Tag: Technology is not my friend

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In Which I Recount More Of My Tech Savviness*

Well, I think that title pretty much says it all doesn’t it? I mean, not everything or else there’d be no point in typing any further (settle down Ray) than the title. So allow me to fill in some more tech-related details. Shout out to a faithful reader (and also a family member) (it just occurred to me the Venn Diagram of readers and family members would probably have a steep overlap) (c’est la vie) for pointing out in the comments that I neglected to share the conclusion of my back door lock issue. What was I thinking?

Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up. (Sorry, it’s hard to pass up on the opportunity to drop in a Princess Bride reference.) When we left this topic, our intrepid writer (me) had a semi functional electronic back door lock. I was able to add in a few codes manually to lock and unlock the door, but wasn’t able to connect the lock to my home wifi network. This caused much consternation, and more bad language than I’d care to admit to using. Of course losing my shit also did nothing to expedite the problem, so I did my best to just let it be and wait for tech support to call me back. Patience, however, is rarely my strong suit so I was pleased that I was able to, more or less, not fiddle around with the lock on a daily basis.

The phone call from Schlage Tech Support came in a couple minutes after the scheduled time but still well within the expected window, and, as I expected, the issue was operator (me again) error. Nick, the tech, was remarkably patient with me, even when I made a full bodied effort to eff things up again by repeating the error I had been making all along. So thanks for that Nick! I think we were on the phone for a grand total of about 15 minutes and we had a fully functional back door lock once again! Yaaay technology!

Let’s see, what else do we have that’s tech-related that I can ramble on about for a few hundred words… Oh yeah, there’s this – Around the time I stopped actively doing this, although unrelated to it iirc, my laptop was starting to show signs of its age. I bought it, a MacBook Air, around 2014, and had been very happy with its performance from day 1. Over the last couple years I noticed it seemed a tad slow, not terribly, but enough that it was noticeable. Then it reached the point in its life cycle where Apple stopped issuing updates for it. A few apps stopped responding the way they had before, but I was usually able to figure out a workaround and keep getting results as I was accustomed to getting. I thought at the time about replacing it with a newer model, but decided against it because I also thought about how much less I was writing than I had been and was able to talk myself out of spending the money. And using it less and less frequently over the last couple years seemed to support my theory.

At least until a few weeks ago, when I had one of the aforementioned random ideas about a potential topic pop into my head. It was followed by a thought along the lines of “Geez maybe if I get a new laptop it’ll encourage me to put these thoughts down on “paper” and start posting again. The more I thought about it, the more I started to convince myself of the logic in that point of view.

Until, lo and behold, I found myself at the Apple Store. Where I met a lovely Apple person by the name of Oscar (or maybe Oskar, idk, I didn’t think to ask him how he spells it) who helped me narrow down which model I wanted/needed. Although I pretty much knew what I wanted going in, a little bigger, a little faster than what I was used to, but not top of the line. Anyway, here I am, typing away on my new MacBook Air, happy as a clam. Oscar, if you read this, you’re the best. And I owe you an apology, I should’ve asked where I could catch your act. As it turns out, Oscar is a stand up comic. That came up when he was asking me what I would use this baby to do. I told him about the blog and he asked for the address, then confirmed it after he pulled it up on his phone. And yes, I’d (we’d) love to come catch a gig so let me know. Or if I get back up to the store for something I’ll flag you down and ask.

I have to give kudos to Apple for the way they do stuff. Granted, I’m a long time user because I like the products, but I’ve never had a bad experience at one of their stores. And the Air purchase was just one example.

Here’s another one. B2 and I just got new phones. Not brand brand new, but last year’s model. Which actually brings me to a point I don’t like about Apple. They changed connectors from Lightning to USB-C. Now, that may seem a little like gobbledygook, but it refers to the end of the charging cable. I could go into greater detail about this, but I don’t really feel like it right now so… At any rate, due to that change, I needed a new cable. I had a cable at home to plug my phone into the car (I use Apple CarPlay while driving) however, it was a cheap version from some random device I had gotten at some unknown point in the last few years. So while it charged my phone in the car, it wouldn’t allow for the CarPlay hook up to occur. I chose yesterday, you know, 2 days after the release of the new version of the iPhone, as the day to go to the Apple Store to buy my cable. I noticed my lack of judgement when I pulled into the parking lot and had to park about 3 rows farther back than normal. And, as I walked up to the door the mass of humanity inside was hard to miss. Resolute in my decision to make my purchase, plus refusing to turn around and drive 30 minutes home stewing in the juices of my defeat, I joined the shopping fray. An employee asked me what I was looking to get and pointed me in the direction of the charging cords. It took me a couple minutes to find exactly what I needed (USB-A to USB-C) but, once I had one in my grubby little paws I saw a thing, kind of like a QR Code but different, on the shelf that said “scan to pay”. So I did. And I did. Scanned and then paid, I mean. And it was stupidly easy. Like I was convinced I did something wrong, easy. Like, how did they know I actually paid for it and how did they know I had the product I said I did? I kept the app open so I could show it to any employee that might question what the heck I was doing just walking out of the store like I owned the place with that charging cord in my hand. But no one even glanced my way. Mind boggled.

I think that just about brings us up to date on my tech (mis)adventures. I could probably rattle on a little about the phone shopping experience, but I think I’m good for today. I’m starting to get a little bleary eyed, I can’t imagine how you, gentle reader, are feeling.

Peace

PS- I spent a couple hours yesterday morning, thanks to the interwebz, listening to a Chicago treasure, Terri Hemmert, on Breakfast with the Beatles and as a result have had early Fab Four bouncing between my ears as this gets formed. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it too. I’ve always been able to avoid singing along (off key and loudly) to whatever I listen to while writing, but one of these days I fear I’ll slip up. Of course it would be something else to write about so…

Again, Peace

*Savviness may or may not be an actual word. Consult your local thesaurus for clarity. Or lack of same.

PSS or maybe PPS I don’t remember- Since I’m nothing if not a public servant, I feel I need to warn you that when looking for an image to add to this post I GTS’d “techno boob” and I want to tell you friends, never GTS “techno boobs”. Yikes.

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Back In The Saddle Again

Before I dive any further into any of this mess, Imma place this right here and, as always, apologies if you have to click through an ad. In addition to the title being apropos, there’s something about the exuberance of the song, at least once they get past the intro, that is (happily) a parallel with my mood towards getting back behind (in front of?) the keyboard.

There, I said it, I’m returning to ICRTDs. Truth be told I’ve never left, but I sure as heck haven’t produced anything in really long time. Some (Hi Ray) would say never, but that’s a story for somebody else’s blog. Idk if there’s any real reason I haven’t written anything for the last almost three(!) years. Other than I just didn’t. I still had ideas. I can’t tell you how many times something would happen and I’d think “geez I should write about that.” or random ideas would pop into my head at random times and instead of making a note to myself to flesh it out a little more, I’d let it wither on the proverbial vine.

It’s actually not accurate to say I haven’t written at all, I still kick out the biannual (biennial? idk and I don’t care enough right now to confirm) article for the Illinois Retired Fireperson (not its real name) magazine. Which is now an E-zine. I think. Idk if that’s a thing or not, but I’m on a roll right now so… Yeah, I’ve done two of those articles a year at 500 words a pop, which is actually harder than writing these gems. Typically I’ll toss out 1000+ words into one of these word salads, with minimal editing other than you know triple checking spelling and maybe a once over for a grammar faux pas along the way.

It’s not like I didn’t miss doing this either, I did. Just not enough to grab myself and haul my behind to a local (or local ish) coffeehouse with my trusty keyboard. Or to sit at the desk at home to create, well, anything. I don’t know that I can put a finger on what triggered this renewed interest in writing, but I’m not going to question the Muse. Let’s just go with it, shall we?

So, here’s a thing. I like to consider myself fairly tech savvy for an old timer. I mean, I know my limitations, but by and large, I can keep myself out of trouble when it comes to modern technology. Until recently. A couple, three months ago, I bought an electronic lock, a Schlage Encode, for the back door at La Casa Mains. The installation was a tad cumbersome, but I was able to do a workaround, and the lock worked flawlessly for us. Until late last month when the whole thing came to a screeching halt. What I thought was a prematurely dead battery turned out to be something else. The interwebz provided no real answer either so I reached out to Schlage, which in itself turned out to be ridiculously cumbersome as well. Poor #LillyNo heard so many bad words, none directed at her, of course, but she was not at all happy that I was so fired up. Of course Schlage’s customer service was closed on weekends, because apparently no one needs to lock their house other than Monday through Friday, so I scheduled a call back appointment for 5 days later. That was the first available slot. The morning of, I got an email to, very helpfully I might add, put the CS number into my phone so the call didn’t bounce to voicemail. The call came in, right on time, I answered, and heard nothing. Dead air. For about 10 seconds until the call dropped. As you may imagine, I was not pleased. Go ahead, imagine yourself silly, I’ll wait. The technician called back pretty quickly, the call was successful this time and she apologized for an error on her part. We started walking through the lock and got about two steps in when the problem surfaced. We tried a couple things to no avail, and she said she’d send out a replacement lock. I saw that as a win. When the replacement lock came out 4-5 days later I took that as another good sign. Then I tried to install the new lock.

Picture, if you will, Mount Vesuvius, or really any volcano, erupting and you’ll have a pretty fair idea of how the remainder of my replacement lock installation went. This time I was able to get as far as connecting to my home wifi network, which the lock has, to the moment I’m writing this, yet to find. Idk if it’s using both hands, but it can’t find it. That prompted another scheduling with Schlage CS, this time 8 days out. And yeah, that didn’t help my mood any either. I was able to enter some codes manually, so we can at least lock the door, but we’re nowhere near the full functionality of the lock, and they’re not cheap so I really feel like we deserve what we paid for the product. The next edition of “How do I make my new lock work” takes place tomorrow morning so send good thoughts and keep your fingers crossed for whatever sanity I have left.

But wait! There’s more!

We lost power the other night when a thunderstorm rolled through around 2:00 in the morning. It was restored before we got up so if it hadn’t been for the texts on my phone from the power company, and the clocks displaying the wrong time I would have never known. That evening I sat down to watch some tv, nothing in particular, I mean, right here, right now idk what I was going to watch. So nothing vital. But when I turned on the tv, the speakers wouldn’t connect. I said to myself “Self” I said “This isn’t right.” and it wasn’t. This is not a common occurrence in our house, and if it does happen, it’s usually about a 15 second long fix and we’re good to go. But on this particular night, not only did the typical fix not work, the tv sets, yes, all three of them, couldn’t find the speakers. Not. a. single. one. I was, shall we say, displeased. Because, if you recall (I know you can, I just wrote about it) my lock issues were running concurrently to this new tech problem. Poor #LillyNo was also not happy, as my language took an expected turn to the gutter. So as I’m running through the various potential fixes I could think of; restarting/resetting the speakers, restarting the wifi, restarting, well, anything that might remotely be connected to the issue, I noticed something. The speakers were connected to the wrong wifi network. Maybe it was related to losing power, idk, that seems logical, but it never happened before. Anyway, I had no clue how to get them back on the correct wifi network so I went back to the interwebz. And found all kinds of things that didn’t relate to my problem.

And then, I found an app for Apple Support.

Friends let me tell you that installing and working through this app was the single most pleasant customer service experience I’ve had in a really, really long time. I sent in my question and was redirected to iMessage where a text from Apple Support was waiting for me. It was a tad awkward at first, and tbh it was probably some type of bot or AI that I was interacting with, but after a very few minutes my problem was solved by unplugging the speakers, plugging them in to my computer and updating/restarting them. So I spent maybe 15 minutes on three of the four speakers, the other one, idk how, reconnected to the proper wifi network on its own, and I once again had tv’s and speakers that worked as I expected them to work.

As I prepare to close this Pulitzer-worthy nugget out, I really hope you’ll be able to read it. By that I mean, it’s been so long I’m not convinced I know how to successfully post anymore, I guess we’ll find out together. Also, I don’t have much (read none) of a social media presence anymore, so I’m not sure how to get this out to the masses and I use that term loosely. But I’m game if you are.

Lastly ish. Despite the reference way up top, I haven’t been listening to Aerosmith as I write this today. Nothing against the band at all, 16 year old me loved the album Toys In The Attic, but old me generally spends more time listening to other things. Today’s playlist has been one I created a few years ago titled I Have No Words and it’s all (hence the name) instrumentals. Jethro Tull, Rodrigo y Gabriela, Jeff Beck, some Irish reels and the like, Santana, The Allman Brothers, Roy Clark, Mason Williams, Link Wray, The Pogues, and many more. I remember reading somewhere that listening to words, whether songs or podcasts, or what have you, while trying to write was not helpful. So I thought I’d give this a shot. Honestly I have no idea if it worked or not, how do you quantify something like that, you know? At any rate, that’s all I’ve got for you today

As always, Peace.