Pillings Lock marina 2010#9

Wednesday 21st April and we have another beautiful, sunny morning.

I received a reply from those nice Typeitin people this morning. Paul informed me, something he should have taken the time to inform me about much earlier than this, that my version of the prog is not compatible with Windows 7!! Oh boy!

So, I downloaded the latest version and tried to install it. No such luck. I then tried uninstalling the earlier version, but no luck there either. Why? Because my computer tells me it can only be uninstalled in 64 bit, but I am now running 32 bit.

I then tried deleting the folder from programme files, but, as you would expect from this recalcitrant machine, that didn’t work either.

But, not to worry, help is at hand in the shape of my boater pal, Ivan, who has promised to wipe the HDD and install Windows XP, along with MS Office 2003 Professional and will give me a copy of both.

Say what you like about XP, but at least it had a good run before Vista and 7 came along, and it was much more reliable. Also, with 3Gb of memory, it should run pretty darned fast. Despite certain family members’ protestations to the contrary, Windows 7 sucks, at least on this laptop it does. I shan’t be sorry to see the back of it.

I am now awaiting the arrival of a new external hard drive, which is twice the size of the one I have now. I propose transferring all my backups to the new one and using the old one for saving important files and other installation programmes.

Meanwhile, back at the buildings, I am hoping my AFM arrives today and, more importantly, that it cures the fault. If not, and we find a repair will be too expensive for the car’s value, we will have to start looking for another one. Shame really, I do like the Alfa, having enjoyed driving one when I was still a working stiff. I dare say the super, duper model I saw in Autotrader has now been sold, because I would dearly love to get my hands on that one.

It is now 9.45 am and the Postman has been but, since Wifey met him outside the office, and hasn’t reported back to me, I must assume the part for the car has not turned up. This really is becoming something of a bore, because I can’t decide about the Alfa that is advertised until I know whether the new part solves the problem, by which time it will probably have been sold.

Now, this current situation leaves me on the horns of a dilemma. Do I a) cut the plywood up for the pretty panels on Sheila’s flower boxes or, do I b), get on with reformatting this laptop and installing Windows 7 again or, do I c), simply ensure I have all my files and programmes available on the external hard drive, and turn the laptop over to Ivan for the installation of Windows XP? Of course, I could go for option d) and simply do nothing. Hmm! Hmm! That’s another fine mess you’ve got me into, Stanley!

What I will do, is save this blog to the external hard drive until I need to update it, which could be a few days.

Thursday 22nd April and, while Wifey has been in Nottingham, I have been carrying out the long and laborious task of recovering the laptop, yet again. I have to say though, that I am getting awfully close to asking Ivan to install Windows XP, because this is still not right. Even as I type this in Word 2003, I’m finding the cursor dragging behind my typing, and when I stop typing, and then go on to a new paragraph, the cursor disappears for a few seconds.

As for the car, well the part arrived this morning and I went straight out to fit it. Strangely, when I ran the engine and waited for the automatic choke to cut out, the idling speed fluctuated for a very short while but, while I allowed the engine to warm up to normal temperature, it didn’t do so again. I tried again this afternoon and had the same result. All I need to do now is take the car for a run and see what happens.

Saturday 24th April and, despite Ivan’s attempts at sorting out this laptop, I still have the same old problems. Still the cursor trails behind my typing, still the cursor disappears when I press Enter and still the document will not scroll down when I first open it. OK, so, I have installed Office 2003 again but, since I am running the 32 bit version of 7, this should not be a problem. I am now considering uninstalling 2003 and putting 2007 Home and Student. But, if I do that, I will still have to install 2003 Publisher, because I like to use it for re-sizing photos and, if you try that trick in Word, the picture always sits to one side of the paper, never in the middle.

I have just been running the inbuilt Compatibility Module on this infernal machine, not for the first time I might add and, all of a sudden, the cursor is keeping track of my typing and Word scrolls down without a hiccup. Also, I ran the Module for .pdf files and they seemed OK too. So, what am I to make of this? Well, the only way to find out is to reboot the laptop and try again, just to see if it really has taken effect.

Nope, I just pressed Enter for a new paragraph, and the cursor disappeared for a few seconds.

Sunday 25th April and, as we are supposed to be taking our boats outside the marina for a bar-b-q later today, it’s raining. No surprise there then?

Yesterday, after much fiddle farting about with this laptop, in a serious attempt to speed up the workings of MS Word, I seem to have had a modicum of success. I am typing here, at a fairly rapid pick and peck rate, and the cursor is keeping up with me. The only thing not quite right, is if I hesitate between sentences, which is when it still hesitates, and when I hit Return for a new paragraph, it still disappears for a few seconds. I really don’t know what else I can do, and so I am going to have to live with it until I can get it into a proper repair shop, or buy another one.

It is now 1.30 pm and, having arranged to use the apartment, instead of taking the boats out for our bar b q, the sun has come out. No turning back now, it’s the apartment or nothing.

I have had in my possession for a very long time now, a disc full of autographed photographs of sports stars and other well known people. This particular disc does not show the names of all the people depicted, which is a shame because, even though I recognise many of them, without their name those photos are pretty useless.

Anyway, there was I, blithely going through my disc boot, when I found another disc that also claimed to hold thousands of pictures of well known people. However, when I opened it I found, much to my surprise, that almost all the pictures are titled. Whoopee! This means that, when I can get around to it, I can arrange the photos in separate folders according to their vocations, and then sell them as prints on eBay.

Tuesday 26th April and today is the day the car goes into the garage. Hopefully they will solve the problem without undue cost to us but, whatever the case, we have decided to keep the Alfa, rather than look for another car. Better the devil you know… etcetera!

As for the book, that is now finished and ready for sale on eBay. I have now reduced it to just one volume of 200 recipes, but I have loads more where they came from, so I can compile a second volume as and when it takes my fancy. If the book does well then that will be in about six months time. I might also publish it as a physical book and sell it through Amazon.

Our bar b q should have been held outside the marina but, due to early rain, it was decided to hold it in the marina apartment. This usually would have cost us a few quid but, as Marion works at the marina and, since nobody was in residence at the time, Paul let us use it free of charge.

It’s just as well we held it there because, with the amount of food Marion put out, she would never have managed it on her boat, or even on both our boats, had Sheila helped with the cooking.

This was a very enjoyable evening, with plenty of laughter going around. One particular funny bit stuck in my mind, and that was when Brian was reading through the Guest Book. One wag had scrawled across a page, “Elvis is not dead. I heard him on the radio” We all pretty much creased up at that one.

The view from the apartment is pretty good, especially on a bright, spring or summer evening, so you can imagine our surprise at another entry that read, “This is a right rat hole”. Some folks are just never satisfied, but we didn’t let that spoil our enjoyment. We all, finally, came away with sizeable doggy bags, so Monday was a snack day. Unfortunately I have been left with a dicky tummy, no doubt from the pork pies and sausage rolls. I suppose I shall simply have to leave them alone completely from now on.

Having run the Compatibility Mode on this wretched machine, I now find that Word runs almost perfectly, except for the odd occasion when the cursor disappears, but I can live with that. However, certain other programmes are still not right, especially Internet Explorer and Outlook, which are both rather slow in responding. So, I shall have to do the same to them to see if I can speed them up.

Wifey has now surfaced, so I must assume it is now breakfast time.

It is now 3.30 pm and I am awaiting the verdict about the car from our local garage. Believe it or not, when I ran the engine this morning, prior to taking it in, it behaved itself, even when I left it running up to normal temperature. When I took it to the garage, it didn’t misbehave once. Goodness knows if they’ll find a fault although, when I mentioned the nasty sounding rattle, they said it could be the Universal Joint. Oh, deep joy!

Well, since I am online, I may as well post this latest screbe.

Cheers me dears from
Dave, Sheila and the Mutt.