Tuesday, May 24, 2011

About Brainpower

Some of you might have heard Donald Trump say "20% brilliance, 80% don't know what's going on" or something similar to that.

That is the asessment of something called "psychometric testing". I took that test after sustaining a head injury when a car slammed into the back of mine while I was legally yielding to mainstream traffic. I was feeling "stupid", I said, like I wasn't thinking as well as I used to. And that was true.

The test revealed that at the time I had damage to the left frontal lobe of my brain AND all my early childhood was "dormant". So I was right. I was at the time not thinking as well as I used to. Nevertheless, the Docotr said I am far from stupid, in fact had scored in the top 20% of the entire USA in regard to my mental capacity. That is with - say I was 36 years old, my early childhood consisting of 8 years-a dminished capacity of no less than 25%. And still I'm "smarter" than 20% of everybody else. No wonder they can't figure out what I'm talking about. They cannot "connect the dots".

So what's my problem with computer use?

Primarily, computer malfunctions. My mind has more to do than coccupy it's time trying to fix something that should be working right in the first place. I don't care to be rmemebering passwords and codes and links and repeating information already given. In short, I just don't have the patience.

But my American Dad is a different sort. His whole life he worked, from the dawn of computers, as a programmer, an administrator, a data systems analyst. He's used to these things. Yet the very things I have problems with resulted in him having a stroke. And after Dell messed up something they were supposed to fix, making it even worse than the problem that did exist, I'm not altogether sure that I didn't have a stroke.

I stopped being mad after I decided that they really also didn't know what they were doing, but were trained only to "the Dell-Microsoft Way", which I use very little of outside the operating system of this computer. I don't use their e-mail, I don't use their blogs, I use very little of anything of them at all. They don't like that, so every once in a while, they manage to slip in an "upgrade". Their last "Security Upgrade" was not security for me, but for them. They blocked everything that was non-Dell or non-Microsoft. And I lodged complaints with the FCC and my Congressman. And told them to remove the $200.+ charge they had put on the credit card for "technical support contract". It is for me totally useless. Suggestion: Take it instead to an independent local repair shop. You'll be less frustrated and you won't have to spend 10 hours with Dell trying to fix what they broke and aren't reversing in the first place. Not that their AIO printer ever printed anything from my computer. Maybe 3 times it did. It refuses to scan things into the computer all except twice. But it's a great photocopier and fax machine. So if you want a dinosaur in your living room, go ahead and get one of them.

I also have an Hewlett-Packard (HP) inkjet photoprinter. It was great until their sensor chip "timed out". Not that it's all that costly to find another, but they don't give me what I have with this printer. I can plug my camera in. I have slots for SD cards of varying sizes, as well as flash drive and mini-discs; I can print directly from the camera without having the need for a computer in between.  I can adjust the colors inside the computer and pick any font that I want. Not so with the new ones. You get to plug in your computer or go wireless. You can print from one size SD card. And that's it. The thing also malfunctioned all over the place. I contacted HP and got a service rep wanting to waste my time doing things I'd already done before I picked up my telephone. I hate things that waste my time.

At least I did get that time wasting stuff resolved with my local IO carrier. They now ask if you've done the routine trouble shooting and let you skip to where you need to be. But that was after a year of non-stop trouble with everything from the modem burning out to the converters going bad to screw-ups on their end. It all stopped pretty much after they upped the prices to the regular from the $99. introductory. But still, at least once a month, it does go out. Can't they let me know before it "goes down for maintenance"? Now they don't load the program info until I ask for it. OK. It's lag time, but the constant feed does eat up electricity.

I've never been a typist. Of all the things in the world, typing the way they wanted me to, "blind"-you just look at the letters on the thing to be transcribed and punch them in without looking or knowing what you're "typing"- I just can't do that. And being born a "leftie", it was all backwards to me anyway. So please excuse the occasional mis's. Sure I could spell check. But there are too many words it doesn't recognise and it wants me to put them in American. And that isn't about to happen.

I'll be changing my settings so it will be possible for people to print my blog pages. I didn't before because I was tired of people ripping off my themes and ideas. That's why I don't talk a lot and communicate with a few trusted or proof of creation. Which makes the computer a most valuable tool.

Pegi