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

Friday 12 August 2011

When it comes to Microsoft, don't dither

Not so much technology, more human nature.

Years ago, as a bumper birthday present, Mrs BB (working in secret with her techno-advisers) bought me a Logitech wireless mouse. Then, wireless was the coming thing and it cost an eye-watering £75. Weighed a ton, worked a treat. I’m hard on mouses and eventually it wore out. Bought and tried two more wireless mouses but both were inadequate. Cast them aside in anger and made do with a £10 cheapo conventional mouse – with a tail.

Here’s where human nature enters the story. As I write (ie, word process) my hand perspires, an inevitable outcome of seeking le mot juste. To the cognoscenti I am the Flaubert of the Marches. Perspiration builds up on the mouse and a solid deposit eventually gums up the works. One reason of several why my social circle is so circumscribed. I needed another cheapo mouse.

Conventional mouses at PC Retail come in two price bands: £10 (made in Nepal, utterly unheralded) and £15 (same thing, branded Microsoft). For minutes I dithered over this piffling difference, hating to be suckered into big-brand pusillanimity. In the end I went MS and:

Oh the difference in me.

That’s a quote by the way. The sensuous pleasure in that delicate yet positive click, quite quite superior to the previous cheapo. I’d have paid millions willingly. As we should for things we use every day of our lives. Forget the luxuries. Moral: I’ve absolutely no idea.

NOTE: The word “mouses” is used deliberately to stir up pedants.

NOVEL Original wordage (119,154) now down to 117,208 after first-pass editing of seven-and-a half chapters.