Is This Thing On?

Happy new year! Only a week late… No sewing projects so far this year, I’ve been dealing with iPad photo woes.

Making silly faces

Short version - on 12/26 got a warning that my iPad memory was full ‘cause I have so many pictures… it’s 6 years old, probably due for an upgrade, so bought a new 1 terrabyte iPad… pick it up from the Apple Store, help line is loooooooong, so take it home to do the setup myself. Setup is good but pictures won’t download from iCloud… go back to the Apple Store… spend 4 hours waiting for help… help sucked and basically sent me home to do it myself. 

I’d kept the original iPad offline, thinking if the iCloud transfer failed, I’d still have those as a backup. Yeah… help guy forgot to tell me about one more teeny tiny setting I needed to switch off and…. Poof! all but about 6000 random pics from my 59,000+ photo library are gone. Cue pulling out my hair and yelling at the universe.

Bottom(ish) line, my iPhone is backed up to a separate account and has most of the pics I lost. Apple makes it very hard to download/upload pics, especially to a PC or other service (help guy said they throttle download speeds deliberately to make it difficult.) It’s taken me the better part of a week, but I think I have everything in place to do the iPad reload tomorrow. Please cross your fingers and beseech the computer gods that it goes well. I’m tired of this and just want to quilt. 

Techie Joy

Back in the olden days, before I retired, I was a kinda techie software-nerd, the one who solved software problems and taught software how-to’s to most of the department. I kept up on computer specs and couldn’t wait to get new hardware every couple of years.

How things do change in retired life! My current computer is 15-ish years old, I haven’t looked at tech specs in at least 10 years and the thought of a (much needed!) upgrade to new hardware was stressing me out. 

Fortunately, Gary’s step-son has a degree in computers (top of his class!), works at Best Buy for the holidays, and was willing to help me make both a decision and a purchase. 

Everything was due to arrive Tuesday but in an early Christmas miracle, it actually got here today. I was worried about the learning curve from Windows 8 to Windows 11 but… it was easy. As was moving over all my files and (most of) my photos. I’m so excited (now that the hard part is over.)

Happy early Christmas to me!

Monster

This sweet, adorable little child?
 
Has turned - almost overnight - into a computer monster. If anyone is using a computer, she has to be right there - turning the monitor on and off; banging on the keyboard; and her absolute favorite - pressing the main power button to off. This last one gets a strong reaction, needless to say, which is probably why she likes it so much. Tell her 'no', move her away, substitute other toys? Nothing works.

My little darling outdid herself this weekend though. She swiped my computer mouse - while Naia was using the computer - and very carefully dropped it into the cats' water dish. Oh, the irony.  And oh, the very dead mouse.

Fortunately, the mouse was very old and the little girl is very cute. 
But I'm keeping this new one well out of her reach.   

Routers and Beefcake

I've mentioned before what a camera hog Lily-kitty is. Saw her posed on the bed like this and she stayed there, watching me, while I went to get a camera and took several shots. As soon as I switched the camera off, she rolled over and got up. A little kitty beefcake, anyone?

A couple of people asked about my new router. I bought the Netgear Wireless-N 300. We tried to get it at Fry's but it was out of stock - and I would have walked away anyway rather than continue dealing with the very pushy, obnoxious sales clerk - and ended up at Best Buy where it was on sale for under $60.

With Netgear's very clear instructions, it took me less than 30 minutes to switch from the old to the new - and that included untangling cables. So far, I'm very pleased (hope that doesn't jinx me.) We have a strong, continuous signal throughout the house, even in rooms separated from the router by several walls, and we can have multiple computers online at the same time - neither of which our old router could handle.

There is a Wireless-N 150 that covers less area (for smaller houses) and a larger, business version that the tech guy said was overkill and too much trouble to get working correctly. Hope this helps - let me know if you have more questions and I'll try to answer them.