The first “It” being tech; the second”It” being all the trouble. But this question could apply to many parts of life, and so that this post doesn’t become endlessly hopeless and boring and bummeracious, we will add some enjoyment with photos from an end-of-October walk in my neighborhood.

Amazing Amanda fixed my website, was super communicative, responsive, clear, knowledgeable, available, encouraging, professional and personal. And expensive.

(Fernando moved into my neighborhood when I sold him. I miss him something fierce.)

Last spring I bought a new scanner when my old one turned everything hot pink. It was complicated to learn, and I basically pantsed it every time I needed to scan something. It was inconsistent, and I figured it was just because I hadn’t figured out all its idiosyncrasies yet.

Then I had a stack of paintings to scan and WHAT IS THIS?? It scanned some crooked when they were lined up straight on the flatbed. I’d rescan and it would twist a bit in the other direction. Sometimes it scanned upside down, sometimes sideways, and almost always it cropped off edges, sometimes severely.

I finally looked it up online, went to the manufacturer’s website, and ended up in a 2+ hour chat with real people (I could tell by the typos and the normal non-robotish way of speaking). They had me do the same thing over and over. . . shut things off, unplug, clean the screen, restart, recalibrate, delete, upload a different “driver”, install, recalibrate, unplug, restart, clean the screen again, scan and scan and scan and scan, lid up, lid down , send another screen shot, try a piece of paper, try a piece of colored paper, try a drawing, unplug, restart… I finally said “The definition of insanity…”, and whoever it was at that point reassured me there is nothing wrong with the machine, that it is the materials I am scanning.

Oh? Then why is it that I can put a drawing or a painting in, square it up, close the lid, scan it multiple times without changing anything, and it comes out crooked one way, crooked another way, crooked a little worse, cropped off one side, cropped off the top, upside down, sideways, other sideways, AND I HAVEN’T TOUCHED THE ITEM OR THE SCANNER!!

Sounds like it is a software problem. The last dude asked for my email and name; he said he was going to look into the “driver” as it works or doesn’t with Mac.

Maybe he will and maybe he won’t.

It’s probably because my Macbook is “old”. It’s so “old” that the operating system will no longer update.

Is there a way to make a living as a visual artist in this day and age without scanning art? without having a website? without a blog? (most artists I know don’t blog) without social media? I don’t participate in normal social media sites; other than everything techie going splat at the same time, I’ve done fine without it.

So, is it worth it? Maybe. Probably. Some days yes, some days no. Prolly best to just go take a walk in between all the emails, phone calls, chats and texts to remember what is real and what is just stuff, just work, just tools.