Uncomfortably New. Back To The Familiar

Sorry, but I loaded the pictures in the wrong order. So we begin with this morning and go backwards in time. I am also using the laptop keyboard for the first time (I had been using an add on keyboard all this time with a real mouse not the touch pad) and one of the shift keys (left) is broken so I have to stop and shift right with capitals. This is going to take longer than usual.

Here's a picture of our table at lunch yesterday at Macaroni Grill at around 3 pm. G had Chicken Marsala and I had Eggplant (of course) with salads but no wine and no dessert. We may be on vacation but I am still on the diet.

The Apple Store in Portland. To the left is Adam who sold me my new iMac. That's my iMac on the cart to his left and he has a coat on because we are going outside to where G is waiting in the car in 27 degree weather. G is parked in the Department of Motor Vehicles spot, illegally.

Yes, I bought a new computer. I selected it while standing up. And now that I have it at home, it is so large, the screen so wide (like a television) and my chair so low that I am having visual problems with my tri focals. G had to switch all the colors to muted tones. It was all so bright. Like a carnival. And we tried to use iPhoto last night. And now I am back to using the laptop and have the camera hooked up here. I'm seriously considering packing the new one up and taking it back. It's really too much. And it's the smallest of the iMacs. Overkill.

Our first stop yesterday was the Art Supply but that picture is next. Here is our second stop. Big Sky Bakery. Where we each sampled some bread. G had English Muffin and I had German Rye (a very small sample compared to G's). Then we drove into Portland and the Apple Store.

Art Supply. They have painted all the walls of the building and it looks very nice. There were so many cars in the parking lot that this was the only wall I could take a picture of. Everyone was parking so they could eat in the bakery which is next door to the Art Supply. It was lunchtime. I purchased more NeoColors, this time buying the water soluble ones which I used to do the drawing in my red book at the top of this post. I also got some more brush pens but in a different brand and a Niji waterbrush like Roz uses in her journals. We've come full circle.

I hate all things that are new except for art supplies which are completely under my control. Despise new machines. I take comfort in the familiar even if they no longer work for me
(fridge is an example). The things I can use, wear and enjoy without struggle, tears and failure. So far, I do not like this new computer at all. I liked it in the store when it was dwarfed by the larger machines. In the bright lights. Now, here at home, on my small cramped desk, with a wall behind me so I can't back up far enough to not have my eyes cross while looking at the screen? It is too large. It is far too complicated.

Apple has taken iPhoto which was so simple that even I could use it the first time and made it into something so confusing that I don't think I will ever be able to understand it. And does it do a better job with all the complicated techno files crap? My daughter has had her iMac for 6 months and while she tried to help me navigate iPhoto over the phone, it was soon obvious that she has found it too complex to use, and doesn't use it as she had hoped to. The things that worked in the older iPhoto on my old computer are no longer available. Gone. Even the cropping tool is ridiculous. Clumsy. And neither G or I can figure out how to make a desktop file icon. And we have owned and used Macs since 1984.

So, the vacation so far, is giving me a headache. And because I am sitting up so high (just to have the correct part of the trifocals level with what I am looking at on the screen) and the screen is so large and the colors so vivid. My neck aches already. It's 10.30 in the morning and I think I will be going to my room to cry for awhile. Or just cry right here. Meanwhile, G is unpacking the new printer. Which I just told him to repack. Why unpack something we maybe returning to the Apple Store????

And, yes, I have read the horror stories of others with new Apple computers. And I have witnessed the weeks of absence on their blogs as they fight with technology. And they reappear with new visuals and not many scars. We'll see. My needs are simple compared to them. The blog, email and pictures. Period. I don't do anything else. No scanning, no Photoshop, no written text over photos, no photo montages, no slideshows or videos.