With certainty, I can now report that Hallandale Beach Public Library is the worst I’ve seen. They let children and teenagers romp around and let anyone talk as loud as they please. That includes the staff, who love to teach newcomers on the computers at full volume while the rest of us are trying to concentrate. I was testing the netbook a final time to see if it could be made to work. Nope, I’m taking it back. The doggie wig place called right while I was caught under an awning for a surprise two hour afternoon rain squall. That’s a remote password change, which has to occur each time there is a staff turnover, and a chat with the owner. She reports after all these years the only systems there that were done right the first time and still work properly were the ones I created. What does that tell you about the computer geniuses of today?
One more time, folks, let’s go over the rules for a password. No capitals, no spaces, all small letters, no punctuation unless it is from the top row of keys. And now I must add more: No unusual double vowels and stick to words that have a unique spelling. By double vowels, here is what I mean. Consider this password, “savannaalbert”. Worse, the original version had been misspelled “savvanaalbert”. Because of those two a’s, it took an hour more to crack it, and that costs a lot.
Remember Anna, my real estate agent? Her Verizon contract ran out and rather than lose her as a customer, they provided her with a private cellular antenna. It looks like a large wireless router and has a sticker saying to keep it near a window as it works with GPS. Has anyone ever heard of this? Anyway, she is switching to Comcast, so that will be a few dollars next week to reconfigure all the wireless gear.
Then over to Publix, where by coincidence half the old gang showed up at once. Fred and his wife, and etc. Naturally, the talk got to computers and passersby were stopping to listen in some awe. Fred is progressively taking over the laptop repairs formerly done by Mike. By not having to pay the shop bills, this is already my best September yet. Fred tells the same.
I’m looking at throwing my belongings into a storage bin and heading on the road for a few months, maybe for the winter. Have you seen the prices on those places lately? Maybe a few million other people have the same idea, for rental rates have doubled. And they want your life history over a 6 by 5. One alternative being considered is to buy a prefab shed and put it up at Fred’s. If my gear, consisting of twelve suitcases, is stored more than five months, the shed costs less.
Big Al called. He is a real fan of PeopleString. He views it as a potential business where I see it as a potential investment. Big Al knows countless people and has the demeanor that would make him successful as the leader of a sales seminar. He’d like me to put together a brochure with his family coat of arms. I can do stuff like that, you know, things like print up CoffeeTimes flyers. But Big Al is not going to sit around for a month after I’ve finished and then accuse me of “doing nothing”. Got that, Theresa?
The following [information] is heavily edited, but I thought some might find it amusing. I have probably the oldest spreadsheet still in regular usage, possibly the oldest of its kind in the world. It was my own retirement plan, one of the first things I programmed when I discovered the capabilities of VisiCalc back in 1982 (before I went to college). The relevance is that I now have actual figures to plug in. What do you know—I was only $166 per month off. Guru! Guru! The major item I did not plan for is that I could take this money now instead of waiting until I’m like 60 or 65, nor could anyone have foreseen that.
I’m still the youngest person ever to retire from the phone company but I vested the money and have never yet touched it. The rulebook states pensions are not counted as income, so I'm considering touching it. Here’s the quandary: that fateful decision is irreversible. If I wait, I’ll get that little bit extra, but there are soon to be millions for whom that little bit extra ($166) is going to mean the difference between steak or dog food, and in many sad cases, life or death. I don’t care to be among them.
[Author's note: my record youngest retirement from the phone company is likely never to be bested. I worked there during the heyday before cellular competition. I succeeded only because of the imprecise wording of the union contract, and the phone company has taken extreme measures to ensure the same can never happen again. (That nobody as young as me can ever retire like that again.) As it stands, people who worked there the maximum 44 years as wage slaves will get pensions at most a few dollars more than I. Golly, maybe next time they'll read the rules instead of talk about them.]
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