Thursday Thoughts: Dealing with writing, rewriting and technical difficulties while planning my NaNoWriMo 2015 novel

I am in the process of rewriting one, finishing another, and writing at least one short story. I am also planning my NaNoWriMo 2015 novel. All this work means I do not need any distractions caused by technical difficulties. Yesterday I encountered the Blue Screen of Death, which meant that today I had to re-enter my log in name for Facebook and my g-mail accounts (among others). When I went to my g-mail account, I found out I had forgotten my password and the back up e-mail account I use. I changed my password and found out what my back up e-mail account is.

Next I decided to post some video ads to this blog. When I attempted to post the ads I encountered an error message. I don't know if the problem results from the yesterday's rebooting the computer after encountering the blue screen or something else. I e-mailed tech support of the company I get the ads from and included my cellphone number if they need to contact me. In the mean time I am going to continue writing and not worry about the ads. If it is God's will that I post the ads then tech support will get back to me before the ads are taken down.

In the mean time, I have a NaNoWriMo novel to plan, several writing projects to complete, and an apartment to clean. Since I have no plans to go anywhere until Sunday I am remaining home. I hope to complete at least three of the writing projects before Saturday just in case I have to leave the house for something important.

No More Afternoon Naps

This morning I logged into writing.com without difficulty, but then I got sleepy and decided to take a short afternoon nap. Now when I need to get back on, I my computer is having difficulty accessing the website. I'm not sure what's wrong because there was not problem this morning. It could be weather related, I checked weather.com and they're dealing with some extremely cold weather back east.

According to weather.com, the temperature in New York city is approximately 27 degrees, while the temperature in Las Vegas is 59 degrees Fahrenheit. I know that here in Las Vegas the cold weather will interrupt my Internet connection, so there is a good possibility that's happening with the connection between here (in Las Vegas) and the East Coast. This is, of course, my own fault because I should know better then to wait until the last minute to finish any writing project or any project for that matter.

I'll keep trying to access that website  the rest of the night, since I'm not planning to go any place tomorrow I can stay up all night (if necessary). It may be necessary because I have to finish a project and post it sometime before noon Eastern Standard Time. Every time I attempt to access the website, my browser indicates it's connecting with the website, but then it either just does nothing or gives me a problem loading.

I'm going to post this and try accessing the website on my other computer. It uses a different browser then the one I'm on now. I don' t know why the the browser would make a difference in loading the website, but there I guess there could be.

Writing and Technical Difficulties

I had a few modem technical difficulties this morning, but I did learn one thing that may help me in the future. My modem has a backup battery, which keeps some of the lights on when it doesn't want to work on cloudy days. I'm not sure why, but two or three cloudy days in a row cause my modem to tiptoe of into Internet Never Never Land. Normally, I can manually reboot it without calling in technical support.

That wasn't the case this morning, after attempting to reboot it without any luck I called the tech support line.  They weren't  getting any signal from my modem, so she had me take the battery out. After I put the battery back in the modem and router worked just fine. However, the time spent talking to the tech cost me writing time and phone minutes. I haven't checked my cellphone provider's website to see how many minutes the whole thing cost me because it was worth the price to get back online and let my cable provider know where I will be moving.

I thought the apartment was cable ready, but I could be wrong. The technician I talked to couldn't find the address or the apartment number, so she put in a request to see if it was cable ready. I don't know what I'll do if it isn't, but I will deal with that situation if or when I encounter it. I have too much to do this weekend to get ready to move in by either January 28 or January 31, depending on when the money for the security and cleaning deposit arrive. Oh well, it's these little unknowns that make life interesting.

Midweek Reflections on writing and technical difficulties

It is Wednesday and I spent the morning dealing with technical difficulties, which makes writing difficult, but not impossible. Persistence is the secret of handling technical difficulties. Since my system runs slow as a frozen waterfall, I started keeping track of the issues two or three months ago.

I found that I am dealing with the same issues repeatedly. One of the issues is the virus scan, which normally takes about 40 minutes to run, even when it finds warning and threats. However, sometimes it takes between one to six hours to run. The cause of this is the computer going into hibernation when the scan has completed about 51% of the items it checks.

Another issue is the virtual memory. Several times a week and sometimes several times a day the messages “Windows – Virtual Memory Minimum Too Low” and the computer does something to increase the virtual memory. This is aggravating especially since other issues force me to restart the computer two or three times a day.

Today, when I turned the computer back on after turning it off, the system ran chkdsk. Whatever repairs the program made caused the system to run faster. I am not sure how long this will last, but I think that from now o n I will run the chkdsk myself about every 30 days or so. This may help some of the problems I am having with my system. I will continue to keep a record of the problems I am having because that is the only way to find a solution to the problem.

Technical difficulties and writing goals

A stressful morning went into the afternoon. This was “Technical Difficulties Friday” so it is a good thing today is not Friday the Thirteenth. Next Friday it July 13 and hopefully I will have fewer technical problems then today.

The main issue today was nonresponsive plug-ins, specifically Shockwave Flash, which gave me the most difficulty this morning. There were other issues as well, mostly nonresponsive websites and programs. I know that part of the issue is “Virtual Memory”, but that, like the Shockwave Flash plug-in, is not the only issue.

I have to reboot several times this morning and this afternoon. The programs just seemed to freeze up for no particular reason. I do not think it is a virus or spyware issue because I do a scan everyday and most of the time nothing shows up. The problem is that the technical difficulties interfered with writing and that interfered with accomplishing my writing goals.

Fortunately, I can stay up a bit later to night then normal. Tomorrow is Saturday and Mom will be at home all day. Since Mom is here all day, I will not leave the house, which means I can stay up and write tonight. As long as I am up by 5:30 AM everything should work out. I have to make sure I get the trash to the curb by 6:00 AM.

Technical difficulties

It has been a long Tuesday. This afternoon everything seems to be running fine. This morning was a different story. This morning both my computer and my cell phone gave me problems. As I have said before and often, “Technology is great, when it works properly.”

I took my virus scan 10 hours to run. It began about 3:14 AM and completed the scan after 1:00 PM. Part of the problem concerned the computer going into hibernation (on its own) before the scan completed. I am not sure, but I think that had to do with the computer’s virtual memory, but could have been another problem.

Then there was my appointment with the doctor. My appointment was at 9:30 AM. At 8:15, I decided the only thing for me to do was pause the virus scan and put the computer into hibernation while I went to the doctor. It would have gone into hibernation again anyway before the scan was completed. This is not the first time this has happen.

As for the cell phone, I have to call the technical support line because of a periodic issue with the phone. I suspect the best way to solve the problem with the phone is to buy a new one. I also think a new computer would solve the problems that I am having with it. To repeat myself, “Technology is wonderful when it works properly.”

Sunday Thoughts on the past couple of days.

It's Sunday, October 10, and I haven't posted since Thursday, October 7. On Friday, I spent most of the day dealing with technical difficulties. My modem went out Thursday evening and I presumed it was nothing more then unplugging the phone jack and plugging it back in, but that wasn't the problem. The problem apparently has something to do with the fact that my alarm system goes through the phone line and it doesn't have the proper protection or splitter. A tech from the phone company is coming in on Thursday morning to take care of that issue.

I don't know why I didn't post on Saturday. I spent Saturday morning driving around Las Vegas and Saturday afternoon I caught up on writing. In addition, Mom had a difficult time Saturday afternoon. There are some days like that especially when we go out in the morning. Mom has Alzheimer's disease and get angry easily.

Saturday afternoon Mom was upset over something. I'm not sure what caused the problem, anything can upset Mom. When Mom is upset she either gets angry or cries and yesterday she got angry. Sometimes Mom gets angry because she has to take medication. Sometimes Mom gets angry because she has to wear a hearing aid. I still don't know why she got angry yesterday afternoon because going out in the morning usually brightens her mood.

An encounter with the Blue Screen of Death

This morning, I had an encounter with the Blue Screen of Death. I am not sure what caused the problem this time. I am never sure what causes the memory dump. It occurs without any warning, usually when I am in the middle of something. This is not my first encounter with this phenomenon, it is the first encounter this year. I know the problem has something to do with one of the device drivers. The question is "Which device driver?"

I am sure there must be a story or poem in his experience. I have not used the Blue Screen of Death in any short story, yet. I think a good working title is "The Blue Screen of Death".

Afternoon slow down

My computer slows down in the afternoon, so accessing website is a long process. I am not sure what is causing the problem. Part of the issue could be a virtual memory issue. Also, Zone Alarm has reinitialized twice in the past two days. At the time, Zone Alarm reinitialized I was attempting to delete mail from my inbox.

I decided to spend the next few days cleaning off the hard drive, backing up documents, and reorganizing my files. In addition, my printer still does not work and it keeps giving a print cartage error. I am going to buy two new print cartridges to see if that solves the problem. If I cannot solve any of these problems myself, I am calling in an expert because I need both a working computer and printer.

When all else fails disconnect, reconnect and pour yourself a glass of cranberry juice

For the past three or four days, my system has ran slow and twice, Zone Alarm shut down because of a True Vector failure. This morning, my modem would not connect to the Internet. The modem worked because three lights came on, the only light that did not come on was the Internet light. I try almost everything, but nothing worked.

I temporarily threw in the towel and went to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription. When I returned home, I turned on the computer, the  modem and the dozed on the couch. After I woke up, still no Internet connection. Before calling tech services, I disconnected and reconnected the modem wire. I then went to the kitchen to pour myself a glass of cranberry juice. When I returned to the computer, the Internet light had came on. In addition, the system seems to be faster then yesterday, so whatever I did this morning helped as well.

Writing about my slow computer

Every morning, my computer is extremely slow. It takes several minutes to access a website and then to do a survey or anything else I am doing. I know part of the problem has to do with the virtual memory and I do not know how to solve this problem. I am considering calling a tech to come in and look at my computer because I cannot solve the problem.

Even when I am not online, the computer is slow. I think that has to do with the virtual memory as well. In the afternoon, the computer and web access is faster. The speed picks up after the computer increases virtual memory paging, which it does every day. I do not think it should have to increase the paging of the virtual memory every day.

It is frustrating because I cannot solve the problem myself. I have did all I can do the figure out the problem, so my next step is to call in technical support. There are several people in Las Vegas, who make house calls to solve computer problems. All I have to do is find one that is inexpensive and trust worthy.

I am not a happy camper

I am going to attempt to make this blog entry directly into the blog. I am not sure how well it will work since my browser is acting up. That is why I am not a happy camper. Actually, in this case I am not a happy surfer.

I attempt to access a website and it takes the browser several minutes to get me there. Sometimes if I place the curse into the address window and pressing return helps, but not all the time. Sometimes I get an error message or the gate times out. In either case, I have to start all over again. While I was typing this entry, I got the message there was a problems saving it, so I attempted to save again and it worked.

In addition, to the slowness I am having difficulties tab browser. I enjoy tab browsing when my browser does it properly. Sometimes the browser works fine, but that is rare. This situation began occurring about a week ago. I do not know what is causing the problem I just want it fixed. I just love technology when it works properly. I am going to end this entry, while there is still a chance that I can post it properly.

Technical issues

I have encounterws technical issues for the past three or four days. I encounter difficulties surfing and accessing website. I am not sure what the problem is, but it makes surfing and posting hard. When I click on a link it takes several minutes to get onto the website and sometimes I have to click the link several times before I get to my destination.

Today I did three different virus scans on my computer. The only problems they identified were tracking cookies. After the last virus scan, I deleted the cookies and history on my browser. That seemed to help quite a bit; however, I still have some issues with slow access. Eventually, I will solve the problems, in the mean time, I think I will let the browser delete the cookies and history each time I closes my browser.