Techno-follies

-1) Cellphone machinations:
We have discovered that apparently our cellphones lose their sound-level settings if the battery is removed.
For some reason the display setting remains the same.
Our cellphones are like PCs. Every once in a while a function hangs and the battery has to be removed.
Fire them up, and they play a welcome-tune, mostly in full, but often aborted.
Same with shutdown.
Charging the phone isn’t supposed to play music at all, but sometimes it does. This is especially true of removal.
The other day, Linda’s phone wouldn’t shut off — it was hung — so we removed the battery.
That, of course, shut it off; we were back to Ground Zero — but Linda also noticed the ringer-volume was reduced.
Some time ago my phone had hung, requiring battery-removal, and for months the earpiece was barely audible — I’d have to trigger the speaker-phone. (I thought the phone was dying — it’s at least three years old.)
So last night (Wednesday, August 8, 2007), I set about resetting all the settings on our phones.
The ringer-volume is back to full blast on both our phones, as is the earpiece-volume.
It’s gotten so I can do this without the manual — it’s 44 fiddling the menu function.
And there were no steaming hairballs to speak of. It’s also gotten so I can reset my digital watch without the manual.

-2) Online-ordering follies:
Last night I decided to try ordering a new denim jacket online — my old one has gotten too big after losing weight, plus I’ve had occasional success with online ordering.
So first I Froogled “denim jacket,” and then narrowed to “Levi denim jacket.”
Fine; 89 bazilyun hits. I fired up the non-Macy’s and it showed me some store where I could order a jacket online.
Okay, guile and cunning here: copy/paste the web-address from FireFox into Internet-Explorer. Seems the web-designers set their sites up to work with IE — other browsers often tank.
Next move: take all the hyphens out of everything — hyphens often throw things for a loop.
Similarly: five-number zip only; adding the “plus-four” throws sites for a loop.
Okay; everything hunky-dory to not throw things into the ozone: “process order.”
Boom-zoom: “Please fix the part in red!”
Okay; there was a state scrolldown I didn’t notice, and it was still set on Alaska (there’s not a 14469 in Alaska). Change it to New York.
“Process order.”
Boom-zoom: “Please fix the part in red!”
“What are you talking about? I don’t even see a red part. There ain’t a red part!”
Start over. Now it has me ordering two Levi jackets. Delete one. Do the whole stinkin’ kabosh again from start-to-finish.
“Process order.”
Boom-zoom: “Please fix the part in red!”
“Oh for crying out loud! What’s supposed to take five-minutes is turning into an hour wrestling-match. Who designed this site?”
Linda came in, and we tried this-and-that. Ordered a third time (again delete the second jacket), and again “Please fix the part in red!”
I gave up. Macy’s got the sale.
Maybe the first site didn’t like autofill; I’ve had that happen. Copy/paste an e-mail address (or password) a second time and the site bombs.

-3) PayPal for MyFamblee.com:
Bill is crying that MyFamblee.com wants us to re-up again for FlagOut.
The thought comes to mind to PayPal it — after all, I’ve paid for two things with PayPal.
Nice idea; but it’s just asking for trouble.
Just print him a check and an envelope, and send him the six-bucks 20th century style.
Like ordering subs with a ‘pyooter, it’s worth a try; but I know how things go.

-4) Go figure........
I received an e-mail from SteadFast Cycles, where I am ordering a large Ducati-patch for the new Levi jacket.
Um, “Your payment has been received,” and then “Please send payment for your eBay purchase.”
We’re waiting (thrump-thrump). I e-mailed a response, but it bounced.

“Linda” is my wife.

“44” (Agent-44) is my brother-in-Delaware’s onliest child.

“MyFamblee.com” (actually MyFamily.com) is our family’s web-site server. Our site is called “FlagOut;” what my mentally-retarded (Down Syndrome) kid brother always used to say every morning about hanging the American-flag out. My younger brother-in-Delaware “Bill” is a site administrator. The annual charge is $6 per member.