By DOROTHY ROSBY
My email account was attacked by spammers. My internet provider changed hands. My home computer crashed. My work computer was updated, which to a technophobe like me, is almost as debilitating. And it all happened in the span of four months. I’ve had it with technology. From here on out, I’ll be using a typewriter and a carrier pigeon.
It started with the spam attack. I’ve had the same email address since email was invented and I’ve been very careful. I don’t click on random links. I don’t do a lot of online shopping. I never respond to emails I shouldn’t respond to; sometimes I don’t respond to emails I should respond to. But suddenly, I was inundated. Every time I opened my email, my inbox filled up like a flower pot in a hail storm. I broke down and got a new email address, but I continued to wage war on the spammers with my old one, adding every one of their addresses to my blocked sender list. In the process, I may have added a few legitimate ones as well. Forgive me if yours was one of them.
I’ll never know whether the spammers were to blame for what happened next, but I’m blaming them anyway. My computer started acting lethargic, even lazy—like me around two o’clock every afternoon. It took longer to start up and close down. It couldn’t keep up with my typing. I do type fast, but no computer has had trouble keeping up before.
Twice I sought online tech support; the kind where you type a question to a computer person in a faraway office and they go out for coffee and think about it, then come back and type your answer. In both cases, someone I knew only by first name eventually took over my computer remotely, and I watched helplessly as things happened on the screen that I didn’t understand, not that that’s unusual.
As thrilling as it was to watch, my computer was no better for it, so I took it back to the store where I bought it two years ago. After much deliberation, they made the diagnosis: It needed a new hard drive. I don’t know much about computers, but I don’t think a hard drive is optional.
The computer tech suggested he should probably update my software too. Sure! All my software at my other job has just been updated. Why not go on a complete learning binge? It’ll be fun.
While they were taking care of all of that, I still had a column to write. Thankfully I have an ancient laptop I use when I’m traveling or when I have computer problems, which I seem to have with alarming regularity.
But wouldn’t you know it, my laptop wasn’t working quite right either. I blame old age—the computer’s not mine. I don’t know how old it is, but I do know computer years are like dog years. I hauled it in for repairs too. That would have left me with a deadlines and nothing to type on were it not for my husband’s laptop and his willingness to share with his increasingly agitated spouse.
I didn’t get my computers back for ten long days, just in time for my internet provider, who has recently changed hands, to begin doing whatever it had to do to convert all its hapless users to its way of doing things. I was informed I would not be able to receive email for a few days and I would need to change my email address again. NOOOOOOO! I wanted to change it to whyme@Igiveup.com, but that wasn’t an option.
I have to go lie down now. Just telling this story has exhausted me. It probably didn’t do much for you either. Despite everything, I realize that computers are essential to a columnist. They’re a huge time saver for writing and research, and thank goodness for that. I need that time to deal with technical problems.
(Dorothy Rosby is the author of the humor book, “I Used to Think I Was Not That Bad and Then I Got to Know Me Better.” Contact drosby@vastbb.net.)
