Synchronicity & Gratitude

So, some weeks (months?) ago, my MacBook Air took a nosedive. It had been acting a little quirky throughout one particular week, and Friday night it went down and never came back up. Luckily, I had run 2 or 3 different backups Wednesday & Thursday, and keep all the super most important writing stuff on one cloud drive and also backed up to another cloud drive at the end of each session. I might have lost a couple of cat memes and the most recent screenshots I take of every word game I play for no discernible reason. But other than that, no worries. Well, except for needing a relatively current computer to do everyday things with. I have a few older machines around that remain un-upgraded for legacy software access, but I don't think gmail will even consider letting me use the mail clients on those anymore. 

I posted my plight on FB, asking if anyone had something they might sell cheap, and a few friends offered some older machines for free or cheap. I'm currently still using a loaner MacBook Pro 2015 from my friend Robin over at Kitten Associates, and wondering if I might still offer to buy it even though I technically don't *need* need it …because I have a 2019 MacBook Pro gifted from my friend Gordon.

Not long ago, before the Air took its plunge, I had been contemplating my current state of tech. My "big work" machine - a Mac Pro Tower - is 12 years old now. It still does the things I need, albeit somewhat grumpily and slow, but someday it won't at all. And not being in a particularly great position financially, if that were to happen, I would have to discontinue the graphic design offerings that I take on here and there. I haven't tried to push the tower for video, once a primary purpose along with all the graphics stuff, for quite a while. 

I did not expect the Air, a 2017 model bought gently used, to give up its ghost first. And I definitely did not expect MB Pros to show up as possible replacements.

As I was loading the 2019 with my various Apple softwares from over the years fresh from the App Store, for the first time in a long while, my brain drifted to Final Cut. Yeah, I had a license from back when I worked at the Apple Store, and hells yeah, I installed it. I was like, "holy crap, I could do video again."

A very short time later I had a quickie video project land in my lap to do as a favor for NEHW (New England Horror Writers) to warm up the skills, then an actual paid video project for one of my Apple colleagues from back in the day who needed some behind-the-scenes footage edited to go along with an independent movie he'd just finished. 

The thing about video and graphics is it takes up a lot of space. The thing about my regular computing habits is that all my music and all those saved cat photos and memes and word game screenshots and 15 or so years of email also add up to a lot of space. I haven't loaded the loaner up with all that (my white MacBook serves well enough as my partial music server at home), but I really don't want to load up the omg I'm doing video again machine with all the things. 

It also occurred to me, towards the end of the panicked ebay-search-ful interval between realizing the Air was gone and the first offer of a loaner, that I could spend a little money on parts and repair the Air. I mean, I could still do that. I kinda want to do that, just to see if I can. I've done a few repairs on the towers I've had, and several on the white MacBooks where the charging port need to be replaced… a few times. 

Anyway, I just wanted to acknowledge the awesomeness of my friends when I put out the call for some used tech, and the awesomeness of synchronicity when I started to think about doing video again. And also to post. If only the words in my head could post themselves. SO MANY posts get nearly fully composed in my head, and then languish into irrelevance. All I can do is keep trying. :)