You Had Me at “Lighted Keyboard”

One day my husband asked me if I wanted a MacBook.  I hesitated.  I’m a computer girl.   I use three different versions of Windows at work.  I understand how the operating systems work.  He was asking me if I wanted to learn yet another operating system, and I didn’t like it.  His Mac baffled me even more than his iPhone did.

Honey: “You need to upgrade from that tiny netbook.”

Me: “But I like my netbook.  It fits in my purse bottomless pit.”

My netbook with its custom skin.

Honey: “You’ll like the size of the screen better.”

Me: “I don’t use the netbook for that much stuff.  I don’t need bigger.”

Honey: “You’re blogging now.”

Me: “I’ll think about it.”  What I was thinking: “I don’t want to think about it.  Mac scares me.”

Later that afternoon, I was typing away at our home computer in the study.  It got dark in the room as the sun went down.  I had to turn the light on so I could continue working.

You can stop laughing.

I’d like to think I’m a fairly decent typist, er, keyboarder.  I took typing in high school on a electric typewriter and was good enough to earn the privilege to type on one of the fancy advanced ones that had correction tape.

I’m not saying I was great and error free. Being able to type came in handy in college when I had to write ten page papers.  (I didn’t feel sorry for my friends when they complained about three pages.)

By the time I graduated from grad school, typing class was called keyboarding.  Students learned on computers–disabled backspace key, no correction tape.  I still call it typing.

Here’s the thing.  I can type without looking at the keyboard.  I can type with my eyes closed.  I cannot type in the dark.

Seriously, you can stop laughing now.

What is it that makes my fingers completely misbehave when the sun goes down and darkens my home office?  It’s not as if my fingers can see what they are typing.

My husband walked by and said, “The Mac has a lighted keyboard.”

Sold!

He could have lead with that feature.

Since then, I’ve been learning how to navigate my updated MacBook Pro.  Switching desktops, deleting files, finding files–it was enough to overwhelm me at first.  I told a friend (an avid Mac user) and he welcomed me to the Dark Side.

The double-finger and triple-finger swiping are getting comfortable.  So much so that I tried double-finger scrolling on my work laptop this week.  Just so you know, it didn’t work, and I was disappointed.  How did that happen so fast, my acclimating to the Dark Side that is Apple?

My little netbook with its custom made skin sits quietly in a corner waiting for me to use it. Sorry, it’s not going to happen. It doesn’t have a lighted keyboard.

Now, I can type in the dark. *happy dance*

Are you still laughing?  What kind of computer do you use?

If you’re checking, here are my ROW80 goals for the week:

• Finish the minutes for the PTA meeting and send them for approval.
• The back garden beds are ready, so now I need to plant kale, spinach, and carrot seeds.
• Write as if I’m not a NaNoWriMo rebel this week.  😀
• Make chicken soup and venison stew for the week.
• Get back to 3 or more blogging posts a week.