My Cat Caught a Lizard, and Other Things

Oh... I can't resist mentioning the grammar in the title...
Can't... resist...

It's just that it's such a good example of using a comma for clarification of meaning, not for telling someone where to pause or take a breath. See, these two sentences mean different things:
"My cat caught a lizard and other things."
"My cat caught a lizard, and other things."
The first sentence means my cat caught other things along with the lizard, which, with my cat, could be almost anything. Actually, I think he caught a spider this morning, too.
The second means that my cat caught only a lizard and there are other things I'm going to talk about.
Commas. They're important.
And not for telling me how to breathe.

I've made no secret, even though I haven't mentioned it in a while, of my antipathy for Windows 8. It's like a book, a horrible-bad book, that your English professor wrote and then made you read as an assignment. But, not just read it, read it over and over again. And it never gets any better, just... you get used to it. But, then, he tells you that he's made it better. You know, major re-writes and edits and all of that, but people start reading it and they tell you it's pretty much just the same. Maybe worse. Definitely not better. You don't bother with the new one.

That's me and Windows 8.1. I haven't known a single person who has said to me, "Oh, yeah, you should definitely switch to 8.1. It's way better." No... Pretty much everyone has told me that it's pretty much the same. A few of said they liked it less. So my computer has been prompting me to "upgrade" to 8.1 for a while, now. Months. Every time it prompted me, I told it "no." Why bother for just more of the same. I am, at least, used to Win8.
I guess it got tired of asking.

The other night, it just up and told me, "Heya, I'm upgrading to Windows 8.1. I can do it right now, or I can do it tomorrow. When do you want that to happen?" What I wanted to tell it was "NO!" but it wouldn't let me. I tried... well, I tried all sorts of things and it wouldn't let me stop the "upgrade" even though my stuff in the "Should I upgrade?" section told me that I could opt out.

Then it told me I needed to backup all of my files, which was fine except that I couldn't. I backed up my document files, but I have all of my photos on the computer, and I didn't have anything to put them all on nor did I have time to do it by the time I realized there was no way to stop the 8.1 installation. Really, I wouldn't have had time to do it without at least a week of notice. I was pretty furious by that point. Sort of a walking rant.

When the computer finally prompted, "I'm going to install Win 8.1, right now," I thought I had beat it by simply turning the computer off... but I was wrong. An hour or so later, the prompt came up again. And I turned the computer off again. But, when I turned it back on, it said, "Screw you! I'm installing this sucker, right now!"

Have I mentioned that I hate computers? Yeah... Kind of like how I hate cars. They should just work. Period. And they should work in the way you want them to work.

Anyway...
I have Win8.1 now. Here's what's changed:

• Everything is slower now. The computer takes longer to boot and pages take longer to load. You know, it's the heightened security or whatever.
• I no longer have to sign out of Windows before I can turn my computer off. Seriously, why was that even a thing? So that's one positive thing, although I still have to go to the start screen to do that.
• All of my files are now backed up to the "cloud." Because, as we have seen with the recent cloud hacking of celebrities "special" pictures, the cloud is more secure than having things just on my computer.

All of that and my cat caught a lizard. In the house. It was a western fence lizard

which I think are pretty cool because they're immune to Lyme disease. He was playing with it under the kitchen table, but I didn't pay any attention to him, because that's where he likes to play with pieces of cardboard he pulls off his scratching box or with the little strips off the Netflix envelopes. But he just kept going and going. Usually, he's only good for entertaining himself in that way for 5-10 minutes, but, once he crossed the 20 minute mark, I began to wonder what he was doing. At some point, I checked. He had a lizard. Amazingly, it was intact. Apparently, all he was doing was batting it around and throwing it in the air. However, it was still dead.
It was sad-making.

There was another thing, too, but I can't remember what it was. That's what comes of being interrupted as many times as I have. Always am. Probably, it wasn't important, and this is long enough anyway.

The Transition

As I've been mentioning recently, my computer died. It was an old computer, and, by all rights, past its time. I knew it was going, and, especially, I knew the video card was going. I kind of hate video cards. I had a huge drama with Dell many years ago over a video card and my first laptop. The only laptop I've ever owned because of the drama over the first one and the fact that it spent most of its life as an over-sized paperweight. That's exactly what I need, right? I a $1500 paperweight that was too big to be anywhere useful while it held that designation.

The problem I have with getting a new computer is that they have always changed so much since the last  time I got a computer. What I want is not a new computer but my old computer back again but faster and more intense (any Star Wars person out there worth his salt should get that). I sort of have the same attitude about shoes. I hate new shoes. I hate looking for shoes. I hate trying shoes on. New shoes never feel right on your foot. Old shoes feel right other than the fact that they are falling apart and causing you to trip as the sole flaps around at ground level like a dog snuffling for food. And, you know, tape just doesn't work to hold the shoe together because it wears out too quickly as you walk around on  it. It doesn't matter, though. What you want is a pair of shoes that feels like that part but without the floppy bits.

Or maybe that's just me.

So I really didn't want a new computer; I really just wanted my old computer back the way it was when I first got it but still able to do all the new things that it wasn't really capable of doing. That's why I put off for so long doing anything about the fact that I new I needed to do something about the video card. Well, that and the fact that I really didn't want to spend the money on
1. a new video card in an old machine that wouldn't be able to keep up with the new card.
2. a new computer.
Money is always tight, and new computers aren't in our budget. But, as I said recently, I have to have the computer, so, when the old finally went off to wherever old computers go when they die (which, right now, is actually behind my chair but which will soon be the garage), I went and got a new one. Actually, the reason for the new one is that it was going to cost as much to get the old one going again as it is to buy a new computer.
[That's actually something I hate, the disposableness of technology due to repair costs making it more cost efficient to buy new stuff. It wasteful, and our society needs to do something about this issue, not that I know what  that should be, but we need new attitudes around this stuff.]

Another note: I've always owned Dell computers. This is not so much because I love Dell or anything, but it's always just sort of worked out that way. In fact, there have been distinct periods of my history when I have absolutely abhorred Dell (see the incident with the laptop (okay, so I haven't actually told that story, but I'm not sure you really want to hear it, because it involves something like 80 hours on the phone with Dell (and that's not hyperbole -- I actually spent 80-100 hours on the phone with Dell over issues with the laptop))), but we always ended up with Dell anyway.

I needed a new computer. I needed to not spend too terribly much money on it. I needed it now.

Of course, the first thing I did was look at Dells, and I liked the prices, but I needed more information (because looking at the specs is like trying to read a foreign language, and I'd actually do better with some of those). One thing that's different with Dell since the last time I got a new computer is that you can actually go to a physical store and buy one (and, if you don't remember/know of a time when you couldn't go to a store and buy one, that should tell you how long it's been since I had a new computer), so I started calling around trying to figure out what I should I get, and, then, going in to places to look at stuff (and get all of my documents pulled off of my old computer (which is anxiety inducing)).

In the end, I didn't get a Dell (but I did get my documents). What I got from pretty much everyone I talked to is that Dell has crappy video cards. In other respects, they make the better machines, but you better just plan to get a new video card right off the bat. And that was the decision maker, really, because, at the price point I was looking at, I was told by a Dell fan that I should go with the HP (which was also on sale) because, if I bought the Dell, I'd need to get a new video card for it, which was going to up the price $120, which put it out of the price I wanted to spend (which was actually $0, but, you know, those don't exist).

I own an HP, now, and I don't know how I feel about that. But it's less of an issue that I now also have Windows 8, and I do know how I feel about that.
I hate it.

Oh my gosh! What were they thinking?

I get that we're heading into a tablet world and that's why, in effect, I could even replace my desktop, right now, because tablets are driving down the prices on desktops and laptops, and that's cool, but I did not want Windows 8! I don't own a tablet or anything like it. I haven't even used the Kindle I gave my wife for her birthday, which is the first and only mobile tech we have, so this whole touchy/feely thing we have going with our new technology is bothersome to me. I don't like it, and I don't want to have it.

The forced leap from Windows XP to Windows 8 is not a fun one is what I'm saying here. I don't like the interface. I don't really like anything about it. Sure, I know I'll get used to it, just like breaking in that new pair of shoes, but, right now, I don't like it. And I certainly don't like having to adapt to a whole new system when I'm feeling stressed about losing a week of work and two deadlines. All of this while knowing, in my head, that one day Windows 8 will be the old pair of floppy sneakers that I don't want to get rid of.

Still, for the moment, can't I just have my old shoes back?

And this, women, is why guys never throw out their old shoes.
Just sayin'.