Life After Windbird, Day 115: Too Many Computers
Date: Monday, December 5, 2016
Weather: Overcast with Rain; High Temp 46, Low 35 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA
I have too many computers! Better too many than not enough, but my day was spent staring at computer screens. That’s not what I intended to do, but one thing led to another that required cross-referencing documents from one computer to another. I was really just trying to get a head start on a presentation I will make to the Newcomers Club here in Falmouth in January about the favorite places visited while sailing around the world. I started by looking through the ‘Windbird Presentations’ folder on the computer I am currently using. This is the Asus that was Mark’s computer. There were lots of files that I knew should be there, but they weren’t. So I turned on the Toshiba computer that I was using prior to the email fiasco in November. The files I was looking for weren’t there either, but there were a few files that were not on the Asus. So I had to cross-reference files and copy and paste the ones that were missing. Then I dug out the computer that Mark used prior to the Asus. I need to get rid of that computer because the keyboard doesn’t work (has to be attached to an external keyboard to type). Near the top of my ‘to-do’ list has been cross-referencing files and folders to make sure everything has been transferred to the newer computers. After just checking the ‘Windbird Presentation’ folder, it became evident that there is LOT on that computer that is nowhere else. So I ended up spending a great deal of the day just getting the one document folder the same on all three computers. The good news is that much of the work is already done for that January presentation. The bad news is that I now know that I really have to cross reference all the other document folders on all three computers—not hard, just time consuming.
While pouring through the contents of the ‘Windbird Presentations’ folder, I decided that I really need a good Pacific-centered map of the world to hang in my hallway. All of the maps Mark and I used in past presentations were Eurocentric and those maps really don’t do justice to the island countries of the Pacific and Indian Oceans. For instance, the Republic of Indonesia is a country of 17,508 separate islands. Only 6,000 of those islands are inhabited and Mark and I only visited something like ten of those islands that stretched over 1,500 miles. Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world and eighty-some percent of those people are Muslim. It is easy to get side-tracked when thinking about the most important things to include in a presentation when there is just so much information. But back to the maps, I think it is much easier to see the expanse of Indonesia on a Pacific-centered map than it is on a Eurocentric one. I found a beautiful canvas three-foot by four-foot National Geographic world map that I would love to have, but then I found another NG world map that is about four-feet by five-feet. It is not canvas, but I want the really big one. So “hint, hint” for a Christmas gift if either of my children might be reading this!
Monday night is Scout night for the Goldstones, so I headed over at 6 pm to have my game night with Ollie. We played four different games and then headed upstairs to read. Ollie chose Curious George’s Christmas which is a book of Christmas carols and Raffi’s book of holiday songs. So we sang our way through bedtime reading. Jonah and Heather joined us for some of the singing. They all have such beautiful voices. It was definitely the highlight of my day.
