Volunteer Work; Keyboard Error; Opera beta

Journal eugene ts wong's Journal: Volunteer Work; Keyboard Error; Opera beta 8

Journal by eugene ts wong on Sunday September 05, 2004 @02:34AM

***Volunteering Experience***
***Volunteering Experience With The Volunteer Coordinator Lady***
***Keyboard Repeat Rate Error Update***
***Opera Beta***

***Volunteering Experience***

Well, I went in on Tuesday, & boy was it unstructured. The guy really has no opinion on much. Therefore, I've decided to be extra careful on how I phrase things with him, & to listen extra carefully. If he even hints @ a possible suggestion, then I'll try to work with it. Normally, I'd prefer to discuss it before I work with it, but I'm concerned that he might be a little bit too accomodating. I think that the important thing to do is to let him talk--a lot. This'll help me to get an idea of what he really wants.

So, for my 1st volunteering opportunity, I thought that I'd teach them how to type. In general, I feel quite positive about it, but it does feel weird in some ways. It doesn't seem to lead to more job opportunities, but how are they going to get jobs requiring data entry if they can't type? :^/

To start off, I got them to open up a text editor. I then got them to start typing, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog". Notice that I didn't give them any punctuation? I didn't check for spelling, spacing or anything. The important thing was to get them comfortable & wanting to learn more. As the lesson progressed I got them to improve in different things, because they each had different skill levels. 1 would be better @ spelling, another would be better @ spacing, & the last didn't even know how to hold the key or not hold the key. I had to teach her that you could hold the key, or type the key which is touching it "really fast!". Just exposing them to the keyboard & giving them the basic lesson really made a drastic improvement. For example, the latter student would like this.

tttttttttttttttttttthhhhhhhhhheeeeeeeee qqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqquuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiicccccccckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk bbbbbbbrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrroooowwnnn etc.

I let her go @ it for a while, until she kept complaining [politely, though] about it. After I explained it to her a couple of times, she began to type like this.

the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
etc.

I'm really proud of her. This memory brings a smile to my face as I type.

After they would reach about 7 lines, I would correct their spelling, then get them to delete 6 of the incorrect lines. They would then use the correct spelling of the remaining line for any new lines. This wasn't meant to be a spelling lesson, but it was meant to develop muscle memory of the correct spelling, so that they wouldn't become inefficient in their typing. Also, I'm quite impressed that they began to catch on as the lesson progressed. In some cases they tried new things that I never asked them to do [such as using both hands] or they asked me if I meant such 'n such. I'm really impressed.

By the end of the class, their lines were correct & well spaced, & they were typing quite a few words per minute [maybe 30?] with only 1 finger per hand. I consider this to be a vast improvement compared to typing with 1 hand. Also, 2 of them were beginning to try out the home row. Their best examples looked like this.

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
asdf
asdf
asdf
asdf
asdf

Notice the capitalization & punctuation? I'm quite proud of them.

So, the teacher & I have decided that it would be best if we divided each class into several lessons, so that there wouldn't be computer exposure just once per month. Instead, it would be XX minutes per week, which would give them a chance to refresh their memories. Also, 1 student had knuckle problems. I noticed him rubbing his knuckles near the end & making those inhaling sounds that we make when we're in pain. I asked him about it, & he said that it was hurting. So, spreading the typing time out over the month, would help to prevent his knuckles from hurting.

This teacher & I seem to be gelling really well. I'll have to be careful about what I say to other people. If I get too excited & mention some of our plans, it might scare the other workers. There's nothing illegal, but it's just that it might be unconventional. The general plans are to try different things like drama & theatre sports to help them to develop social skills. Most people would be thinking in terms of finding jobs on the internet or some such, then applying for those jobs. We want them to develop their own opportunities to make the opportunities fit their own unfortunate predicament. It's a lofty goal, isn't it? I could reveal more of our discussion, if I can remember what we discussed; I assume that none of them read my journal, & even if they did, it won't be the end of the world.

***Volunteering Experience With The Volunteer Coordinator Lady***

Wow. This deserves a whole section.

I think that I spoke with the volunteer coordinator @ least once per day, starting on Monday & ending on Friday. She was calling me so much that she even said that she was calling a lot. She's a very attractive woman who's about 2-6 years younger than me.

I don't even know where to begin, other than to say that we chatted quite a lot about non-volunteer related stuff. I'll spare you the boring details, & fast forward to Friday.

* She calls me up with another volunteer opportunity, & says something like, "Huh. I guess I just can't stop thinking about you." [this is also a subtle reference to how she tried to get me to do some computer work with their network admin; the admin wasn't interested].
* I'm stunned to hear that, so I say, "Hmm. :^)" [I put the emoticon in there to convey that I'm trying to smile over the phone].
* "blah blah blah" [I wasn't paying attention because I was still stunned; I wasn't entirely sure that she meant what I thought]
* In reference to her 1st statement, I say, "I wonder that means... :^D Just joking!".
* silence, then "...what?".
* "I mean...I mean...I meant that in reference to when you said that you can't stop thinking about me. I wonder what that means, but no, no. I'm just joking. :^)"
* [insert gagging sounds as she tries to muffle her embarrassed laughter]

I changed the topic pretty quickly. That was pretty close.

Another time that was a little less funny was on Tuesday when we were eating those nacho thingies in the staff room where you dip them in salsa & whatever. She dripped some on her skin tight skirt, which was kind of odd because she actually seemed to move into the drip which made it appear that she caught it on her clothing on purpose. I thought that it was my imagination, & I didn't even bother to check her skirt. Suddenly she says that she got some on herself. I was going to say, "Oh, here. Let me get that for you.", but I thought that I'd better behave, & decided to say, "Oh here. Let me get a napkin for you.".

She's a bad girl too. She told me how she broke the law. I was stunned, but she thought that it was funny because she was laughing. I just kept looking @ the nachos & the 7 layer dip. She told me that I couldn't tell anybody because she revealed to me what she did. I said, "Well, I make no promises." [I usually try not to make any promises, especially in legal matters].
"You can't tell anybody because I told you!"
"I make no promises."
"You can't. I already told you."
"One thing that I really appreciate about volunteering is the opportunity to blah blah blah."
"Oh, way to change the subject."
"Huh?"
"Way to change the subject."

I can't remember what we said here, but I did try to explain that I wasn't changing the subject, & that I was just trying to find something else to talk about. Yeah, I know. I know. That's changing the the subject, but the thing is that I was thinking on my feet. I eventually explained to her that I wasn't intending to report her, but that I always like to avoid making promises & to have room to wiggle. By the way, I don't think that I actually said, "One thing that I really appreciate about volunteering is the opportunity to blah blah blah.". I did say something unrelated, though.

We'll have to see what happens as far as the friendship goes. However, I don't think that anything significant will happen because she's a non-Christian. I'm pretty certain of this because of her use of numerology, which she used on me, & her blatent disregard of the law.

I'm sure that nothing intimate will happen, but even if it did, I wouldn't kiss & tell. :^/

***Keyboard Repeat Rate Error Update***

Well, I don't know what I did to fix it, but it seems that the repeat rate works okay now. I stopped playing around with the nice levels. Normally, I would adjust the processes owned by root to the worst priority. Stupid? I suppose so. Now that I stopped doing that, everything seems so much more responsive. Before I stopped messing around, I noticed that the browser would almost freeze when it was trying to load a page, but now there is no problem. Repeat rate works fine. Browser works fine. Pages load faster.

I'm happy.

***Opera Beta***

I noticed that Opera beta has fixed the cursor movement [Ctrl+Left & Ctrl+Right]. Before it used to go to the beginning & end of each word no matter what direction you went in. Now it just goes to the beginning of the next or previous word, which is what it is supposed to do. Even Ctrl+Backspace & Ctrl+Del works better because of that.

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