A Pain in the Whatchamacallit
By Tiny Ruisch
Bah! Humbug!
It’s that time of the year again. The retailers want us to spend all of our hard earned nickels on lots of things that we don’t really need. I remember last year when I got suckered into buying a multifunction printer that also copies, scans, faxes and probably would clean my nose after a sneeze. The problem is that I don’t need to do all of that stuff and would probably have saved some money if I’d just bought a scanner and a box of tissues.
About the only difference in the holiday season every year is that it usually seems to start earlier and earlier. This year, I saw my first Christmas display on labor day. Newegg started advertising Black Friday deals sometime during the first part of November. I’m expecting the 2011 season to start around the Fourth of July.
Bah! Humbug!
During the holiday season, I spend a lot more time online getting my news. I refuse to pay extra for a newspaper on Thanksgiving Day. Do they really expect me to pay more for the extra advertising? I can look at all the same ads online for free.
You can predict the news. On Thanksgiving and Christmas, you can be sure that we’ll read about celebrities working at some homeless shelter or at a soup kitchen. Where are they the other 363 days of the year?
Bah! Humbug!
This is the time of the year that the scammers are out in full force. I consider myself to be pretty computer literate, but I almost got scammed when I got this e-mail from order-update@amazon.com:
Dear Amazon.com Customer,
Your order has been successfully canceled. For your reference, here’s a summary of your order:
You just canceled order #823-2346426-4655389 placed on November 23, 2010.
Status: CANCELED
ORDER INFORMATION (this was the link)
Sold by: Amazon.com, LLC
Because you only pay for items when we ship them to you, you won’t be charged for any items that you cancel.
Thank you for visiting Amazon.com!
Amazon.com
Earth’s Biggest Selection
http://www.amazon.com
I do quite a bit of shopping at amazon and I almost clicked on the order information. If I hadn’t noticed that it wasn’t addressed to my amazon e-mail address, I would have been scammed. The bad guys have sure advanced from pickpocketing, breaking into cars at the parking lots and giving us all a free I-Pod.
Bah! Humbug!
Every year, I’ve got to listen to some novelty song about five zillion times. I’m just happy that Grandma doesn’t get run over by a reindeer as often as she used to.
Bah! Humbug!
It’s that time of year when we get to watch all of those TV specials and rerun movies that are better off forgotten. It was a Wonderful Life when it was a movie, but 9000 times as a TV special leaves something to be desired. Did you know that Jimmy Stewart has been dead for thirteen years? The only good thing you can say is that during the holidays, we don’t have to watch the regular lousy television programming. Don’t get me started on the commercials.
Oh well. Time for me to stop bah humbugging and write some club related stuff. As I hope you know by now, our club web site (SWLAPCUG) is back up and running. Travis and Tom have spent lots of time getting it tweaked to be user friendly. All club members will soon be able to read the minutes of club meetings, view the treasurer reports, download newsletters, share computing tips, laugh at my inane jokes and many other exiting things.
When you go to the site, click the login button and you will be asked to register. Your login information from the old site will not work. Just pick a user name and password and enter your e-mail. After a few minutes, you will get an e-mail with your registration information and a verification link to click. This is the only time you will have to go to the web site from your e-mail. The next time you are on the main page, enter your new username and password. Click the login in button and you’re in business.
You don’t have to register to view many of the items on our web site; however, you won’t be able to participate until you do. After you’re registered, one of the moderators will move you to the club members list. More features are available to club members than to general visitors.
All of the features on the new site aren’t working yet. In the Forums is a “Suggestion Box” topic. If you’ve got any ideas for improving things, let us know. Remember, we can’t make the site easier to use if nobody knows that you’re having a problem. Once again, the link for our web site is: Southwest Louisiana PC Users Group.
Bah! Humbug! My wife just told me to put my shoes on because she wants me to go and help pick out the son in laws Christmas present. I know what that really means is I’ll have to carry something.
Thanks for reading.