Slices of Color in Paint and Stone

Anyone ever tried to use the Virtual Agent that Microsoft provides?  If you have , have you noticed the circles around you??  The Microsoft Community is helpful, IF, that is a large IF you can get to it after you climb over Edge and the other non sense  that is pretty but often not helpful if you are in a rush.

I had voice recognition set up on my windows 10 computer but have not used it for a couple of years!! Then the icon disappeared after a download about three months ago.  When it used to work it was kind of OK. So today, having a bit more time,  I decided to try to figure out what happened to the icon and see if I could reload it.  Kind of like the disappearing trash can on my desktop that would and will take off after a download from Microsoft.

I solved that trash can  problem with some help from the Microsoft Community and the users of U Tube. Those solutions worked so well that I had two "trash cans" for awhile! I remembered that when I tried to solve that problem,  I had tried to use Cortana, who or which, take your pick, is a useless waste of my desktop space. AS usual, I WAS in a hurry to complete the post, so I thought mistakenly that I would try the  much hyped "Virtual Agent", who immediately seemed "untrained ".    I abandoned that idea of using her relatively quickly on that first attempt because  I was losing that day and found solace from my virtual Microsoft users Community.

  Today, I was going to blog about my art show that I curated, "Slices of Color in Paint and Stone" that opened last night in Kansas City at the Vine Street Studio 2033 Vine Street near or in the Jazz District, this show,which is by the way, my best, my opinion, curation job thus far. This show will be there for the month, and we will do another First Friday invite slash, for October 6. So keep the date in mind , if you are in KCMO  and come out to our show. While Pat Jordan, the owner of the Vine Street Studio, offered  me a solo show, I decided to share with two other Kansas City Artists, Phyllis Wiggins- Horne, a jeweler, who I often show with, and Margaretre Gillespie.  


This brings me back to the Virtual Agent. To my credit, I solved the disappeared Voice Recognition icon got it up and working, all is well, right??!!  This posting was going to be a breeze. I was going to dictate my blog, post some great shots of the show and move on to doing something about the floor that I am ripping out in the upstairs bath. The microphone worked. Check! The headset worked.  Check , check. I found from U Tube, note, not Microsoft, how to find what happened to the icon and how to get to it via Easy Access, man`- Check, Check, Check, this was going to work .  Voice Recognition  was re trained and worked according to the computer.

Now on to Blogger and my new found resolve to do a better job with my Website: http://www.ErleneECFlowers.com and blogger, http://erleneflowersstudio.blogspot.com.  This is how I got into it with the Virtual Agent, my "helpful friend" residing on my computer, promising me help whenever I need it.

Logging into Blogger, I found that while my computer said that voice recognition was ready and functional, it did not work!! Talk , Talk , Talk  nothing, appears on the Blogger page. Well, this is a Microsoft App, surely the Virtual Agent will know how to solve two Microsoft App communication problems.  The comedy begins. She referred me back to Easy Access and all the steps on which  I just spent an hour. When I typed, notice she turned off her hearing aid when I said that it was not helpful, in response to did it solve my problem,. she referred me to Chat- which is her. Tried again, sent me to Easy Access, which referred me back to her. I did this for 15 minutes with different questions which she either did not understand or just is "untrained". If she were a real person, we would label her unsuited for her  position and lacking soft skills and pink slip her!!

Needless to say, I typed this blog and will re-visit Microsoft Community and U Tube for a solution later..

 

Update on Miss VA, she  has been relieved of her position, temporarily for "alternate truths" that do not support her stance as a helper.

Take a quick look at the show, "Slices of Color in Paint and Stone" in the images attached. Hope that you can make our next First Friday, October 6, 2017 at  2033 Vine Street in the Jazz District of KCMO from 5-8 pm.

 

A New Way to Work

 Learning A New Way to Work

It seems nowadays I am learning all new technology whether I want to or not. I bought a new computer  Windows 8 version and an ipad. My favorite, Brother,  printer just passed into the land for dead printers. Now, I have a new Brother and another learning curve to climb.

 Today, I found out that my iPad would take voice dictation. Now, getting this new discovery to behave is a new problem. This is my blog for February using my new iPad dictation with some insert over ride..

 

We are expecting a lot of snow tonight. This is a great night to work on the computer as I have a lot of work to do that includes much writing. I have to design directions for a new format for the Artist for Life Project in which some of the members of The Light in the Other Room are participating. You might want to check this project out at these web addresses.

 

http://artistsforlifeproject.com/

https://www.facebook.com/Artistsforlifeproject

I need to write my blog; and I need to write my first newsletter for 2014. This is going to be challenging  and fun night. This is my entry into the project. It was featured in the Kansas City Star. 

 Yahoo Update…..

 I am still in the process of correcting the hijack on my Yahoo account. I am still missing over 600 names. By the way, Yahoo finally admitted that they were hacked and many accounts were hijacked.  They claimed that this incident just happened this month when it actually happened in December 2013. I posted their shame to Facebook.

 My experiences with Yahoo were definitely unsatisfactory. All the phone numbers listed for assistance are not answered. I waited as long as two hours on the phone only to have the phone disconnect. I researched every phone number listed for Yahoo none of them led to the company help line or customer service. My absolute favorite was the one that said "your call is very important to us, please hang on we will be with you in a moment", after five after five repeats of this message the phone disconnected.

 Long story short, I never was connected with Yahoo at all. I emailed Yahoo at the suggested email given to the subscribers to change their email. The big trick is that you had to sign into your old email, first from which they sent the reset password message that promptly goes to the hacker, who promptly locked me out of my email.

 

 When I emailed Yahoo, I carefully explained that blah blah email was hijacked. I asked them to respond to the email that I listed or to the phone number listed as a back up. Yahoo has no effective way to deal with hijacked accounts. Yahoo has dropped the effective customer service accounts line once used to email for assistance.

As I have worked with this problem, I found that several companies use the same strange system the Yahoo does they only will communicate with your registered account so any information for reset is sent promptly to the hijacker or your hacker..
 

Did you know that Etsy uses the same insane approach ? There  is no way to contact these businesses by phone, and they will only respond to the registered email? I think that this is called a loop.

 

Finally got Yahoo to reply by email. I went to one of their sites that asked my opinion on great a job that they were doing. In other words, I tried a back door approach. I told this link my story. They responded and direct me back to one of the nonworking ,non responding phone numbers.  The circle is now complete.

 

Sell your Yahoo stock !!

 

 Progress Report    Zip, Nada

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yahoo Hacker address -IP 27.50.86.125 from Australia Dec 3, 2013

This said, I will start with Yahoo -long story short- Close your Yahoo account! Sell your yahoo stock! Stop supporting a company that does not value you  and will not respond to you!!

I am an admittedly a lazy blogger.  I never saw the real value until now !!

 Thanks to the Aussie ,hacker at IP 27.50.86.125,  I have a new goal for 2014 to share all the really disturbing stuff that I found out from this hack.  This hacker has 80 IPS addresses all identified as high risk by McAfee and WebRoot. All are coming from Australia.  He writes English well, because that is his native language, and is pared with someone in Rotterdam, Netherlands where he maintains a drop box to collect all the money that he plans to steal from his scam.

I think artists and musicians are venerable to this kind of hack because they have fans and followers who care about them. I believe that he has carefully researched this and cherry picks which persons to send these e-mails. I think that he is on Facebook, and I think his name might be James E. Lynch, will explain this in another blog., so follow me.

December 3, 2013 will be remembered by me as the day that I. had to literally start over with all my virtual on line internet stuff. Changing my password did not work on this hack.  FYI, If they jack your contacts list and your folders - you are screwed and changing your password means nothing. Special thanks to all my friends who called me ABOUT the hack and started at 5:00 in the am and did so from around the world, across the US, Europe and Costa Rico. See I fit the  profile;  I  have a good following of caring people who are not all geeks !!

I have read numerous articles and talked to several IT people, web designers, web fixers, hackers etc.. after the compromise, hack, hijack, theft, invasion of my yahoo emails, dreamwoman59@yahoo.com and her more sophisticated sister, erleneflowers.artist@ yahoo.com  and the step sisters, dreamwoman59@hotmail.com, and erleneflowers@hotmail.com that this virtual rapist created December 3, 2013. I never had a hotmail account. I got  lots of advice and literally learned somethings that are worth sharing.

 I  had a quick and dirty reality lesson on what is not and who does not give a feather about your and the loss of your information  including our U. S  government people. I have not tried Missouri yet. Will let you  know how that goes. Personally, I would like .001 %of my income tax spent on finding hackers, prosecuting them and allowing the public to openly testify against them in court. You can balance this by subtracting my .001% from the subsidizing  of the oil industry who are making 400% profits, and do not need my .001%, anyway.

Yahoo is scrambling to try to keep their 4,000,000 business customers who were hacked. Their claim that these were only AT and T Business accounts. LIAR ! They have totally written off the other large hacks that were done at the end of November and the beginning of December which were broadcast nation wide on the news channels.  

Finding-  and FACT- you cannot talk to them !!! You cannot e-mail them about an invasion.  These sophisticated GEEKS return the answer to the hi jacked email.  How's that for stupid ?!  You cannot communicate with them if your account was hacked and their poor system allows the hacker to add information to your profile. The only thing that worked was removing the added e-mail, which was put back as a different email within hours.  None of the listed and laboriously google researched phone numbers work. If they answer, they will hang up the phone after, 10, " your call is very important to us, please hold an operator will be within you shortly", repeats the line goes dead and your are disengaged.  Tried it 5 times- FACT !!

Yahoo used to respond and that service had disappeared from their website that they are working so hard to make function like  windows 8.  This might be a pretty dumb decision too because most of their users are having problems with Windows 8. If you noticed, two days after launching Windows 8, the Geeks met to design Windows 8.1. When I am working on line, I do not need or want little colored blocks or a layout that looks like Windows 8 and tries to function like Bing.

Finding FACT- several  of the businesses with whom I had been doing business have no contact phone number and function like Yahoo- asking you to sign into a hijacked accounts and returning the response to the hijacked  accounts which will never reach you. . Will be blogging about them too !!
Stay tuned for the
-Next Blog  No Customer Care - Non Working  Phone Number at Yahoo.

I went by  Images Art Gallery in Overland Park, Kansas  7320 80th Street 913 232 7133  and this is still available in time for Christmas giving !  http://imagesartgallery.com/wordpress 

Finding Time to Do It All !

Well, it is Sunday again ! Still have not gotten around to do everything on my " To Do List". I am glad to keep up with friends via blogger. Moon Stump, my artist friend from Indiana, really is developing her painting. Love her works !!

I did get to Augusta this year and stayed with a really nice family.  I only painted two days, but I really loved the break.

These were the efforts of my three days.

    

I Need A Wife !

I  did not get to Augusta, Missouri Plein Air  to paint this year.  Instead, I had a surprise surgery; actually two surprise surgeries.   I did participate in the Stems Plein Air. www.stemspleinair.com.   I did  two paintings  prior to the second surgery.  I was pleased that both endeavors sold at the Stems events.  

Twilight  done in oil at the Quick Paint

 

Shadows oil

 

For the last week, I have tried to sit down and tackle three paintings that I need to begin. One is a commission that needs to be started like last week ! Besides the usual duties, I have had company twice which means extra house work, laundry, cooking, cleaning, errands, shopping and attention. I am pretty organized, but like many creative persons, once I start a  project, I do not like to be interrupted.

I am immersed.
I work until I am tired.
I eat what I want and when I please.
I do not clean house or do laundry.
I do not answer the phone for unnecessary time consuming conversations.
My family understands these moods after having put up with them for years and so do my very close friends.

It is hard to entertain and be a charming gracious hostess with all the work that is required to entertain- when one's mind is on the creative process. I need to paint, I need to work... my mind keeps churning as I bake, clean,  smile and plan.

I realized  last week why male artists have more time; they have a wife to do the cleaning, washing, ironing, cooking, errands, grocery shopping and all the other stuff necessary to keep life moving !  This last week I needed a wife. A maid has to be directed. A wife functions without direction. I know - I was one once.    

Next week with a deadline looming- I am retiring to to my cave studio to work all week. I  am not answering the phone or doing e-mail or attending meetings- unless of course  money is involved.

I have four shows to prepare for---one on Chicago,one in Kansas City, one in Independence. I need to re place the jewelry pieces that just sold as well.

I plan to be ready .

Electronics Work without a Hitch - (when you do not need them)

                                                                 
                                                                    Maasai
Did you ever have one of those days where there is no room, time or space  for errors and everything electronic that you touch goes Wham-o ! The printer stops talking to the computer and decides that it hates the new paper that was  just loaded; the print wheels decide that they need to clean themselves for 15 minutes. (I have an automatic clean myself printer) Well, the last two days  deserve to be nominated  as classics in this area. I worked with my photographer yesterday-- we had everything set  -- or so I thought.  Five minutes after leaving his house, I realized that I had left my flash drive. So with little time to spare, I returned to his house to retrieve it. Needless to say , I had an appointment elsewhere which I was pushing the envelope on for time. This miss- step was the sign of impending doom.

I got the flash drive yesterday and returned home-as I planned my next two busy days in my head. I was ready to rock and roll today.  Get all the  good stuff done !! Correct inventories,do the books-- you understand and clean because I am expecting out of town company, Sunday.  Low -  and be hold , you guessed it-all the pictures that we had worked on so diligently yesterday for size, settings and color were not on my  flash drive. Especially, the ones  that I needed to apply electronically to a show.  I discovered this as I was applying to a show on line.  E- mail pending send.   So,  off  I went back to my photographers to get the saved picture files off of his computer. I waited impatiently as he uploaded  files in all the correct sizes on my flash drive.  Back I went  to complete my tasks.  I started the upload- picture one- great, picture two great, picture three - part of the new doomed  series - wrong- format- which I found out AFTER I pressed send !!. You do get the picture--Electronics only work well   WHEN  NOT  NEEDED!


There must be some kind of special Murphy's Electronic LAW that exists in my studio and only comes into play when I have deadlines!!

I have to go back again tomorrow-to get the upload for my flash  and rush to  hang a show in Kansas before 3:00.  Did I mention that the site for the show is an hour from my house in Lee's Summit and my photographer is 20 minutes from me  ??  I have a 10:00 am appoint with the photographer. This should be fun to see what happens tomorrow !

Consequently,  I can only share one picture here,  Maasai.  No, he does not have on red; they really do sometimes wear blue.

Namaste,

Erlene

THE GAMBLER

This was inspired by the song, the Gambler, and the advice that the song provides...you have to know when to hold em and know when to fold em-- know when to walk away and know when to RUN...