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How tech-dependant get by when it goes belly-up

Don’t let the right hand know what the left hand is doing.
This is not just advice, this is how I live my life. My right side of anything never knows what my left side is doing at any given moment. Even though I haven’t tried, I now see the fruit of living this motto.

Trying to be as transparent as I dare in this column and on my blog, I will share my vulnerable side with the world in hopes of making someone else feel as if they aren’t quite as bad as me.
My vulnerability? I’m organizationally challenged.

Yes, I know, I hide it well (hmm ...), but you might as well know I’m not the Queen of Organization one might think, looking from the outside. (Wait just a minute while I take another bite of my crackers and honey. I do@’t kno4$ waht’s wrong wit# these key*s on the computer but theyyy just won’t stop stickin!.)

Take for instance, this wonderful piece of technology: The computer. A few weeks ago it went crazy and I couldn’t do anything on it. I took it into the computer expert and called him every day begging him to get it fixed ASAP.

When he asked if I had a backup PC, I laughed and said, “Who has a backup PC?”

His reply: “Anyone who writes for a living has a back-up PC.” Whatever.

Because life could not stand still while my computer was in the shop, everywhere I went I did a little business. In the computer store, the laptop on display became my office while I waited. I stopped in at my neighbor’s and the laptop on her counter was where I set up some appointments while we discussed the perils of housework. On my way out of the bank, the library was all of a sudden my office in town.

When I finally got my computer back, I set it up and had exactly one hour to write my column. The keys were on fire, I was halfway through with one of the best columns I’ve ever attempted, and bam! The computer shut down.

It overheated. I lost the column and any sanity I had for that day.
It was naptime, anyway.

When I discovered I had no word processing program like I used to have, I was more than disappointed. I remembered the computer expert telling me he saved all my documents but had to wipe all the software off and reinstall everything – but he forgot to reinstall Word.

I called the company and explained my situation, and they told me that I should have a disc with the software on it. It was obvious they didn’t know to whom they were talking; I’m still trying to find the disc.

Last week I had a deadline for a column. While I was working on one deadline, the editor was working on one two days earlier than mine. Then, you add in the fact that the editor is in Holland and they are seven hours ahead of us, and they have to translate my column into several different languages, taking even more time. This was a problem.

While I began writing, my mind began to wander to How am I going to count the words for this column? It has to be 350 words, no more, no less. How in heaven’s name am I going to count them without a word processing program to count them for me?

The Great Rustico came through for me again – thanks to the generosity of Jersey Canada allowing their head honcho to take time out of his busy day to take my column, paste it into Word, count the words for me and send it back to me for more editing. Seventeen e-mails later, I finally got it finished and sent it off.
So this morning, as I write, my desk is a mess, I still haven’t found the Microsoft Word disc and all the covers on the remote controls are missing. Besides my neighbor and me, does anyone else have trouble keeping the covers on their remote controls?

Readers with questions or comments for Melissa Hart may write to her in care of this publication.

3/4/2009