Why Machines Should Not Be Smarter Than Their Owners

I have been outsmarted, yet again, by Windows 7.

I am a PC person. Macs and I just do not seem to get along and I have always had PCs. I have always had my qualms with Windows, but Linux, in my limited experience with it (a much older version), was far too complicated. Even though the Windows interface is unintuitive and cumbersome, I like the ability that if you play around with it for long enough, you can figure out how to troubleshoot problems. Windows 7 has changed this one feature that I actually like.

My Windows 7 changes features on its own whim, and no matter how much I explore the computer, I cannot seem to get them back. I had a problem with a program whose settings had mysteriously been truncated by my over-zealous operating system (I was provided some warning about compatibility issue only after I had been searching for a remedy for the better part of an hour), and I found that the only solution was to uninstall the program and reinstall from scratch. It was absurd.

When I was at the airport coming back from my Alma Mater the last time, I had the unlucky coincidence of being placed at the gate where the Windows 7 people were advertising the media capabilities of the operating systems by having people take a picture with a Santa-impersonator. Although little kids seemed excited, the young representatives were encouraging adults as well. I was getting sick and feeling fairly miserable. One young rep had the unfortunate gall to come and ask me what operating system I was using on my laptop and trying to get a picture. I tried to courteously decline at first, but when he started questioning me on the operating system, I let out a tirade about everything that bothered it about me in a cold tone. The man, trying to maintain his advertisers attitude sort of sheepishly invited me again and scooted off to bother someone else.

In the daily mail

Cerinthus and I returned to school yesterday. Classes do not resume for a long while, but we get to spend the next week enjoying life in the apartment with work preparing for the semester (I must, of course, spend a lot of time working on my thesis), but not the same hustle and bustle of classes. We have been enjoying each others company as well as catching up on news, reading, grocery shopping, etc. Things are a little bit strange because Cerinthus got a haircut while he was home. It used to be quite long-- he wore sideburns and a ponytail (his hair was down to his shoulders). Now, it is quite short-- not a buzz cut or the like, but still only an inch-and-a-half or so long. He looks so incredibly different, especially because he also got a pair of glasses (he regularly wears contacts and he still does, but the glasses are for days when his allergies act up, etc) and is rather hard to accustom myself to it. However, it is lovely to see him again and to be back.

Today, being our first full day back, we went to check the mail. Although I was expecting one package, I ended up with four. One of them turned out to actually be for Cerinthus-- Acomdata repaired the harddrive that I accidently broke and sent it back to him. Oddly enough they sent him no warning. It was, however, a wonderful surprise and we now have another terabite of backup for pictures, movies, and music, which will be quite nice (and I don't feel so bad for accidentally messing it up, although they could not recover any of the data). A second package should have arrived before I left school-- it was some tea and a new head for my toothbrush from my lovely mother. Very nice and useful, even though it was late.

The last two items were orders from amazon.com. The first were the figure skate guards I bought for Cerinthus and me. Mine are silver glitz and his are red glitz. They are guard dog skate guards and I found they fairly easy to put together. We will probably go skating tomorrow, so I will get to test them out for real, but I like them so far.

The last package was the most exciting of all. I am actually using it right now. In the big amazon box was my Dell Inspiron 11z. YAY. I have had the same computer for the last 5 years. It was a fabulous laptop-- a Dell Inspiron 700m. It still works perfectly well, but because I am in the middle of my thesis, my wonderful parents decided that they should buy me a new laptop so that I would have it in case my old laptop crashed. I feel very sad, somehow, abandoning it, but I am glad to have a lighter, faster, more powerful laptop with a much bigger harddrive.

The one thing that I am having a real trouble with is Windows 7. It is too much like a Mac operating system. I understand the beauty of Mac operating systems but they just do not work for me. I do not love Windows operating systems either, but there was something less graphic and more manual about them that I appreciated which Windows 7 does not seem to have. I will have to continue using it and then evaluate it again.