It’s been a few weeks since my Mac up and died on me. I really miss it.

I have parts on the way to me here in France from the US (where they are a Hell of a lot cheaper) that I hope will fix the problem; if the problem is from another source than what I suspect then I’ll have to send the laptop back to the US for repair.

If I have to do that, I’ll buy another Mac laptop to replace it while I wait for the repair. Yes, I find it THAT useful and helpful in my writing.

Neither of my PCs (the desktop or the laptop that I don’t use as a music player, I have two PC laptops here with me) are as comfortable to write on, either in keyboard positioning or in the force required to type.

Also,I simply like the Mac interface better.

Yes, there are PC advocates out there who proclaim that Windows is the best operating system ever, and I won’t dispute their assertions as it applies to them.

For me, however, the Mac works best.

Sigh… hopefully the parts will arrive soon, and they will fix the problem.

If not, I’ll just have to spend some money.

Courtesy of Eric, The Straight White Guy, I have been reminded that I missed an anniversary, one written about eloquently by Kathy at The Cake Eater Chronicles.

She writes:

I don’t think I’ll ever forget this man.

No one knows who he is. No one knows if they should really be using the word “was” instead of “is” when they write about him. No one has any idea about anything in regards to him.

Yet everyone remembers him.

He was the one who screamed through his actions that you will have to get around me if you want to do this. The world will be watching. Just go ahead and try it on for size and see what happens.

I wonder about him. I know this is hardly new stuff. Half the world has seemingly speculated on what this man was about when he stepped in front of a row of tanks, tightly grasping what looks to be the fruits of his Saturday morning shopping. But I can’t really help myself from wondering about him. Who he was. Why he did what he did. What happened to him. What his name is. All of it fascinates me.

I would like to think that this man is the one who gave a massive boulder a good hard shove and started it moving down a hill. Even if his own country didn’t benefit from his actions, I think he’s the one who led people to say, just like he did, that enough is enough. He showed them they could be brave. He showed them you didn’t need to have a party membership or a position of power to make a memorable effect. All you really needed was the will to make that statement. To say, in effect, “no, you’re not going to do this because I am here. I will try and stop this. Because I believe your actions to be wrong. I am going to make a stand, right here, right now, because this is what I believe is needed.”

Even more than usual, I recommend you read her entire post.

We can all learn from this simple, yet incredibly brave act by this one man.

Even if China was not fundamentally changed by his action, it still serves as an inspirational act of courage.