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Wednesday, 30 August 2017

JAWS TAP TAP SEE AND ME BY FIONA CUMMINGS


My Husband challenged me the other day to write my darkest poem ever. Haha. He hates my poetry unless they are roses and hearts. And not real living hearts but those kind of picture perfect hearts one sees on greetings cards. Bows and bells. Then he will put up with them but any kind of sad or dark moment, he’s out of here. So why did he ask me to write such a poem the other day? I don’t know, but like a good girl, I did as he asked! I don’t think he thought I would take him seriously, I didn’t, but I still wrote it. I read it to him the next day when I pinned him down and away from his cricket and oh my. It wasn’t a good moment in the Fifi household.  Talk about dark moments?  I said well, that will teach you to ask me to write a certain kind of genre!

 

He told me if I were to publish that poem, I would, or in his opinion, should get arrested. Well, it’s obvious that he hasn’t read half of my past poems. Years back oh boy. I must have about three hundred poems I have not published too. I only didn’t publish it because it kind of was a little on the dark side of life, or in my poems case, dark side of death.  Great name for a book title don’t you think? Having said that, are there light sides of death?

 

Oh, my I updated my lap top the other day as requested and I have whatever version of windows, whatever number we are up to now. When I did it, my JAWS stopped working, no you don’t silence me that easily, Jaws is the name of my software which makes my lap top talk whenever I push a key. It reads what is written too as long as whatever has been written is in word not a photograph or text. If that makes sense to you. As I have said before I can touch type so I know where all the keys are on my keyboard or laptop without the need to see them. But, when there are updates I dread those days because my software doesn’t work well with updates as my voice my little man in my lap top refuses to talk to me and everything on screen is just for the sighted. So, my mini, or not so mini technician took a look this is after my top technician, couldn’t do anything as every key stroke he knew wouldn’t work as of course he too needs the thing to talk. So, our Son took a look he is great with lap tops/computers as this was his field at college. So, he too didn’t have a clue. He was reading everything to us that was written on screen but nothing was working. Even Shamrock had a bit to say bless her but we were all clueless. Until Fifi came to the rescue. Well kind of. I was half way there enough to get Boy Wonder to understand what I meant. As always though I came out with the wrong terminology but it did give me a laugh, note, myself a laugh. Everyone else in the house was like, oh my God. Rolling of some eyes deep breaths as they were exasperated by the Blonde before them.

 

So, my suggestion? (Sticky fingers)

No, a child hadn’t had access to my lap top. I got the sticky bit correctly, but not the fingers. The word I needed was keys. Sticky keys!

Well my Son pressed the button which said those words or in letter formation anyway, and then it worked better, but then I was having problems with Jaws. So now the sticky finger thing had been solved, smile, so our boy could work the lap top, my speech still wasn’t working, so I suggested that JAWS needed updating too. Hub said no, but I knew that was what was wrong. It would be a long story if I went into detail why, but my JAWS software is old now and obviously with the new update of Windows, perhaps the two were not compatible? Again, Hub stressed that wasn’t the trouble. So, I put my earphones on so he couldn’t hear what I was doing as only every ten words were being read to me from my lap top. I entered at the correct place and pressed spacebar when prompted then it went quiet again not even every ten words were being read now, oh heck, no. What had I done?

 

I took a picture from my iPhone of my screen and waited for my ap on my phone to tell me what it said. Firstly, it read. “Lap top with fireplace behind and a painting on the wall.”

Very helpful (Tap Tap See) Name of ap.

Second picture I took read after a long wait. “Computer on persons lap with black dog in background.”

My Husband could hear my phone talking and what it had to say. He asked me what was I doing? I replied fixing my lap top. He got really anxious with me as it cost him almost £2000 wit software included only a year and a half ago. So, he thought I was going to totally break it. Third photograph came just in time. Few.

“30% updating. 40% updating.”

Great, fantastic. So, something was going on. I had to be patient. Eventually it read 100% then nothing. Oh no…. What had I downloaded or removed? Another photograph by this point my loved one was having palpitations. I took out my earphones as the voice in my phone read to me. “Turn off computer and wait for restart.” Well I froze. How to turn it off? My software still wasn’t talking to me. I have to go to a drop-down box to turn it off and I can only do this if it talks to me to give me the options. Then, suddenly, the lap top automatically turned off. Great. Or maybe not.

 

A minute later suddenly, it turned back on and guess what? It only blooming spoke. Hehehehehehehehehehe. I shouted on my Son with loads of qualifications in computers and my Husband was with me, with loads of fantastic exam results from school and university with his degrees and I said. Yep not so little not so oo’oo’ooo’oooooo old me, fixed it.

 

The only thing I can’t get to work and to be honest I haven’t been able to do this since I got my lap top, was, to or is to use word count. Any hints or tips would be appreciated. My Son says it shows on the screen how many words I have written, but as soon as I do the prompt or command to count words, my JAWS stops talking and I have to force shutdown and start again to get my lap top to talk. I miss this feature as need it for my writing. If someone asks me to write something for them and it has to have a certain amount of words, I’m slightly stuffed as Boy Wonder is in my life no more than half an hour each day unless like last night Sham comes here and we have dinner together. But then we eat, we don’t do computer studies.  On a weekly basis I need to count my words and I can’t, so if there are any JAWS users out there, please can you help me?

 

OK, washing machine finished so I’m going to try to hang some washing out on the line before the threat of rain. Such an exciting lifestyle I have. Later gators. X

 

  

 

 

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