Manic Thursday

I had a really manic day on Thursday.

This week has been my first child free week since the school holidays and I have been driven to work hard on all the things I have not had time to do.

I painted heaps of the fence, cleared a path for myself along the fence line (through the undergrowth and the tree branches).

I hadn't made any attempt to clean up the house and it had been driving me crazy so I just went through each room and tried to tackle something that needed doing (and preferably something that had been needing attention for some time).

This plan of attack worked well because there was no pressure to tidy everything in every room (which would be way too much to ask), but it did mean that there was a noticeable improvement in each room.

I think I remember reading about this house cleaning tip on one of the helpful websites I visit ... it was something along the lines of set a timer for x amount of time and just tidy for that amount of time only ... so my plan was a variation on this theme.

Apart from clearing some space on the floor in the lounge room, I also went through and got rid of a lot of older artworks. My art box is full to overflowing and I had 6 months worth of paintings piled up in there.

Our big bins had just been emptied so I got rid of a fair bit of stuff (while still being very sentimental and keeping about three quarters of the original stack).

I won't clear out any more artworks until I have photographed them ... and of course until next fortnight after our bin pickup ... I have to leave some room for our other waste.

I also started to tackle the reorganization of all of our digital photos so I can back them up onto DVD disk in date order and keep them safe.

Now that we have a fully functional computer I can do that and have been reunited with all the old videos I have taken over the past 6 years but have not been able to view on my previous computer due to a malfunction with the quick time application.

I am surprised to see how much changes in 6 years ... and equally surprised to find that I have taken (and kept) approximately 6000 photos in that time.... an average of 1000 per year!!!!

I have been playing with Kodak Easy share, Picasa 3 and Windows Photo Gallery/Pictures to try and decide which is the best way to sort and store and process my photos. There are pros and cons for each ... some have overlapping features and I am trying to learn them all in depth and record information about them so that I don't forget what I have discovered. In the space of only a few days I have learnt quite a lot.

I am also very happy that I did some study in word, excel etc (this study is yet to be completed) as I am much more familiar with tricks and strategies to get things done. The kind of things that work in many different applications ... like Control A = select all, control v, control x, control c and also selecting multiple things with Control click etc.

I am very tired though, as each day I have been getting up early and going to bed later and later as the week progresses.

Finished the day with a massive headache ... but feeling very accomplished!!!

relearning the computer

There is a lot for me to learn.



Everything looks different, things don't quite work the same way ... I am much more computer literate these days and panic less about the challenges ahead ... but I do find it frustrating when the way I used to easily do something is no longer available.



I am trying to figure out which is the best way to sort and store my photos. I have a couple of options ... kodak easyshare is how I used to do it ... and it still has a few features that other programs don't have. I am a bit reluctant to use it though because to play videos I have to also download apple quicktime and that was the program that got corrupted and I couldn't remove it or reinstall it on my last computer. It appears though that when I use a kodak camera ... I kind of have to use quicktime.



Uni likes to use realplayer and he thinks it is really good ... not fussy about what it can play ... so I may wait until he downloads that and see if that will play my videos or not.



Windows photo gallery ... which came with Windows vista home premium ... seems to also be a great way to sort and store photos and it also has a fix it tool which helps you to edit your photos. It has some great options for displaying your photos to... very user friendly and easy .. like changing them to sepia or black and white, or fading photos in and out, or panning in or out of photos.



I might have to put photos onto my camera via Kodak easy share software to take advantage of features like it recognizing whether it already has downloaded a photo from your camera previously (this avoids double ups in your collection) and also transfers any photos that you have tagged as favourites back to your camera so you can have them accessible on your camera to show others or view yourself.



Then once they are on the computer I can copy them to windows photo gallery and edit them and display them in a more fancy way.



I love viewing photos on this 22" screen ... just beautiful!!!



And I am surprised to look back over past photos and realize just how much I have forgotten about how our yard used to look etc.



I have worked out how to switch between the two email programs I have available to me. Again I am in the process of deciding which one I like better ... so far it also seems to be the windows mail. I am still ironing out some message rule issues but for the most part it is all under control.



The next step will be to try and connect the printer .....