A Day in the Life of the Addict

Today the addict was scheduled to give a presentation to 50 financial planning professionals. Here's how it went ...

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I arrived in plenty of time. I had my computer with the presentation on it, a
projector from work, and a remote from work. I also came with some simple
handouts. I realized on the way in that I had forgotten to print out copies of
a form that I wanted to hand out. Oh well.

I checked in and went to the front of the room to set up my equipment.

Plugged in and started the computer. Check.
Set up and focused projector. Check.
Plugged computer into projector. Check.
Got presentation up on screen. Check.
Toggled F7 switch so that I could have the presentation up on the big screen and
on my computer at the same time. Problem ...



I couldn't get the presentation to show up on my computer - only up on the big
screen. After a few minutes I gave up figuring at least everyone in the audience could see it even if it would be more difficult for me.

Tried out the remote control to advance the powerpoint presentation slides.
Problem ...

The computer seemed unwilling to recognize the hardware for the remote. Oh
well, at least the presentation was up on the big screen where everyone could
see it. So I decided just to go have breakfast and not sweat the details.

About fifteen minutes before the presentation, I thought I might be able to fix
the screen problem if I rebooted the computer with the projector already plugged
in.

Computer reboot. Check.
Password entry. Problem ...

On reboot the computer wouldn't take my password. The program director was
telling me we were going to start in a few minutes. I just nodded. I'll reboot
again.

Computer reboot. Check.
Password entry. Problem ...



So now I am getting nervous. In my desire to have the best possible set-up
(presentation on both computer and big screen), I had potentially screwed up
everything. The computer was not accepting my password. If I couldn't get it to accept my password then I would
have no presentation at all. Nothing. Zip. Zero. Zilch!!!

Slow ... deep ... breath.
Acknowledge powerlessness.
Surrender.

Then I realized that the number-lock key was on and this was interfering with my
password!

Number-lock key off. Check.
Computer reboot. Check.
Password entry. Accepted.
Presentation on computer screen. Check
Presentation on big screen. Check.

And then I was already being introduced ... Whew!

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Aint technology great!!