In case I left anyone hanging by not concluding my story about my poorly functioning mouse, I just wanted to clue you in on the resolution.
I was pretty sure I was going to get a replacement, I just didn’t know if I was going to order one online, or go to the store and pick it up. I searched online and found many likely candidates at various price points. I figured I could quickly buy one and maybe even bundle it with some books that have been on my wish list for quite some time. The thing is I realized that I actually wanted to touch the thing as size and comfort level were going to be somewhat important.
After delays due to things beyond my control, I finally had the chance to go out today and pick one up. I chose a store that was convenient to me. Since Covid 19 we haven’t received too many flyers, so I didn’t even know if there was a sale or not. It is “back to school”, or so they believe at this point in time, so I expected things like computers and accessories to be on sale. As it turned out, one of my choices was on sale and I am now the proud owner of a new wireless mouse.

As I indicated would be most likely in the post, I salvaged an older, corded, mouse from the electronic scrap pile awaiting e-waste day. It was okay, but not much more than that. If I didn’t have to teach online, I probably could have put up with it for a while longer. However, the cord dangled and tickled my knees, it clicked loudly, and it scrolled…well, saying it scrolled is pretty much what I can say about it.
There are other things I could have spent money on–my back wheel isn’t true and a new one seems like the best option. I also should think about new, and slightly wider, tires. Also there are walls to paint and tools to buy. I could go on forever.
Now I just have to figure out how to use this new “block editor.
But once-upon-a-time the wireless mouse was all we had.
In the early days of wireless mice, I splashed out on some for our learning centre computers in a new sixth form college with a generous learning resources budget. At the time, they seemed like magic, but we couldn’t get through to the students that they had to stay with the computer they belonged to. Sadly, they didn’t work for long and one-by-one they were replaced by the long-tailed variety which we, fortunately, hadn’t disposed of. The students went for the traditional mice when they had a choice of computer.
The same thing used to happen to the remotes for the smartboards in our classrooms. Sadly, we could not blame this on the students. It was the teachers who packed them up and took them back to the teacher’s rooms.
Luckily, they were not specifically geared to one projector and you could take one from room to room.
We debated giving each teacher one, but that didn’t work because some teacher’s couldn’t remember to take them with them, and those teacher’s who packed them up at the end of class found they had a surplus by the end of the week.
Finally, room numbers seemed to do the trick–or those other teachers leaned their lessons….or moved to different jobs.
Sleek
The block editor isn’t all bad. Look for the “Classic” Block (hit the + and search classic, then add it). It works a lot like the classic editor we are used to.
No, it isn’t bad. I was just dealing with a lot of other frustrations while I was writing it and couldn’t find a way to justify the text of the whole document. I had to do it paragraph by paragraph.
Slowly exploring the block editor and liking it. Although it doesn’t work on my iPad which is annoying