BIRTHDAYS +NOOKS=FRUSTRATION

Saturday, January 22, was my birthday. And, no, I refuse to tell you how many years "young" I was. I hate when someone discribes anyone over 65 as "young." Honey, we are not young. We are on the sunny side of the end of the road and how we walk, ride, or run down that road is up to us. I plan to live every day of my remaining life to the fullest, hope I can do unto others as God would have me, and have a heck of a good time doing it all. Even though I'm not young, I don't have to act old.

I think I made a mistake though when I asked for one of the newest techie things for sale. I read a lot. Do I read a lot! You can tell by the stacks of books in each room, the filled bookshelves in my office, the two cartons of books in our storage area, and the fact I can't pass up a used bookstore or Friends of the Library. I've been looking at eReaders and, maybe envisioning the disappearance of all these books, hubby decided to surprise me with one for Christmas. Not that we hadn't looked at them everywhere we went.

Feeling I might not enjoy reading books on a screen as much as others, I told him not to purchase a higher-priced Nook or Kindle. He gave me a lovely eReader, easy to navigate through, and it had free classics to read. But I could never get it to connect with my WiFi and it had no way of connecting to my computer for downloads. So I returned it two days after Christmas.

A friend got a Nook and loved it. I went to a demo, heard the differences in it and others and, with extra birthday money from hubby, purchased a Nook. I have learned how to navigate it easily; I love the idea of downloading those books from B&N, Amazon, all the ebook sellers. But, again, I cannot connect to my WiFi.

I've spent hours with B&N and online with AT&T, the place where I purchased my WiFi router and my Internet service. I spent as much time on my own attempting to solve my connection problem. My next step is to talk to a real person at AT&T tomorrow. Maybe that will work. My next step, if it doesn't, is to let my computer guru, Jeff, see if he can find the problem--that is if he is available in the next 12 days, which is what time I have left to decide whether I want to keep this Nook or not.

Today, in the middle of my frustration, I came to the realization that I threw away an entire day that I could have spent writing. I have a deadline for the last of my columns. I have two classes to do lesson plans for this week. I am sort of mad at myself for thinking new techie stuff is such a big deal, when the only thing I want to do is write. And have someone read, and enjoy, the words I put on paper.

I don't think this is progress.