I just can't imagine a life without orchids! After raising them lovingly for years, suddenly I found myself bedridden. When my aide arrived in the AM, I got a "Hi, how are you and I'm taking ten!" She went out to the back yard, quickly checked the orchids and brought any new bloomers onto the patio for me to enjoy before starting my day. It was my incentive for overcoming adversity. When hurricane Wilma flattened and twisted everything, I was ready to just hire a truck to haul the whole mess away. Eight weeks later, members of my favorite orchid society had dug through the mess, salvaged a mess of bedraggled plants and restored things as best they could. A fellow forum member (from Oklahoma) actually sent me over four hundred plants to encourage me to continue! Several society friends still come every week to care for orchids, as I am physically limited in what I can do out there. As they come into bloom, I sell them on the silent auction table at meetings, knowing they are going to good homes. Still about 1500 left, so I don't think I have to plan a "life after orchids"

You can pick up a new internal HD for peanuts but even if you find the original install disks you may not be able to install the OS on anything other than the original HD. This is one of the issues that makes me HATE PCs. I had to reformat my drive last summer and had to take out the new video card in order to install the original OS. Why do I prefer Macs? Simple, they just work. There is none of this Vista crap where peripherals no longer work, needing to update drivers etc. I can't tell you how many PCs we've had to throw out or replace parts but we've got 15 year old Macs that still run fine. Of course, they don't take enough RAM to be usable anymore but they still work. One of these days when I feel the urge to give myself a migraine I'm going to turn one of the original Bondi blue iMacs into a server for the PCs. Try doing that with a PC. And Vista, don't even get me started on that. Ever since peripherals began to be AC/DC when it comes to PCs or Macs I've only bought that which can be used on both. There is no way I'm letting an OS dictate what gadgets I can use. The next computer is an iBook running Parallels so I can use it for work. My rant for the day. I feel better already. Oh, yeah, Macs aren't really more expensive than PCs if you compare the standard features of a Mac versus the add ons you need for a PC.

It is true that Hot Topics is not a "thank you for sharing" forum. But it's a good place to keep up with current events and what people think about them. Sticking around, one might get a broader perspective or embrace a point of view not previously considered. We do get our share of drive-bys who come in to lob a bomb then disappear; those who can grind a point down to where it's no longer recognizable... but that's the nature of a free discussion.

I should clarify my earlier post: Where I wrote that people have been successful shutting down controversial posts, I ought to have said "Hot Topics-type controversial posts." So far, since I've been coming here, there was only one posting that really did go into Hot Topics territory, and it was getting fierce. Most people recognized that and it just died off. Differences of opinion are frequent here, and that's not a concern to most of us -- yes, it livens things up! Most of us can handle it until it gets too personal, with individual attacks. (And "scrolling on by" are good words of advice sometimes; thinking the "light and fluffy" posters should go someplace else and start their own forum? Not so nice. Coexist.) --Pammyfay (who is very glad she had a busy several days and was off the forum when it blew up!)