thought you were dead

Sent an email out the other week, and one of the recipients replied "thought you were dead".
Their reasoning was that because I had not been active online for some months, then I must have died, because everyone is online all the time.

How strange. I know many people who never use a computer, but who are most definitely alive. They go shopping in real shops, meet people face to face or use that old fashioned thing called a "phone".

I have myself spent several months (apart from my full time employment) attending committee meetings of various charities that I am a trustee of, sitting talking to friends, visiting relatives, helping a reading scheme in a local school and going for walks in the countryside with my dog. And all of them without a computer in sight! What a relief for me not to be staring at a small screen for hours on end.

So I make this comment, partly to reassure all my friends across the world, and acquaintances, that I am still very much here.

Customer support

I have just spent a few very frustrating days trying to get hold of customer support for an internet based company. There is no address or phone number that I can find on their web site - just the email address for their help desk.
Well, I have posted a series of questions relating to a payment and a supposed upgrade of my service, but I have not had any reply in the last three days.

How does any company expect to retain its customers if those customers cannot get any help for the products they have purchased? The most visible aspect of any company is its customer support department.

ill? - see the vet!

Coming home by bus from town yesterday, I saw an interesting notice on the side of a Veterinary clinic. "Special Senior Citizens Clinic, come for your vaccinations here".

Well, I know older people need special treatments, but I did not realise that they had to go to the vet to get treated!!

paperless society - who me?

At work, we are (like all other companies, I hope) trying to cut down on waste and one measure is to stop needlessly printing out emails. However, it is still true that most staff have notebooks that are taken to meetings.
I remember reading an article years ago that heralded the advent of the paperless office. But paper is still so much easier to handle in many situations.
And at home? Well, I have just bought a new bookcase, to hold my overflowing collection of books - crime novels, books on science, geography and travel, religion, cookery and education. I find nothing more relaxing than curling up with a good book. Especially after a day spent staring at a computer screen!

early wake up

getting up early during the fast is a bit of a problem to many people. However, yesterday I had help from an unexpected direction. I live on a bus route and the nearest stop is just a hundred yards away. Anyway, workmen have been repairing a cable by the stop, so it was temporarily moved.
At 5am yesterday morning I was awoken by the sound of a bus waiting at the bus stop -right outside my house!

after the Feast, the Fast

Well the Intercalary days have come and gone, and we are now in the month of fasting. It has been a good few days this year in our family, with some nice presents, visiting family and friends and going to the cinema one evening.

Really looking forward to fasting for the next few weeks, as it involves getting up before sunrise for breakfast and dawn prayers. Actually, I suppose the evening meal should then be called 'breakfast' for this month! Certainly a time to reorient the "spiritual compass".

tea and biscuits

It has been a long family tradition through several generations, that mid afternoon we had tea and biscuits. Never just a cup of tea. Well I have been trying to lose weight recently but I still find myself going for the biscuits. It is the same at work. Whenever someone comes back from holiday, celebrates their birthday or some special event (fund raising for charity) out come the biscuits, cakes and even jam donuts.

So what did I take in to share with my team yesterday, to mark the Baha'i calendar "Intercalary days"? Yes, of course - biscuits! (OK there were some apples and oranges as well.)

documentation required

an old point this, but worthwhile repeating. Keeping notes is important. You may be the one that comes back years afterwards trying to make sense of the material. The notes that you made at the time may save much time later on. That goes whether you are writing a computer program, running tests on computer programs, or just (as I have recently been doing) going through lots of old photographs. Actually there are over 1500 slides that I am digitising - and the notes I kept (each slide is numbered) are proving invaluable.

My aim is a comprehensive family archive on the one hand, and a new, updated set of slide shows (now called 'presentations') for the Baha'i Faith. Years ago I travelled the country, and across America, Canada and Europe, giving talks on the Baha'i Faith and carrying sets of slides to be shown at the meetings.

Headphones and Acer Aspire with Linux

Finally I have a working set of headphones on my Laptop! I have been trying to sort the problem out for some time, and have scanned many (hundreds?) of messages trying to get to the solution of my problem - why is there no sound from my headphones.

I have discovered that it is nothing to do with the version of Alsa that I am using, and nothing to do with the version of Linux or the kernel drivers. My problem is now solved.

It all comes down to the fact that in the sound chip used in the Acer there are several channels, and thus about a dozen volume controls in the mixer. Well, the control that deals with the output to the headphones is the one marked "surround sound". I just would never have guessed. Having unmuted the surround channel, I can now get sound in the headphones.

Where are you, or why are you not online?

I had an email from a friend recently. He thought that just because I had not been regularly posting on my blog, that maybe something had happened to me again. Well, I have news for you, dear friend. I am alive and kicking. Just because I do not feel the need to get a daily dose of electronic life, does not mean that I have ceased to exist.

There are many, many people who happily go about their daily life totally untouched by email, mobile phones, or any other online activity. (Several members of my own family for starters.) My activities over the last few months have kept me very busy both daytime and evenings, and I will admit that I have then been too tired to go online for weeks at a time. Attending charity meetings, regaining my fitness (cycling, swimming and this last few weeks even skiing!), and that usual one of "spending more time with my family" as well as my full-time employment and going to Baha'i prayer meetings and such.

I am online now because of the snow having stopped our plans to go out, and because I have been looking up information to help sort out getting sound on my Acer laptop running Linux.