Now that I am settled into my new place, and I have the space, I can begin to get serious about art again. It feels great to get out of my cocoon (motorhome) where I had difficulty turning around without hitting something let alone trying to paint. Here are some photos of my new Condo in Oliver BC.

Computer station between dining and living room

Living room shown from dining room

Dining room and kitchen counter

View towards the kitchen

Part of the painting studio with another computer station

Main painting area in the studio

Total cost for moving my artwork out of storage in Whitehorse to Oliver BC with a moving company was $1576.46. Total weight less than 500 pounds. Surcharges: Northern Surcharge $90.40; Labour Surcharge $15.45; Small Shipment Surcharge $250.00; Fuel Surcharge $48.12; Empty Miles Surcharge $257.92; GST $75.07; Valuation Charge(?) $37.50. Time to deliver: 1 month. Storage charge in Whitehorse for approximately 3 years >$2000.00. Conclusion: It would have been less costly to mail each item by Canada Post!

It served me well, my Pontiac Sunfire. It never let me down. Even when I was driving along highway 97 thru OK Falls and ran into another vehicle that drove thru a  stop sign in front of me, I wasn’t hurt. The Sunfire, a write-off, gave up it’s life and protected me. I only received a few bruises from my seat belt when I hit the intruder in my path. Who was it? Only the driver of the other car knows. The collision was treated as a hit and run incident and ICBC has since settled my claim and I have wheels again . . . a 1998 Buick Century. Yes it’s old. But it is in good condition and drives well . . . like me?

Farewell my Sunfire. May you find a new friend, in the junk yard, or wherever you  end up. Hello my new Buick. May you serve me as well as my now wrecked Sunfire did.

The problem of being unable to download .pdf files from Google Chrome using Adobe 9.2 appears to finally be fixed. Who, how, or exactly when this occurred I don’t know, but I am happy to be able to now use Google Chrome without a problem.

First the bad news; you cannot upgrade from Vista Home Premium to Windows 7 without doing a clean install. If you have many programs like I do, that is a *big* job. Some of my installation keys are now lost and reinstalling programs without keys are impossible and getting the suppliers to give you the key is *not* easy. Also if you initially downloaded some of the programs you also have to go back to the supplier to get new updated programs; a good case for purchasing CD’s right from the start (with installation keys and with an install program that will most likely reinstall).

Another problem I had was transporting my Eudora email to Windows 7; I couldn’t do it and I was forced to reinstall Eudora *without* my email files. A bummer!

Now the good news; Windows 7 appears to be much faster and it looks pretty with nice little gimmicks. Organizing your files yourself however, does take some time to learn.

I do not want to see another Windows OS upgrade for a very long time.

The problem that appeared to be fixed (see previous post), only lasted for one session. Google Chrome still does not display .pdf files downloaded with Chrome. Other browsers are okay.

After installing Windows 7, Chrome forced a reinstall of Adobe Reader 9.2. The new Adobe Reader 9.2 now works well with Chrome. I haven’t tried a new install using Vista but I wonder if Adobe 9.2 now works with Chrome on Vista as well. whether it was a Google fix or an Adobe fix I don’t know . . . but thanks to whoever fixed it.

Now it wouldn’ t it  be nice if WSFTP would work with Windows 7?

I managed to install Windows 7 after continually getting a “Windows could not retrieve information about the disks on this computer” error message. The solution can be found HERE. Thank you Kevin!

Today I tried upgrading my Vista machine to Windows 7 Professional. On the first try I received the following error message: “Windows could not retrieve information about the disks on this  computer”. So I followed the instructions and ran their program called “Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor”. Then I received the following error message: “Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor ran into an unexpected error. Please reinstall Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor and try again”. I did that with no different result. I checked for information and/or further possibilities online without success. No information online and no help from Microsoft!

Why am I not surprised? Now plan B: Give up on Microsoft and put both of my computers on Linux Ubuntu using all open source software. I fought a valiant battle and lost . . . and so did Microsoft. Or did I really lose? Maybe I won and Microsoft lost?

The incompatibility problem with Adobe Reader 9.2 and/or Google Chrome is still present. My advice at this point is to use Google Chrome as a browser unless you want to download a .pdf file in which case Google Chrome won’t work . . . so I suggest in that case use FireFox.