Curse you Microsoft

Always having been one to use the proper Queens English (or at least my interpretation of it coming from the House of Hanover), I always go the extra step and select Canadian English as my default language setting for Windows. It is the considerate thing to do. As an engineer living in a house of eloquent english majors, it is always a struggle to keep ones head above water in any conversation. As mentioned in my previous posting, I am one who would rather experiment with the abstract meanings of words. And find it a struggle to properly punctuate and string together appropriate adverbs and adjectives in a structured sentence. Let alone maintain the proper tense throughout a thought. Life without those nefarious language rules leads to a much simplier opportunity to express ones self. And keep the others at bay as they wrestle with what was actually said. (before the suppressed chuckles start).

Fortunately I have multiple, pervasive, editors only a shoulder away, ready to pounce and pronounce and purify any deviations from Britania's printed edition. I don't mind this as it gives them something to delight in as well as making all ends of conversation topics for future dates. In fact when the book, Eats Shoots and Leaves appeared in our home, despite all claims to the contrary, as a novel of humour for the Honours degree crowd, I unmistakably noticed it magically appearing close to where I had settled in on more than one occasion. Feeling parinoid? Subtle reminders? Who knows, but these thoughts did not linger long as I am easily distracted and on to the next flow of consciousness.

And now that I am fully enabled and properly equipped to defend the British Empire, out here in the Colonies, I bravely engaged all my busines collegues with appropriate language and spelling. In particular lobbing a multitude of documents across the 49th parallel to my unsuspecting peers and more delightfully, management with colourful, scripted summaries of various engagements. Ah, barely have I depressed the send button when you can practicly sense the defenses springing into action. Half a league half a league, half a league onward. Barely a word survives the intial charge. Spell checkers to the left, Spell checkers to the right, Spell checkers in front. One may sense the futility of it all, but still onward we press. And in a modern fashion, carve out small victories as the defenses higlight the intrusion, briefly flaring up as each deviation is noted and hopefully leaves a lasting impression for future, subconscious retrieval.

While you are reading all this, one might wonder. Was this not a blog on life in Cary. The land to the south. Well I digress a little, surely the heart of the issue is coming to a head. And well it shall. Here I am in the US. And voila, my new laptop arrives. A nice shiny new Dell. And off I go. Enabling all my defenses to continue my noble quest. But to my horror, there is no option for Canadian English. I am at a total loss. Will I finally be absorbed by the Borg to become one of the many faceless bloggers with no descernable skills or principles? This cannot be so. And it shall not be. There is an option, the next selection on the menu. To preserve my ability to maintain my language, I am now the equiped with the UK english option. I have catapulted my workstation across the pond to further protect and insulate it from newspeak.

Unfortunately, I truly did not comprehend the extent to which the forces of MS will go to circumvent my will. It is truly insiduous what they are capable of doing. You have no idea, and neither did I understand the implications of my choice. The forces aligned against one are formidible. The first inkling was a naive web search. A simple request for a local establishment. I was a bit puzzled, as well as slighlty amused, that the first response had the suffice co.uk. And then the next one and the next one. Why would all the primary response be from overseas? And then the next search and the next seatch with the same structured response. Could the language of choice somehow be duly noted, catalogued and then quickly dispatched to other elements of the system. A mindless uniform response? The Borg? Pervasive, omnipresent and extending its tentacles into every facet of my daily existance? What else could they be up to?

Not to be one to give up lightly, this became a minor annoyance I could live with for the greater good. Having to scroll down or go to the next page to fulful my request was a small price to pay. Was there a man dismayed? Not I. It will take more than a mere triffle to disuade me. Unfortunately I was not prepared for what I was about to face. Theirs but to do and die. The onslaught of DST was my undoing.

A missed meeting here, a calendar request in error there. And then the reality sunk in. DST in the UK still changes at the traditional time. The end of March. But here in the US, threre is a one hour change in time. I was out of sorts with the working world. Somehow my system had taken it upon itself to observe UK DST, causing several of my appointments to be one hour later than the other participants. And not to be outdone, the changes were not universal. Some were accurate, some were not. The system, the institution was toying with myself, daring me to respond. And finally, all I could do was capitulate. They that fought so well.

We live for another day. (that being march 29th when I restore the settings to their rightful place)