If there is one thing I’ve learned over that past couple of months it is that I am getting too old to move an entire household and adjust to a new computer at the same time while recovering from shoulder surgery. Lou and I have decided that one or both of us will die in this house. Believe me, that is a huge relief knowing that we will not have to go through this again.
We both have a shitload of stuff that has been accumulated
over the decades. The better part of the last few months has been spent packing
up 41 years worth of Lou’s stuff and 20 years worth of my stuff. Neither of us
can believe how we managed to fit all that stuff into a 1300 square foot house.
The unbelievable part is that even with getting rid of a lot, we are barely
fitting it all into our new 2400 square foot house!
The really difficult part is how much we have both struggled
through this move, physically, emotionally and mentally. It seems that endless
boxes have been packed and unpacked. Every time I emptied several boxes and put
things away, several more miraculously appeared. We’ve been here a week and
three more boxes have shown up on the
counter today. Thank goodness we only moved four miles away and didn’t have to
be totally out of our old house at a given time. We would be raving lunatics
for sure if that was the case.
It's extra hard since I’m still limited physically with my
shoulder healing from surgery two months ago. That makes poor Lou the muscle
when I need to move anything even a little heavy. Another difficult element is
that mentally our brains are both having a hard time keeping up with the nine
thousand things we have to do and remember. Suffice it to say that I am feeling
my age and I’m pretty sure Lou is, too. But we are muddling through and the
place is starting to take shape. My goal is to have most everything in its
place and organized by the end of the year. Knowing where it is all kept is
another story.
So far, we are surviving our major move even if it is just
barely. Taking a hot bath in our big, beautiful bathtub has been sheer heaven
at the end of a long day. Once we are more settled and decorated, I’ll post
some photos along with more details.
Now, on to buying a new computer a couple months ago. I’d
like to think I’m fairly tech saavy for a 72 year old woman but it has been a
challenge to get a new computer up and running. I was using Windows 7 and had
to upgrade to Windows 11 which meant that my 2003 Microsoft Office CD would no
longer function on my new computer. Not to mention that my new HP desktop
doesn’t even have a CD drive.
Plus, I have a bone to pick with the computer geeks who
design these new systems. What I used to be able to do in one or two clicks now
takes three or four. For example, copy and paste used to be highlight, click to
copy, click to paste. Now, it is highlight, click, select “options”, then
select copy, click, select “options”, then click paste. Why??? In my humble
opinion, they should leave well enough alone and not fix something that isn’t
broken.
Both of us still prefer a desktop even though we are fast
becoming dinosaurs in the computer age. This one has one terabyte of storage
space and tons of memory to accommodate anything I’ll ever want to store for as
long as I live (and am able to still work a computer).
I put off buying a new MS Office suite until after our move
because I was afraid doing both concurrently may put my mind over the edge. I
sucked it up and purchased a one time downloadable one. I’ve been arguing
with my computer to NOT store every file I have on the “cloud” or One
Drive as it is called. After an online search I finally figured out how to
unlink One Drive completely. At 11:30 PM last night, I began typing this in
my new Word Document and it is being stored on my own computer. Hallelujah! There is quite
a sense of accomplishment in that for an old lady.
When we first hooked up my printer at the new house, it
wouldn’t print. For whatever reason my printer didn’t want to talk to my
computer. Maybe they had a fight in transit, who knows. At that point I really
didn’t care. Anyway, that was yet another project. I decided
to restart my computer when I was trying to get rid of One Drive. Low and
behold, my printer started spewing out all the pages I had tried to print a few
days ago. For the time being I’m happy being able to finally type a Word Doc
and print it! That’s enough for one day in my book.
