I tried to log in was a big pop-up, asking me all sorts of gooble-de-gook, "permit" or "deny". I didn't know what I was permitting but I did it anyway. Lights flashing, more Greek on the bottom, and all over the screen. On the bottom a pop-up appeared: "e-mail scanning in process". That looked very safe to me, after all we don't want spam do we? By that time my screen looked like the inside of the Space-shuttle on lift-off. I panicked again. Perhaps it was a lot safer to actually buy a type-writer and paper and hop on the plane to deliver my articles in person. Perhaps cheaper too.

So now I have a computer that has so many security-systems that it is safer than a Bank, but I cannot get e-mails and it takes me at least 30 minutes to get past the pop-ups and into my own computer. And all I ever wanted was writing articles for you.