A PHOTOGRAPH QUESTION??

I have two groups of photographs that I need to put somewhere so that friends can look at them. One group of photographs is from our trip to Chaco Canyon and another group is from a party that we attended as a farewell to good friends and I want to share them with other party-goers.

I went to Flickr and looked at their website and then I went to Snapfish and looked at what they had to offer. Both seem similar but different. Today my nephew was here and I mentioned it to him and he suggested another online company--I have already forgotten the name (overload, maybe??).

Photo by Jerry

Choices, choices. Do any of you have suggestions for downloading photographs to sites where family and friends can view them?? I think I am about ready to tackle another new technological task--gulp! :)

KEEPING UP!

In the past couple of years I have learned to blog, to join Facebook, to burn DVDs, to program my picture key chain, and master my self-publishing project. Lately I have been feeling right proud of myself and all my technological accomplishments. However, today I got a message that requires me to join Twitter and a request to put a bit of a video on my blog. Those two requests were just about the straws that broke my techie camel's back!

All of these advances in technology are marvelous and I really am excited when I master them, but the learning curve for me is often quite a stretch. I grind my teeth, make attempts by myself, and when all else fails I call one or more of my sons who know far more than I will EVER learn. They certainly did not inherit their technological skills from me, but I am really grateful that they are willing to share their expertise with me. And they do it so nicely. Thank you, boys!

Anyhow! When I have a block of time, I will figure out how to join Twitter and I will hopefully learn how to put a bit of video on my blog. Meanwhile, I continue being proud of the techie skills I have acquired so far as I prepare to post this message to my blog.

COMPUTER IS BACK!

My computer is back and I am so glad to be back in my own little nook with my own computer and all of its resurrected files!

Thank you, Son #1! You are a genius in this technology world in which we function today!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

COMPUTER FRUSTRATIONS!

My computer is still under the weather. My #1 Son, aka Computer Guru, had it up and running and ready to ship off to me when it crashed again. He said he just decided to insert a NEW hard drive and dump all my stuff into the new hard drive. Whee! However, that will take more time, so I am still without my Photoshop to create new pictures to paint, my mouse to help me navigate more easily, my files to consult for things I am writing, my e-mail addresses, etc, etc, and so on!

However! I have reminded myself that I am quite lucky to have a laptop, clunky though it is, to use in the interim. I can check my e-mail, read my blogs, do blog entries, and stay in touch with my computer world to a certain extent. Mainly this will make me appreciate my computer, my #1 Son, and the backup computers that have helped me this navigate this cyberspace that has become so important to me.

Ah, technology! How did we ever live without it??

TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCES

I am a bit lacking in technological skills and it takes me a long time to figure things out by myself. Yesterday I talked about pictures I wanted to consider painting when I return home from New Mexico but could not put the pictures on my blog once I had downloaded them to my picture file on this laptop I am using. I fiddled and fiddled with it last night and finally fell asleep in frustration. Today I decided to try a different procedure and, as you can see, it worked! It may be unconventional and my techie son may groan when I explain what I did, but the bottom line is that IT WORKED!!

The first picture is the view from my bedroom window yesterday at midday. The second is a sunset picture the first day I was here and the third is a sunrise picture the next morning.

The fourth picture is of an arrangement in the kitchen that made me think of painting a still life. The shapes and colors intrigued me.

Blogging

Marlys Marshall Styne has posted a wonderful article on her blog about blogging. She quotes Anna Quindlen who wrote, "Bloggers old and young know that we are on the bleeding edge of a renaissance in personal writing. Our blogs will become as important to our current and future loved ones as handwritten letters were to people of another era."

I so totally agree with that statement and I save my blog entries both on my hard drive and my external hard drive to make sure that I have copies of what I have written. I am not sure how my loved ones will save these entries like I have saved letters written to me by my grandmother. Seems like blogging technology is a little harder to keep in a treasure box up on the closet shelf where I keep my treasured letters from years ago. Maybe when I am gone my family will just put my external hard drive up on their closet shelf along with their other treasures. Hmmm! Something to ponder further.

A QUICK REPORT

Just wanted to check in and say that I am working on my book--a collection of stories about my growing up days. I have downloaded a number of the stories (some that you might have read on my blog plus some new ones!) into the files of a self-publishing company and am anxious to see how they turn out. Perhaps I will have a book before Christmas! That sounds exciting!


And I had another lesson in furthering my technological knowledge this morning. Yesterday I read Susan Albert's blog and she talked about downloading a book on her Kindle. I had no idea what she was talking about and I intended to look it up on the Internet, but forgot. Today I was talking to a friend about forming a book club at our church and she mentioned a book that she had just downloaded on her Kindle. She offered give me a quick lesson on the newest way to acquire and read books through Amazon.com at a fraction of the cost of buying the book. She told me that she had recently gone on a vacation with 25 books loaded on her Kindle that is about the size of a paperback! She was jumping all around on that thing, showing me different books, how she could underline and highlight passages, store her notes, and upload a book onto web storage for future reference. Mercy! I have a lot to learn to keep up with all these advances in technology!

Another Graduation in Our Family

Last night Son #4 graduated from college. It has been a long road for him but he finally made it across that stage. His wife, 2 year old daughter, 1 week old son and I watched on a live webcast from the college as he marched into the auditorium and later walked across the stage. It was quite moving. Daughter-in-law sat in the recliner with their two children and a small laptop, while I watched on their larger computer. We hollered and screamed when he walked across the stage. I took a picture of the computer screen and it turned out

blurry at best, but we really felt connected by being able to see the actual graduation as it happened--thanks to modern technology!


A family friend wrote the following rictameter poem in honor of his graduation.

At last!
It's happening
The struggle is finished
Graduation is accomplished
It is a fait accompli; it's all done
No more burning midnight oil
No bibliographies
It is over
At last

--L. Seeger

Congratulations, Son #4!