Once Works Well was pure technology. Now it seeks merely to divert.
Pansy subjects - Verse! Opera! Domestic trivia! - are now commonplace.
The 300-word limit for posts is retained. The ego is enlarged

Tuesday 24 August 2010

Learn to love the alphabet again

Know anything about monitors? Here’s the Lamborghini Murciélago of monitors – the Ilyama ProLite E2208HDS, a prematurely opened birthday prezzie from Mrs BB. What’s so special? Its size (22 in.), resolution (1920 x 1080 pixels) and price (£190). It should be standard for camera whiz-kids like Marja-Leena and Lucy since I merely point and shoot. But dullard wordsmiths gain too. Two text pages side by side and much cleaner rendering of typefaces.

HIGH-LEVEL CHAT I enjoy conversation but only with someone who matches my formidable forensic skills. Dr Paul Harris, my GP, meets the spec. I was in there this morning to discuss a skin complaint which he quickly diagnosed and then gave me a run down on its origins. These centre on my DNA’s “very clever” ability to counter the effects of UV light. Old Paul knows what turns me on.

We passed on to another of my failings – hyper-broncho-activity – which has been around for yonks and for which my previous GP admitted he could offer no help. Dr Paul says things have progressed and prescribed an inhaler. However I am to use it properly: the particles (tiny – a mere 2 microns) emerge at high velocity (200 kph) and I must co-ordinate my breathing when inhaling. Talk took in the structure of eye as proof that the Intelligent Design crackpots have got it wrong. I emerged intellectually refreshed.

NOVEL Another counsellor, Dr Plutarch, recommended adding various passages to GORGON TIMES, including an extra chapter. So the MS which I had revised down to 91,900 words now stands at 104,415 words. There’s a frisson on reaching six figures.

7 comments:

Lucy said...

That's a socking great load of words, forsooth!

I am such a technological pygmy, I have only ever had a laptop - no separate monitor - and am incapable of using a mouse, only a touchpad.

I'm sure I could have told you you had very clever DNA...

herhimnbryn said...

I think the Alchemist would like the look of that screen, so I shall forward your post to him pronto!

This typed using my tiny
netbook laptop. I think I have screen envy now.

marja-leena said...

I have screen size envy! Mine is not small at all but not as big as that! The print studio's new computer that's hooked up to Lucy our printer has one that big and I love it. Sure is easier on the eyes, isn't it?

Oh, is GORGON TIMES the name of your novel? Coming along swimmingly with the help of the dear Dr P....

Rouchswalwe said...

Frisson, from OF friçons. Yum. A new word. The Ilyama is really something. Japanese? It used to be that their specialization was producing small technological wonders. My laptop is finally here with a 17-inch screen. I think I shall dub it "Word-byter" ... what do you think, BB?

The Crow said...

Nice monitor, BB. To join the chorus, I, too, have screen size envy.

Roderick Robinson said...

All: Hey, I'm not stupid. I'd like you all to know I can see a near rhyme - shall we say a modern verse rhyme - in that provocative phrase some of you are fondling. May I remind you all that I have no physical existence. I am what I write and nothing else.

I look forward to further comments about not knowing what the Dickens I'm talking about.

Avus said...

Gadzooks, what a big one! (Thank you for giving me the opportunity to use that archaism.