Why is a Kindle called a kindle?
It’s nothing like a stick or a twig.
It hasn’t lit my fire yet
and it isn’t very big.
My new toy is baffling
It takes time to get used to it,
the buttons are confusing.
In a larger font a sonnet
takes three pages of reading.
The Kindle store I found there
is anything but kindly -
touch a button inadvertently
and you find you’ve bought a book -
when all you wanted was to look.
I need a kindly tutor
to guide me through the maze,
show me what to press
or not, just like a computer.
HEEEELLLLPPP!
I’m with you Sally and if you should happen to print off a manual, then you’re out of ink already! In any case, there probably is a “Dummies for _____” for whatever you’re looking for; do a search on Google (I even found one for iPod’s for Senior Dummies!)
Your poem has sure sparked some interesting discussion Viv – as much as I agree with Amy’s arguments for real books and supporting small book-stores … I’m also getting on and starting to travel more and it’s sure handy to carry many books on my iPod easily – I like having the capability and choice of both … so far haven’t needed to stray over to Kindle-land …
We have a kindle, but I much prefer holding a real book in my hands.
I’m smiling at your expense I fear. Such charming rhymes cover your obvious kindle-smouldering experience with this device. I have the kindle app on my iPad, for cookery books mostly because my shelves are groaning under the weight of my hobby. At the moment, I have pizza dough fermenting, tomatoes cooking into sauce in the oven … And I’m sneezing everywhere. Haven’t time for a head cold darned it; there are poems to be written, bread to be baked, and books to be read. Enjoy your Kindle. Trust me; you’ll come round to it.
Most things I make “out of my own head” as Jock calls it, but I do drag the laptop into the kitchen when I come across a brilliant blogger’s recipe. I haven’t yet discovered how to go to a specific place in a Kindle book and the thought of scrolling right through a Saint Delia to find a specific recipe is daunting.
See the magnifying glass icon at the top of each page? Use that to search for what you want to find in the book. IF you find it (which I often can’t), bookmark it so that you can find it without all the bother. Does that help at all?
Thank you, yes. I haven’t yet worked out how to bookmark, but I assume it’s on the home page.
Just re-subscribed!
I have sworn off the idea of buying a Kindle for two reasons: One, I love the tactile experience of reading an actual book; two, the convenience of video and the Net are putting too many booksellers out of business. Remember the days of secretaries in steno pools? Now one laptop can replace the jobs of rooms full of people who were gainfully employed.
There. I said it! I feel for you, Viv. They make the “purchase” part too easy for a reason, you know… they’ve gotcha. Sorry, and wishing you peace, Amy
Since I love your WWII historical posts, here’s one from my mom’s youth for you:
http://sharplittlepencil.com/2012/02/27/moving-day-circa-1933/
I sort of agree, Amy, but it IS ideal for travelling. It’s getting hard to carry books these days, so the lightness of the Kindle and its ability to ENLARGE the font size is great when you’re getting on a bit! The book I bought my mistake is great! And I downloaded all of Shakespeare’s sonnets FREE. It’s a start, but I’m still learning.
I have never tried a kindle…I’m afraid it would end up kindling my wrath and then perhaps get tossed in the stove. I’m still working on knowing where everything goes in facebook and now they’ve gone and changed it! Some should be writing some more…for dummies books.I need one called facebook for dummies. Why not throw lindle and ipad and andriod in there too?
Good luck:)
sorry for all the errors…still have asleep:)
I felt the same at first but it really is quite easy. Read the instructions!
As Sally says, RTFM. And I did. For a long time, and very carefully. But on screen instructions are useless when you are trying to do something else and it does’nt seem to have the computer’s talent for going backwards and forwards between files. It makes me mad that you don’t get paper instructions with anything these days.