Stress-It's Natural
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Electronically Speaking Page 1 The newsletter of the Fredericksburg, VA Personal Computer users Group 1 2 3 4 5 6 Volume 22 Issue 10 Electronically Speaking October 2009 Next Meeting October 8, 2009 Stress-It’s Natural What is stress and how do we live with it? Libby Wasem, the Staff Director of the Fredericksburg Counseling Services, Inc. has agreed to be with us tonight to discuss Stress. Many of us are retired and we all had many thoughts of how our life would change. Now we’re there with no bosses to telling us what to do, how to do it or making life miserable. Retirement seemed to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. In most cases that is true, however in todays climate, things we never anticipated become a thought-provoking area of concern. Recession, inflation, cost of living, foreclo- sures and probably health matters suddenly take up many of our waking moments. To say nothng of what suddenly happens when our computer does not act nice. This leads to stress. A purely natural phenomenon that is the result of these things. In most cases a natural coping response may include higher blood pres- sure, nervousness, unacceptable personal relations and just plain crabbiness. But sometimes a little help may be necessary. Tonight Libby, using her extensive background in counseling techniques will show us techniques that have worked for her clients at FCS. This will be great meeting for all of us, even if you’re not retired. Be certain Libby at work on one of the new to bring a friend or acquaintance to hear Libby and her stress relieving OneTouch computers techniques. You missed it Yvonne described the capabilities of the Clinic that included treating such things as allergy symptoms, earache, pink eye, Yvonne Wernecke sprains, lacerations and burns. What do you do when the Grandkids come to visit and She also reviewed various one suddenly has a sore throat? services devoted to staying healthy including screen- Yvonne had the answer at the meeting on September 10. ings for cholesterol levels, hypertension, college or She is a Board Certified Family Nurse Practitioner at the school physicals as well MinuteClinic located at the CVS Store on Tidewater Trail as standard vaccinations. in Fredericksburg. This was a great presenta- The MinuteClinic is one of the newer concepts in the retail tion that you shouldn’t health care industry. The concept is the first step in have missed. making basic medical needs more available, in less time than the traditional Doctor appointment. Yvonne presenting a point. Page 2 Electronically Speaking Reprinted with permission from Smart Computing. Visit www.SmartComputing.com /Groups to learn FPCUG what Smart Computing can do for you and your Meetings in 2009 Tips and Hints user group!” November 12 December 10 Gaming Tips For Parents & Grandparents: Aside from checking a game’s Fredericksburg ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) rating, there are other ways you can ensure the video games your youngsters are playing are age-appropriate. PC Users Group Electronically Speaking is published monthly for the information and pleasure of Carefully look at everything on a title’s packaging, including the the members of the Fredericksburg PC Users Group. Any FPCUG member or visitor game graphics. is invited to submit articles for the newslet- Find game reviews, screen shots, or demos to get a better idea of a ter. game’s content. Officers If available, use the game’s parental controls to restrict John Kruelle - President inappropriate content. [email protected] · Learn about games by talking to other parents and older children who are Jim Jordan 1st Vice-President familiar with or have played certain titles. [email protected] · Participate in your children’s gaming and discuss their games as much Roger Schirmer as possible. 2nd Vice President · Be aware of nonrated ESRB material a game may contain. “Mods” are [email protected] program downloads that can alter a game’s content, and online games Ralph Myers- Secretary often have live player chats as well as other user-generated content. [email protected] • Fitness Gaming: If it’s too hot this summer to go work out outside, take Kay Pollock - Treasurer (Continued on Page 3) [email protected] Board of Directors Attendance Reward George Bell Attendance Rewards started again in January. Cliff Dalseide Josh Cockey As you can see from the photo, all members names Trustees are listed and each name indicates a tile number. Bill Williams-Agent of Record Gene Brower Each round tile has a number and these numbers are Rick Neil turned down so that whoever picks a tile it will indicate the person winning a $10.00 Newsletter Editor check. If that person is not present the name is dropped from the eligibility list and Jim Jordan the next month’s award goes to $20. Roger Schirmer won last month so the award [email protected] for this month is $10.00.. Webmaster Josh Cockey If you are interested in what your number is, refer to the signin sheet and the left [email protected] column indicates your number. In This Issue Page 2 - Tips & Hints Special Offer Dave, The Computer machine. That is $60 /hr. rather Page 3 - Speed Demons Guy is offering all than $120/hr. Page 4 - OnLine Calendars Page 5 - Book Review from members of FPCUG a Page 5 - Computer Contribution Techs In The special of 50% off on all This offer is only good when you Page 5 - Help Needed his labor when he is bring in your addressed copy of Page 6 - FPCUG Info Burg called to service your this newsletter. Page 7 - What’s Coming Page 8 - Calendar 20 Free Photos Masthead Photos Richmond Camera of Brian Smelter of 1-Gae & Bill Pinschmidt Fredericksburg Flicko’s is still 2-New member-Dave Ellenwood 3-Bruce Baker is pleased that FPCUG is offering any offering a 10% discount on his helped Habitat for Humanity member of FPCUG free professional 4-An interested crowd printing of twenty 4 x 6 photos if you just service for any 5-John shows packets from Minute bring in your copy of this newsletter and a FPCUG member Clinic bringing in this addressed newsletter. 6-Roger Schirmer won the Attendance memory card or CD of the photos you want Award this month printed. This offer expires 10/30/09 Electronically Speaking Page 3 more RAM memory is a quick, cheap way to improve perfor- Speed Demons mance to an aging computer, and extend life before a replace- ment is in order. Windows XP should have at least 1024 MB Written by Bill Roman, Advisor to the Board of Directors, The (1GB) of RAM to run properly, and Windows Vista (32bit) needs PC Users Group of Connecticut 3GB of RAM. More is not better in the case of Vista for techni- www.tpcug.org cal reasons I will not go into in this article. [email protected] This is only half the battle. The other half is to beat down what I This article has been obtained from APCUG with the author’s permis- sion for publication by APCUG member groups; all other uses require will call the “moochers”. Years ago when I would inspect a the permission of the author (see e-mail address above). computer for sluggish performance, it was usually because of a rogue game that was installed. Back then quite a few games There is an issue that I feel must be addressed, since the adopted the theory that the only reason you owned your $3000 issue continues to come up on a regular basis. As a PC or $4000 computer (yes, it was that much back then, even technician I constantly get asked why the clients’ computer more depending on how far back you go) was to play some has become so slow, and if there is anything wrong with it. ridiculous $49 game. The game would change many settings that allowed the game to work properly, but made it miserable The first thing I tell the client is that there are two main to perform simple tasks like type a letter. culprits that contribute to a PC becoming very sluggish. The first being lack of RAM memory. This answer usually elicits a Now, in 2009 every program under the sun assumes that they quick response from the user that they “only do e-mail, are the main focus, and must be given priority at all times. Internet and word processing” or some similar response. I What does this mean to you, the end user? Each time when an then go into a discussion with the user that there are two upgraded revision of Adobe Reader comes out it always wants kinds of memory in a computer: hard drive storage, which to include the new “MSN Toolbar” or “Yahoo Toolbar” etc. This holds all their music, pictures, documents, etc. and RAM, or adds unnecessary junk to your browser, which slows down working memory. A user could have plenty of hard drive getting online. In addition, many of these programs load an space to store all of their documents and stuff, but when additional program when Windows starts to speed it up when they don’t have enough RAM, the computer will, over time, starting it. This is just lousy practice that is a very poor substi- become slower and slower. tute for tight efficient programming. If the program was small and lean there would be no need for “speed loaders,” which Why you ask? When the computer was originally purchased make your computer take an exorbitant amount of time for (usually somewhere between 2 and 5 years ago) Windows Windows to start.