Not feeling much inspiration, poetic or otherwise, at the moment. I was earlier, honestly I was – or at least, if not ‘inspiration’, motivation to sit down and start writing. But the technology has got to me.
A friend has sent me a story and asked me to read it and give her feedback. Which is absolutely fine, only that I decided to print it out to read in the garden.
First I opened my email, and saw a new email from somebody I’ve asked to look at my blog, so I opened that first, read it and replied. Then I opened Word and remembered about the story I was going to print. Opened emails again then remembered there was already a tab open with emails and that was why I’d got distracted in the first place.
I found the email from my friend, the attachment opened in Google Docs, and I downloaded it to my downloads folder.
Then Office 365 opened automatically and asked for a product key. I have never bought a licence for 365, because I am perfectly satisfied with my copy of Office 2007, bought in good faith about ten years ago, and don’t see why I should have to pay to use 365. I do have it on my laptop as a 12 month free licence which came with the machine, and I’m using this temporarily until I can find a way to install Office 2007. At present I can’t do so because the software is on a CD and the laptop doesn’t have a CD drive. It’s been suggested that I take it to a small helpful computer shop, but of course that’s not an option at present. I’m holding out against Microsoft’s nasty insidious marketing strategy because I’m used to 2007, and having tried both I much prefer sticking with that to paying through the nose for something I consider an inferior product.
Of course, there is always Open Office. I do have that on the PC, and it is pretty good but there are small things which I find irritating and would rather stick with Office 2007 (which, as I said, I bought in good faith and have a legitimate licence for).
When I went into my version of word and tried to open the file from my downloads folder, I got a message saying the file was corrupt. It was an Open Office file – which should be compatible with Word.
I opened it in Open Office, and tried to print from there. Went through the usual rigmarole of removing the memory stick from the front facing usb port so I could connect up the printer, then restarting the printer, then having two copies in the printer input but the printer wasn’t printing, switching it off and on again and having to stop it from printing two copies…
Then rummaged in my desk for a paper clip. Which reminds me – remember the stupid Microsoft ‘Office Helper’ from the 1990s? I’ve said enough.