Seriously, I have totally crossed to the Apple side. I mean, I love my ibooks, I have the apple sticker on my car, I fit the demographic, etc. But after a few days spent with PCs, I just. don’t. get. it.  Every now and then people ask me for help with their PCs, because I do know more than the average bear about them. Not an expert, by any means, but people like to have help setting them up, or setting up a new service, or cleaning stuff out.

Last week, I helped a woman get her DSL installed. She also had this weird thing happening with AOL and her firewall disagreeing, and I found a patch online, downloaded it to my USB drive and fixed that.  The DSL install got hung up at one point, so I called the tech line, got a really fabulous tech, who was like "Oh, let me guess, the install hangs at the account server? yeah, it’s a known issue."  He gave me the username and password for the account (the woman didn’t have it) and we set it up manually, and all was fine, for almost a week. Then, shit went bad.

So, last night, I stopped in after class, around 7:40, to try to fix it. It’s all fucked up. Don’t know what happened there in two days, but I could get a connection, but not login to even the modem itself to check settings. EFFED. UP. I tried a bunch of different things, because I hate leaving things unfixed, but no go. I called tech support, and described the situation, and they need to send someone to the house to fix it. Yay.

But then, I hate taking money to do this stuff. The woman paid me 70 bucks for the first two visits, and I refused payment for last night, and when I got home, it was 9:45. !!! the PC clock was slow, because I kept checking it, but hot damn, getting hom 15minutes before bedtime, with an unresolved client, and NO DINNER, I almost cried. I saw dave for 15 minutes before we went to bed, basically. So not cool. And then I dreamt about WIndows PCs all night. Seriously. I don’t. get. PCs.

Today I had another job, down the street. THis one was a teen computer, on a highspeed wireless network (incidentally, once we can reach from our house, hee! And i told them so, so I’m not evil) with no virus software, and usign IE as the primary browser. Holy trifecta of PC hell.  I ran some malware detection stuff, and came up with 227 problems, most in the registry. I don’t do registry.  I updated the malware stuff and it had 60 more when I left.

I finally left with a recommendation to call aroiund and find someone to reformat/reinstall XP, to use firefox, and to use some antivirus like AVG or whatever. I refused payment, but she insisted, so another 25 bucks.

I think, from now on, that I will just go to these homes with a macmall catalog and say "pick one, and I will do all of your future tech needs for free." If anything, the people that just don’t KNOW computers need to be using macs. Seriously. (Or linux, but that would make their heads explode, I think.)

I love Apple. No spyware, adware, malware, viruses, giant security flaws, or preloaded IE. I love Apple, forever and always. Yes, they cost more than the Walmart deal on the Compaq desktop, but when you factor in the price of all the crap windows people have to deal with, is it that much of a difference? HATE Windows.

On the flip side, I’ve been working with an adjunct to teach him more about computers in general. He was really hesitant about taking lessons from me, because "everyone’s tried, and I just can’t get it through my old head." WHen I first met him, he was still unsure, so i said "look, I got my start teaching computers to mostly senior citizens  [as he is] and give me a try. If it isn’t a fit, no hard feelings, but let’sjust see what I can do for you."

Now, he comes down once a week, and he LOVES me. He sent a gushing letter to the dean about me, and yesterday at the end of our lesson, he went on for 15 minutes about how I really have a gift for teaching technology that he’s never seen before, and that I needed to be teaching teachers how to do this stuff, because I knew how to TEACH most of all. THAT was kind of cool. It’s what I want to DO, you know? ANdi t was cool to hear that I was good at doing it froma student who was very reluctant that he could be taught.

Anyway.

Hey, I am a registered commenter with gawker media now! My complaint to consumerist garnered me an invite, yeehaw! I feel so special. 

OH, one more geeky thing — in one of my classes, we have to use Palm pilots.  I had a Visor years ago, during Americorps, that was basically replaced by my first iBook, but playing with the Palm last night made me feel all gadget-hungry for one again. DId you know they come in color now? And with rechargeable batteries? hee. Anyway, any recommendations for a returning-to-palm customer? I’m thinking bluetooth would be great, and wi-fi not necessary, and smaller would be better. A palm the same size as my iBook would be moot, really.

WHen I used mine, it was to schedule my Americorps students, at 4 different libraries, as well as to keep track of their names and numbers. I also used it to keep track of my classes, grades, and to play chess while waiting for class to start, and to keep lists of things like "Books I want to read."  My schedule isn’t as busy, and I’ve been getting by using my firstclass calendar, but gadgets are FUN, dontchaknow?  If you are a palm user, what do you use for additional software?