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The Portkey
27/03/2005 06:26 pmNearly four weeks after acquiring the Preciousss, Izzie has finally found her way online and has lots and lots of catching up to do.
Firstly, the ma had the inspired idea to finally return their dinosaur computer to its proper resting place in the little room beside the kitchen where the Izzie has no worries about disturbing or waking anyone on her midnight prowls.
We simply pushed the desk with all the works from one room to the other without dismantling or dismembering anything. But when the time came to turn it on - the screen was perfectly well behaved but insisted that there was no signal. Just could not get a peep out of the big grey box. Izzie slinked and lurked around the back in a maze of wires and noticed that the surge board lights were simply not working. But that is strange - all the plugs are connected to the one board so why is one working and not another. But on second glance - turns out the monitor was not connected to the board at all but on a separate plug. But one of the plugs stuck in the surge board turns out to be the plug to the board itself. A cute little Godelian knot that was. Izzie was most amused indeed.
So it was as well we did get it working again because the Iz needed to dial up the ISP so that we could write it down and give it to the Preciousss
Nasty little sneaks have no respect. They just went and jilted the Precious. Mind you - getting 40 minutes online time with that mob without being tossed out is a most unusual thing indeed.
So once we got the name and number and got all the bits and pieces plugged into their various sockets, we went off typing it all in only to be told that there was no dial tone. Tried at least three times. So was it any surprise when after following the strings to their sources that Iz finally figured that the grey attachment on the phone extension was not the line out but the telephone sitting next to it?
Silly serpent. So after figuring out that one, it was not long to go before hearing the celestial sound of a line being dialled and finally being able to stick those Izzie paws in the front door of the Apple Store.
So first port of call was the mysterious X11 which Izzie has been downloading for the last forty minutes or so. Lucky it does not start from scratch each time we get disconnected. Unfortunately, being a dial up line, it will probably take three hours in all to get that little bugger in the box. Then we will make one more attempt at launching Open Office before giving it up as a hopeless case and just grabbing NeoOffice instead.
The Izzie is having lots of trouble with her right paw using this keyboard. We keep veering too far over to the right as it is a good bit smaller than the normal large layout that we are used to. Strange that we have no problems at all with the left paw.
Will now have to download one of those LJ client thingies which hopefully does updates and stuff with each infrequent online escapade. While the Precious fits quite comfortably in the Izzie bag, it is still just a bit heavy and well.... precious to be wanting to go off leaving the Lair any more than absolutely necessary.
Update - the one night that the Izzie was able to lurk online - there's a nasty storm raging outside so we are running the Preciousss on batteries and better get off the phone line in case nasty things sizzle its innards. Did manage to snatch MSN messenger and Xjournal so hopefully can now do Secret Diary stuff offline. X11 was as big a pain as ever - after having downloaded only 11mb from a total of 43mb after three hours or so, the Iz just got pissed off and dumped it along with the even fatter and greedier NeoOffice which is 3 times bigger. Having access to nothing but an old fashioned 56k moden truly is a bummer. Will have to find more devious means of getting those paws on Open Office.
So - time to slink outside and watch the green lightseses.
Firstly, the ma had the inspired idea to finally return their dinosaur computer to its proper resting place in the little room beside the kitchen where the Izzie has no worries about disturbing or waking anyone on her midnight prowls.
We simply pushed the desk with all the works from one room to the other without dismantling or dismembering anything. But when the time came to turn it on - the screen was perfectly well behaved but insisted that there was no signal. Just could not get a peep out of the big grey box. Izzie slinked and lurked around the back in a maze of wires and noticed that the surge board lights were simply not working. But that is strange - all the plugs are connected to the one board so why is one working and not another. But on second glance - turns out the monitor was not connected to the board at all but on a separate plug. But one of the plugs stuck in the surge board turns out to be the plug to the board itself. A cute little Godelian knot that was. Izzie was most amused indeed.
So it was as well we did get it working again because the Iz needed to dial up the ISP so that we could write it down and give it to the Preciousss
Nasty little sneaks have no respect. They just went and jilted the Precious. Mind you - getting 40 minutes online time with that mob without being tossed out is a most unusual thing indeed.
So once we got the name and number and got all the bits and pieces plugged into their various sockets, we went off typing it all in only to be told that there was no dial tone. Tried at least three times. So was it any surprise when after following the strings to their sources that Iz finally figured that the grey attachment on the phone extension was not the line out but the telephone sitting next to it?
Silly serpent. So after figuring out that one, it was not long to go before hearing the celestial sound of a line being dialled and finally being able to stick those Izzie paws in the front door of the Apple Store.
So first port of call was the mysterious X11 which Izzie has been downloading for the last forty minutes or so. Lucky it does not start from scratch each time we get disconnected. Unfortunately, being a dial up line, it will probably take three hours in all to get that little bugger in the box. Then we will make one more attempt at launching Open Office before giving it up as a hopeless case and just grabbing NeoOffice instead.
The Izzie is having lots of trouble with her right paw using this keyboard. We keep veering too far over to the right as it is a good bit smaller than the normal large layout that we are used to. Strange that we have no problems at all with the left paw.
Will now have to download one of those LJ client thingies which hopefully does updates and stuff with each infrequent online escapade. While the Precious fits quite comfortably in the Izzie bag, it is still just a bit heavy and well.... precious to be wanting to go off leaving the Lair any more than absolutely necessary.
Update - the one night that the Izzie was able to lurk online - there's a nasty storm raging outside so we are running the Preciousss on batteries and better get off the phone line in case nasty things sizzle its innards. Did manage to snatch MSN messenger and Xjournal so hopefully can now do Secret Diary stuff offline. X11 was as big a pain as ever - after having downloaded only 11mb from a total of 43mb after three hours or so, the Iz just got pissed off and dumped it along with the even fatter and greedier NeoOffice which is 3 times bigger. Having access to nothing but an old fashioned 56k moden truly is a bummer. Will have to find more devious means of getting those paws on Open Office.
So - time to slink outside and watch the green lightseses.
