1150 Laptop Has Arrived

Wednesday, March 7, 2007

The new laptop arrived this afternoon. I played with it for a while, and got pretty frustrated. It's a Dell Inspiron 1501, with Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium, a 15.4 inch TrueLife Wide-screen WXGA, and 80GB hard drive. Or something.

There's absolutely no hardcopy documentation. I had to send an emergency email to Roman to ask how to open the CD/DVD tray. He walked me through a bunch of stuff by phone this evening.

I've been on Windows 98SE all this time, so I haven't made the stepwise transitions. I'm totally lost! Even the terminology is different. I can't find anything. Hey - who knew that on a laptop "Shutdown" is obsolete! Apparently it's there, but you don't need it, so it's hidden away in a dark place. I feel like the guy who complained that he couldn't find the "Any" key.

Tomorrow I'll read the softcopy documentation. I have to go to the museum tomorrow afternoon and take care of the membership renewals that have arrived since last week, so I'll stop in a bookstore and see if there's a Vista for Dummies book.

Daughter called. Her father (Ex#2) is home from the hospital, and already ignoring the diabetes diet. He has no feeling in his feet, one foot is purple, hands are numb. He hasn't "handled business" in ages, like for example his car hasn't been inspected, registered, or insured in two years. Daughter has some work ahead of her. The only good thing is that he isn't objecting to her plan to move him back east. She doesn't know where she'll PUT him, but, one step at a time....

I did go to the ballroom dance class this evening. There was a guy in the advanced class that meets before ours who stayed to assist with our class, so I had a really good partner.
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