Best Laid Plans
Monday, January 30th, 2006 01:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
caddymanSo here I am, up in Wem for the week chez famile, and not entirely sure how much of a good idea it is. The usual sniping is occurring, but I think there is something of a truce on at the moment, so it's not so bad right now. I think it helps that the kids are at school. Doesn't it always?
I thought I had the week planned quite nicely. Courtesy![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rumfuddle, I borrowed a laptop and loaded all my NWO files onto my memory stick and was nicely set to get some writing done.
The first indication that I have made life hard for myself came on Saturday while I was travelling. Now, for all their other faults, Virgin Trains newpandemonium Pandolino trains do have one great advantage: there are power points for laptops. I'll get some writing done on the journey, thought I. That notion lasted all of ten minutes. I unloaded the lap top, plugged it in and booted it up. Fine. I rooted in my pocket and produced the memory stick and plugged it into the USB port. Fine. Then I realised that the laptop runs on Windows 98. It recognised the existence of the memory stick, but in a moment of electronic apartheid demanded its papers and drivers and such before allowing it a work permit. The memory stick is, of course, a generic little beastie and came with none of those accoutrements. So the two just glared at each other and I sat there helplessly.
No writing on the trip up, then.
My nephew has a quite spiffy laptop, less than a year old and loaded with Windows XP. This of course has the drivers already on board; you have to load them, but they're already there just waiting to be activated. Hurrah! Let's get some writing done!
No Word. In fact, no Office utilities of any kind at all. Fan-bloody-tastic. So Yours Truly writes a couple of paragraphs using notepad before realising that rich text format loses all the bloody formatting that was previously applied to the document, including footnotes.
Great.
Still, it didn't lose the text itself, so not a total loss.
I am now at my final fall back position. I am using my sister's PC, which has web access, Windows XP and Office. I am set. The fact that I am sitting at an odd angle and will probably put my back out because of the strange lay out of the computer set up is nothing.
I have an interesting take on the character I'm writing and just need to avoid distractions, such as family, to get the blighter done. I wish I could turn the central heating off, though, it's like a frikking oven in here.
I'd be grateful if one of the other NWO writers could look through their archives and email me Violante of Erezun's character sheet from Thebes. I don't have it here, and it would be useful, though not vital, to have a look at it for a couple of details of continuity.
Are we having fun, yet?
I thought I had the week planned quite nicely. Courtesy
rumfuddle, I borrowed a laptop and loaded all my NWO files onto my memory stick and was nicely set to get some writing done.The first indication that I have made life hard for myself came on Saturday while I was travelling. Now, for all their other faults, Virgin Trains new
No writing on the trip up, then.
My nephew has a quite spiffy laptop, less than a year old and loaded with Windows XP. This of course has the drivers already on board; you have to load them, but they're already there just waiting to be activated. Hurrah! Let's get some writing done!
No Word. In fact, no Office utilities of any kind at all. Fan-bloody-tastic. So Yours Truly writes a couple of paragraphs using notepad before realising that rich text format loses all the bloody formatting that was previously applied to the document, including footnotes.
Great.
Still, it didn't lose the text itself, so not a total loss.
I am now at my final fall back position. I am using my sister's PC, which has web access, Windows XP and Office. I am set. The fact that I am sitting at an odd angle and will probably put my back out because of the strange lay out of the computer set up is nothing.
I have an interesting take on the character I'm writing and just need to avoid distractions, such as family, to get the blighter done. I wish I could turn the central heating off, though, it's like a frikking oven in here.
I'd be grateful if one of the other NWO writers could look through their archives and email me Violante of Erezun's character sheet from Thebes. I don't have it here, and it would be useful, though not vital, to have a look at it for a couple of details of continuity.
Are we having fun, yet?