Technically Challenged

by June Shaw


This is for all of us who were born technically challenged. I mean, Bob tells my sons not to use mechanical equipment--like a wheel barrel.

When computers became the thing (okay, I have to admit the first one was in our local college, and it took up two walls and was kept in a cold, locked room--but we could see it through all the windows), I said whoever knew how to work that thing was certainly brilliant. (Hint: I should have known then it wasn't going to be me.)

Fast forward awhile, and computers changed. They grew smaller, did not need to be kept in really cold conditions, and a few businesses had them.

"I think it's great that my children will probably learn how to use one of those things when they're in college," I'd tell everyone, so glad I would never have to go through that immense learning curve. After all, I'd given birth to five children, completed a B.A. plus in college, and began teaching whatever from my school's textbooks. There was one computer, and it was in the office, and as a lowly English teacher, I certainly did not learn to use it. (Remember the wheel barrel?)

Okay, but I did want to become a writer. I wanted to write novels, and yes, I had paper and a typewriter that usually worked, but did not have much extra time.

Getting to the point: Yes, I learned the basics of using a computer, which is so much easier to work with than a typewriter (but not the paper and pen), and I'm thrilled that I know what I do. I've written a number of books--maybe nine or ten--and they all come out of a computer until they come out in print or as e-books.


So why can't I use this blog? I'm on it with a number of great mystery authors who post regularly when they're supposed to, but my posts? Sometimes I think I've gotten one written and scheduled to show, and a week later I discover nope, that didn't happen. Now I'm trying again. I hope you'll all cheer for things to work out for me this time because, okay, I am better than a wheel barrel (although I do not want to use one.)

Am I the only one technically challenged? Gosh, one of my sons teaches computer usage to a group of people who work with him and one of my grandsons writes programs.

Please tell me some other person like me is out there. Thank you.

www.juneshaw.com

My own Bermuda Triangle

The scene inside my blog

This particular blog is about a mystery – which I’ll share with you. A while back, I added a tracker to my own blog. It puts little red dots over the world map and shows how I’m progressively colonising North America, the UK, bits of Europe and tiny pockets of land in Asia and Australasia. But it also has a real-time option, which tells me more about my visitors, what drew them to me and how long they spent in my company. As most writers will tell you, they welcome anything which is merely a displacement activity but gives you the impression that it’s time well spent. And this is where the mystery lies.

Forgive me now giving you a list of places but it’s part of the enigma.  In the period I’m sampling for this posting, I had 2 visits from Scotland (Airdrie and Johnstone) and 12 from England (Manchester, Preston, Keighley, Kidlington (4 visits) and London (5)). The 12 English visits were balanced by 12 from the USA (Bronson (3) and the wonderfully named Nacogdoches (2) – both in Texas, Brooklyn (New York) Hayward and San Francisco (California), Missoula and Plains (Montana), Seattle and Tampa. There were 4 from Australia (Hunters Hill and Greenwich – both in New South Wales – and 2 visits from Elwood, Victoria, which I mistook first of all for a name and wondered whether I’d ever met a Victoria Elwood. And last, but definitely not least, came people from Bombay (Maharashtra), Makati (Manila) and 4 visits from the truly exotic Minnertsga, Friesland.

OK, you say, so what? Well, to begin with, rather than being drawn there by my magnetic personality, infinite charm and quiet desperation, many came simply in search of an answer to the question ‘What makes a good novel?’ which was the title of one posting. But that’s merely an aside because it’s the 5 visitors I haven’t yet mentioned whose details hint at the central mystery.

The first came from Birmingham (UK) and stayed for a mere 26 seconds. The next was from the City of London and stayed slightly longer (42 seconds) and the third, from Riverton (Wyoming) was here for 51 seconds. If I ever meet the final two, I owe them a drink because they stayed long enough to read something. The one from Amsterdam, Noord-Holland lingered a whole 3 minutes 11 seconds but the champion came from Englewood, Colorado and wasted an enormous 6 minutes 37 seconds of his/her life in my company.

Again, so what? Well, this is where my crime writer’s curiosity comes into play.  I know the time and date the last 5 arrived, and when they left. But what about all the others? The ones in the first list? There’s no indication that any of them left.

SO THEY MUST STILL BE THERE.

But where? What are they doing? Some have been there for days. What are they eating? How are they surviving?  Are their bosses and families missing them? It’s a huge responsibility for me to know that my wit and wisdom have ensnared so many. I’ll have to start leaving plates of biscuits there and cans of some sort of beverage. And what if the influx continues? We’re all aware of the dangers of overpopulation. What if Oxfam and the Red Cross start sending food parcels and medical supplies? Can Médecins sans Frontières operate inside a blog?

Don’t get me wrong. My blog welcomes immigrants but, for their own safety they need to be led towards the more seemly locations – the jokey bits not the bits about existentialism. I don’t want them to be hi-jacked by some rogue philosopher who’s camped there and may force them to consider Aristotelian syllogisms day after day or read Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason.

I must find them soon and see if they can’t be repatriated or transferred to a blog whose sanity is uncompromised, where laughter, poetry and common sense prevail. I wonder if there are any.