So...

So ... I haven't posted lately because my computer is having troubles... again.  Same issue that came up around July 4th holiday weekend, being locked out and being told the password I enter isn't right.  Last time I called Apple Support and they walked me through sort of re-booting the system.  I haven't had time, or energy, to go through my personal desk to see if I (hopefully) took notes on the steps they walked me through.  If I didn't, my choices will be 1) calling Apple again (which means waiting on the phone 20-30 minutes and then, likely this time, paying money) or 2) taking the laptop to a local computer place, which also means money (and probably time).  There's a place around the corner from us that says it is an authorized Mac service place.  I just have been too demoralized to deal with it.  Since my iPod still works, I can see my personal email there; listen to music (at least the music already on the iPod) and listen to podcasts (which still automatically download).

Then this morning, I used David's computer to log on to my personal email (needed to use his computer just so I could capture a URL from eBay to send it to someone) and after I did that, he had problems logging in to eBay, so now I'm stressed that I somehow screwed up his computer.

But the bottom line is - f**king technology is taking over our lives, we come to "need" it and depend on it and get stressed and strung out if we can't use it when we want it.  Yesterday I got a marketing call from Time Warner, our internet, home phone and cable TV provider.  The woman wanted to tell me about a new "package" that would deliver "hundreds of movies" to me for just another $8 or $10 a month.  "I don't watch movies" I told the woman.  "Well, the package includes other entertainment options..." "I don't much care for 'entertainment,' I told her, "I barely care for Time Warner Cable."  So she gave up. 

That's the goal for next year, I think, when our "discounted" (if you can call it that) price for Time Warner's "triple play" package (internet, phone and cable tv---which was actually "cheaper" than buying only internet and phone) expires - get rid of cable TV, get rid of home phone (get MagicJack) and keep only internet from Time Warner (unless a better option comes along).

My next door neighbor doesn't have a computer.  She doesn't have internet.  She doesn't have cable TV.  She reads a lot.  She gardens.  She's not technologically illiterate.  At work she uses a computer, the Internet.  She watches movies on DVDs from the library.  She is a civilized person and, perhaps, my role model.

So that's what's going on.  I'm squeezing in this posting using another computer.  My next post may not be until my own laptop is repaired.  I am off to Connecticut next week for work and a check-up with my oncologist.  So I may not have time to deal with the computer until I return.

But don't worry.  I am here.  Ella and I continue to enjoy morning walks.  Fall is coming.  It makes Ella frisky. There is crispness in the air.  Northern and interior Maine have frost warnings in the evening.  Yesterday morning I forgot to bring Ella's ball with us on our walk. Down by the water where we stop and I usually throw the ball for her to chase, there's a pear tree. So I threw pears that had fallen on the ground, and Ella chased and returned them to me. What I found interesting was that she barely scratched the skin of the pear. A soft mouth. 

Rosh HaShannah - the Jewish New Year - approaches - the birthday of the world.  The day on which our tradition says that each of us, in fact, each living thing, the whole world, is judged for life... or for... 

I hope God is in a good mood, feeling lenient and more optimistic about humanity that I feel these days.  Otherwise, we may be in trouble...

Peace.