As we slog through life we’ve all heard the falsehoods and outright lies spewing forth from the TV and other media, and from politicians, and not to ignore the televangelists on TV that want you to send your money to the lord but give you their own address. In the last twenty years now we have added the World Wide Web to this giant lying machine we deal with every day. I’ll leave out that retired Navy man telling you sea stories at the bar that always start: “Hey, this is no shit”…….instead of “Once upon a time” I admit guilt in that area!
But Billy Gates lied to me!!! He said download Windows 10 for free and “You can keep your’ files, they won’t move” I remember a president telling the same story about Doctors if you buy his insurance.
19 days it took me to download Windows 10, because every time the Webby thing cut out, it started from scratch once again, sometimes twice a day. But with the persistence and dogged will power it finely happened, I am officially a not so proud owner of Windows Ten, Why it seems like only a couple of years ago they dragged me kicking and screaming out of Windows 95.
I was hired by Military Sealift Command as a Yeoman/Storekeeper keeping track of fleet cargo on the ships. Paul, do you know computers? Why of course I do, I am a retired Senior Chief Ship’s Serviceman. Well the only time I saw a computer was at my last duty station in Puerto Rico, and I had Mrs. Young in my office to do that. (But she refused to make coffee, so I made the coffee and she used the keyboard.
Now MSC wants me to work using a computer, I’d never even had a Commodore 64 in front of me before. My boss Lee looked at me and smiled and mumbled, he hasn’t a clue. Plus everything was DOS as windows hadn’t gone to sea yet. Here was my logic, I saw people who had problems trying to tie their shoes, I watched them sitting at computers, and of course I’m thinking, I can do it too. (Just not very well) but no problem as far as my job was concerned.
In 1994 I bought my first home computer here in the Philippines, at that time they were as rare as an honest politician. It came with Windows “95” and I only knew DOS, do you see where life will pitch you those curved balls? But our two girls both Tweens at the time and within a few weeks were experts on windows and taught me a little at a time. I even remember sending my first e-mail, (I’ll bet Hillary also remembers hers too!)
But Windows Ten, ah here I am, thanking all that is holy that “Word” was not changed, except for the look of it. Waiting for Joel (My Putter Guy) to show up and walk me through the pitfalls and minefields, and help me locate the files that were promised to me that would still be there. (Again similar to Obamacare)
But have no fear, this old codger will soon have the basics’ figured out (Thank you Joel) and will stop grousing about windows 10 within a month or so, by then it will be second nature to me, and we who hate change, will adapt, because we know: “That the check is really not in the mail!”
I refused repeated requests for 10 but it eventually snuck in and downloaded one day by itself when I wasn’t looking. I am still looking for some files and my email is still playing up. Good fun, I know where you are coming from.
Nick;
I foolishly pushed the download button on my own. I wish I could blame someone else! (LOL)
Of course Gates would lie to you, he is a hillery supporter. Are there similarities between hillery supporters and athletic supporters?
Loren;
Is it the vast amounts of money that dull the brain? Or you have so much you just don’t give a crap?
Bring back XP and there will be world peace again!
Gary;
I can’t remember if XP ever darkened my screen before, but maybe it did after Windows 95! World peace would be pleasant, until the military industrial complex realizes they are not making any money. Then the lobbyists will come out to play, and the Clinton Foundation will grow beyond belief! The never ending circle of life in Washington!
Paul like another reader I loved winXP then my daughters convinced me to go win7 then those shifty buggers in the clouds got me, and automatically downloaded win10 not a happy chappy,I look at my pc and like women”you cant live without them”(exclude my ex)that photo of the USNS San Jose taken heading into port in my home town Sydney ,looking at the funnel shape was she built that way or she a converted Matson Line vessel.Cheers Steve
Hi Steve;
Actually we were leaving port going blue water, needed to wring out our livers. We pulled into Freemantle a couple of weeks later and then spent a month in Darwin operating tithe your Navy in East Timor (What a garden spot) But Darwin and the great folks there made the whole trip more than worthwhile. I was still using DOS on that cruise.
The San Jose was the seventh and last of the US NAVY: USS Mars class fleet cargo ships, which were turned over to the Military Sealift Command, still doing the same job, but with a civilian crew vice a Navy crew.
Thanks for the info Paul I should have checked Wikipedia before posting,I miss the visits from USN in Sydney, tour the ships,that’s all stopped,no doubt due to world events invading our fair shores,hope you enjoyed the amber fluids on your visit to oz,back in the 80’s had the pleasure of meeting some crew members of DDG-990 USS Ingersoll(which I believe was used for target practice and sunk off Hawaii)had a great time.
Steve;
Not as much as we did in visiting when OZ, great Folks, beautiful country and great beer (Except Fosters) In a pub in Windom on the Gold Coast I bought raffle tickets to win fresh beef, my buddy asked why, and I said the girl selling the tickets was naked, I can’t remember ever saying no to a nude woman. I won four times over 6 days and the bartenders and I BBQ’ed the beef on the beach on the weekend.
I didn’t know about the Ingersoll, but then I’ve been retired longer than most~
Paul,
I decided to keep Window’s 8 on my old laptop. People said Window’s 8 wasn’t good and that you should keep Window’s 7 instead. My new laptop already comes with Windows 10. Just takes a period of adjustment like with Window’s 8.
Papa Duck;
Windows 8? Living on a mountain we miss a lot in the world. Did I miss Windows 9 too? Oh well, as long as Microsoft Word stays the same I’ll be fine. I just wish I’d not pressed that button for 10 over and over again.
I guess I should feel blessed that my ‘puter just wouldn’t load W10. I’d better quit trying. ?
David;
You are a wise man; quickly move that finger away from that button! If only I’d followed my own advice! (LOL)
Hillary remembers her first email, she just can’t remember where she stored it!
Tony;
Can’t remember where it was stored or when it was deleted?
A lot of controversy over Windows 10 as if it has built in spyware so Microsoft will know what everyone is doing. I don’t know how much of that is true but there have been many ” advices ” about turning off many of the security / privacy options on Windows 10. I am sure your ” computer Guy ” can fill you in on that.
Many that are on Windows 7 have been having problems with the update function running all the time using 50% of the processor continuously slowing performance down. I have one PC with that happening and it is not upgradable to Win 10.
I upgraded the 3 PC’s that I have that were compatible with Win 10 and no problems or loss of files etc. in the process. For what I use it for Win 10 seems ok and as fast as my fastest XP PC used to be before Microsoft started obsoleting them a little at a time.
Microsoft ” claims ” Windows 10 will be the last Operating System they will ever come out with but I think that is a ” Check In The Mail ” statement. LOL I am experimenting with some Linux ( something like generic ) operating systems on my now mostly obsolete Windows XP Pc’s and also got a Google Chromebok so I have something other than Microsoft to use to stay on the internet just in case.
Good luck with your Windows 10 Paul. For me, so far I will give it an OK+ for what I use a PC for.
Your article and writing style appear to have returned to normal so that is a good sign regardless of what kind of PC or Operating System people read it on.
Bob (NY);
You had more information than I had ever heard on Windows 10, I still can’t find some files. But as I said, it’s like a bad haircut, talk to me about it in two weeks (LOL)
Computers were supposed to cut your work day in half, did anyone ever say that happened to them?
I know that I’ll be over it by the time my hair grows out, and all will be fine once more.
I had problems with windows 10 when I down loaded it on to my old laptop. It wouldn’t let me download photos, kept telling me it could not find the device I was using. It still drives me mad at times.
Weren’t we told that computers would save paper, there seems to be more waste then ever.
Marjorie;
I was on the ship’s and every month we had to print the cargo inventory off of the computer, and then put it into a box and stow it in one of the storerooms while mailing a copy on a drive to HQ, the inventory took two days to print. And no one ever read the paper copy so if it stopped printing I just threw whatever was finished into the box, and got away with that for years!
Windows 10 also materialised on my laptop. It is better than 8.1 when you get used to it, but as an old soldier I would kill for XP again.
Murray;
The free part should have been the indicator that something was wrong, which didn’t occur until it was too late for me.
I made the mistake of downloading Windows 10 about a year ago, wish I had Windows 7 back though.
If you buy a new laptop with Windows 10 on it, everything works fine, but when I installed Windows 10 onto my then, 2 year old Lenovo, no one bothered to tell me that Lenovo had not updated many of there programs yet to work with Windows 10, so many things still, to this day do not work , since Lenovo will not update many of there programs to work with Windows 10.
Plus it has no games on it at all, unless I have the internet turned on at all times.
How do you like Cortana, Paul?
Bill S;
I knew Cortana from years ago; she worked at a little bar in Saint Jo, Costa Rica and now works for Microsoft, what a world we live in. All my games whet south with the ducks, but I’ve re-installed them. When I think of Bill Gates and all the money he has, I wonder why he still goes to work every day.
I guess I’m a diehard technophobe. My first duty station was a big Post warehouse, back in ’74. They took me in to see the “brains of the operation”. In an air conditioned room, behind a double door air lock were walls filled with main frame computers. They had reel to reel tapes clicking along at irregular and uneven intervals. It looked like the lair of a James Bond villain. I was fresh from the Virginia hills and it scared the crap out of me.
Halfway through my career, someone decided that I should learn how to use a computer, so they sent me to a one week course. I guess that was Doss. At least I remember folks saying that a lot. I sorta learned how to do simple stuff like write a letter and simple arithmetic. Mostly I learned that they were temperamental gadgets without much practical use. Everything I had learned, I could do nearly as fast with pen and paper or a typewriter. Then I went back to work….. on the truck line…… where there were no computers.
Then I got assigned as the unit safety NCO. Lots and lots of records and reports that had to be done on a computer. But this one was different from the one I had trained on a couple years before. Back to another one week course where I learned the same thing with different commands. Still just as aggravating. Most of the reports were on pre printed forms that had to be fed into a printer. Then you typed on a screen, aiming at where you thought the words might, maybe appear on the paper when you hit the print command. I think that required you to use 2 fingers from the right hand and 1 from the left. Most of us just used the typewriters. Then some evil officer issued an order and all the typewriters were confiscated.
Over the years I bounced back and forth between duties on the truck line and office type work. Each time I returned to a desk, the computers had changed and I did not know how to operate them. I retired before I ever heard of anything called an internet.
These days, I still have trouble with computers and someone frequently has to help me out of a jam. I start each help session by explaining that some archeologists chipped me out of a glacier a couple weeks ago and taught me to use Facebook and e-mail.
Take care,
Pete
Pete;
That was funny and very similar to my experience, but by then the computer was here to stay and I had no way to escape it. But here was military logic at its best: The ship’s cargo inventory had to be transferred to many, many 5 inch floppy disks and forwarded to HQ in Oakland CA by Snail Mail. Then 16 hours of printing of the same inventory on that old huge paper and boxed and stored on the ship for ever and ever, where no one ever opened that box again. BTW the information was still on the computer. If the system crashed we had to wait for HQ to send those disks back by (You guessed it) Snail mail). I in my wisdom was smart enough to keep my own copy of the disks in my desk drawer and reused them the following month.
Hi Paul,
I was undecided about W10, so did a little research.
I’ve always been happy with W7 which does everything I need fast and efficiently.
I also noted that W7 will be supported until 2020.
Given all the above and the fact that my trusty Acer Aspire is already going on 5yrs old, I decided to stick with W7.
With built in obsolences I doubt my Laptop will reach 9yrs old, therefore I will wait until I upgrade it and get W10 pre-installed.
That folks is the method in my madness, Lol 🙂
Chas;
until 2020? no one told me that, I’ll never push a download button again!