Clueless Computing

Not having dictated a message for such an extensive time, makes it incumbent upon me to do so now. Many events take place in a person's life that do not allow for freedom of time. Especially a happy or joyous event that was three months in the planning.

Nevertheless, thankfully a new day has arrived, the good stuff is behind us. And now, any more time that lingers and does not have a message will only be to our detriment.

So we are back to quick mode dictation. I went to deliver an address in Michigan. It was a nice institution with a fine director. An old friend, we had attended the same postgraduate university program several decades ago. I found it most interesting. He's an intelligent, cultured person who is very dedicated to his position and constituency. But to my surprise, he is largely computer illiterate. I know he possesses a cell phone, but that's probably as close as he comes to modern technology. He has computers in his office and computers at home. His wife uses his computer at home to type a synopsis of his speeches. But when he sits down to the computer he cannot make heads or tails.

So I just had to suggest it to him. I told him, hey -- you'd like to transcribe your speeches. Or at least you'd like to put some of your ideas on paper. But when it comes to typing you hunt and peck with two fingers at most, or perhaps only one. I'll tell you what. Why don't you try Dragon NaturallySpeaking?

Of course, he asked me what the jiggers is that?! I explained to him that it was dictation software, and how all he would need to do would be to correct a few little incidental errors here and there. He was quite interested and asked me how does one go about procuring such software. I offered to purchase a copy for him. He was most thankful.

I'm in the process of ordering the software for him. But in truth, I feel it will be to no avail. He won't know how to open the program correctly, and he surely will not know how to correct errors.

Some people, just never learn.