Tech Day

We have a houseguest who loves to hear herself talk. There are people in this world to whom I love to listen-- not many, but they're there. I like quiet soothing people, remember?

This houseguest is not one of them. Knowing this guest was coming, I bought an MP4 player-- a cheap one off eBay. If I'm forced to listen to something can I please choose what it is I must listen to? Life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, etc? Happiness (and life and liberty) can take the form of audio books.

Specifically and currently, Douglas Adam's Hitchhiker's 'Trilogy'

I, the child who never had a Walkman or boombox or CD player, whose experience with earphones is restricted to those on airplanes, purchased an MP4 player and expected to teach myself how to use it. (To this day, my car is without any player of any sort, though I have a radio.)

There was a manual. The manual was in English, technically, I suppose. It read like English, but I usually understand English well, as it's my first (and only fluent) language. I didn't understand the manual.

I tried to find a tutorial on transferring audio files from the computer to the MP4 player. I found nothing that helped.

Enter my favorite (and only) sister. My aunt bought her a Walkman, my dad a boombox and I a CD player. She has experience with earphones. She spent the day loading files onto my MP4 player while I sat and watched and tried to figure out what she was doing.

I did learn, incidentally, that I like Mozart, Shakira, the Goo Goo Dolls and the Eagles. I've never been in a position to choose music solely and completely for myself before. Sister mine found out that I didn't really like some of the artists we used to listen to together and I found out that just because I won't turn the station if it comes on did not mean I want it on my MP4 player.

Then sister mine found a bunch of trash on my computer to delete so as to speed it up. It took hours. All day really, so I did no actual beading, though I did clean up many a tube of Delicas and box of seedbeads and gave some thought to Complimentary Contradictions.

Sister mine also read my blog today, my entire blog, so maybe she'll read this entry tomorrow.