I admit to being somewhat technically challenged. Okay, so I’ve been called a Luddite.
Some years ago, my nascent career in journalism was almost derailed over my inability to work harmoniously with a cranky old computer. Computers know when you’re afraid.
I didn’t abandon my trusty portable typewriter until I could no longer find replacement ribbons for it, moving gingerly upward to a Brother electronic. The learning curve was long and increased my use of four-letter expletives, but I grew to like being able to move paragraphs around and fix typos without wasting reams of paper.
Best of all, the print quality was perfect. It endeared me to the Times’ typesetter who was finally able to scan my copy.
When I began reporting for the Times, they assigned me to “The Dinosaur,” likely the oldest computer on the planet, but it had Quark Express (the original version, I’m sure) and was used to write headlines and captions. My regular office computer was an aging PC (in those days still called an IBM clone) that was incompatible with the Macs used by the copy editors and graphic arts designers. We kept fit carrying each story, or a whole page, on floppy disks to the composing room. About a year after I took over the PC, it expired. Tech announced the motherboard had gone to its grave, taking with it some of my best reporting. I never forgave it.
Soon after, I bought a Mac desktop and conned our typesetter into setting it up for me. It had the uncanny ability to save copy written in its Mac word processing system to any of a dozen others, such as MSWord. This was a good thing. I remembered to back up my files regularly onto floppies. I know; floppies now rest on the junk heap of history.
Then I bought a Mac PowerBook, which I named Jobs. Its word processing program is AppleWorks, which is okay to work in but not compatible in many ways with anything else. I had to buy a new printer and an external disk drive to transfer stuff from the old desktop. Now in its dotage, at the tender age of six years, it refuses to accept any new software even though I added another chunk of memory, which was a total waste. Attempts to download the free 30-day trial of Adobe PhotoShop CS provoked an imminent crash.
So, I ordered a new MacBook with all the bells and whistles. It comes with a WiFi card, since nobody younger than 60 still has dial-up. I haven’t told Jobs yet. You see, buying things in Montana is great, because there’s no sales tax, but problematic in that you rarely can find what you need in stores. And shipping, even from Missoula to Bozeman, is a crapshoot. I ordered the MacBook from a store that had advertised Mac laptops the week before. Evidently they were all sold because mine would have to be shipped from Missoula. Guaranteed to be in on Friday, I still haven’t seen the white of its Apple eye. If and when I do, I’ll christen it Steve.
And I’m still waiting for Adobe PhotoShop, which was also guaranteed for delivery by FedEx today. I was notified by e-mail that my Visa charge was denied. I spoke to a man with an Indian accent who asked me everything but what my grandmother died of before saying the charge was rejected for security reasons. Does this mean the Feds think I’m a terrorist? Well, no. It seems Capital One had my telephone number from 12 years ago. My billing address, of course, is correct. But Mr. Gupta, who now knows more about me than my Kaiser physician, can’t get his head around the fact that I used to live on Civic Center Way in Malibu and now live in Kern County, but my order is being shipped to Big Sky, Mont. Get over it, Gupta.
Meanwhile, I’m making the giant leap from film to digital photography, totally mired in the digital jargon of Nikon’s D70s manual. I figured even someone of my limited technical capabilities could figure this out if I just take it one step at a time.
Pressing the menu button gives you more choices than a Chinese take-out. Now how to highlight the one I want?
I give up and go outside to shoot. Wow. The monitor displays the last shot long enough to actually see it. The playback button and the multiselector let me run through everything on the memory card backward or forward and delete the ones I don’t want to keep. Formidable.
Of course, I’m only up to page 39. My MacBook should arrive today and its user manual will be huge. And then there’ll be PhotoShop and its manual. Good grief.
I’ve signed up for a four-day digital photo workshop, with one session devoted to PhotoShop, starting in three days. If everything actually gets here and gets installed (my son-in-law has offered to help), I’ll be back in school.
A Luddite dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century.