When I first used a computer, I was 29 years old. I had returned to college in an attempt to secure a proper qualification (City & Guilds in Poultry Production (Part II) was not particularly impressive, and unless I was up for a job against somebody with only Part I, it didn’t seem likely to do me much good.

And so there I was – one of only two people on a course of around 40 people who didn’t have either a degree or a Higher National Diploma. I think I was the only person on the course who had never actually touched a computer.

Fortunately, it seemed, most of the people who had used computers hadn’t really used them properly. The instructor started off by telling us that most people used word processors like typewriters and that this was wrong as it had so much more to offer. The secret, he told us, was in cutting down the number of keystrokes.

I thought of that today when starting WordPress. I have to start by selecting a block, which is several keystrokes I would not have had to make if I had been able to stick with the old editor.

All this calls into question the concept of the new system being an improvement.

I just looked for my word count. I still can’t find as way to count the words as I type. Another unimprovement.

It’s 236. I just opened a word document, copied, pasted and checked the count. More useless key strokes. Does anybody know how to get a word count in the Classic Editor block? And if there is a way, does anybody know why it is no longer automatic?

Anyway, enough about WordPress, as other people have also been lying to me today.

This includes two customers and eBay. In two cases there’s nothing I can do about it – eBay is a monopoly that does what it likes, and one of the customers, though undoubtedly  not telling the truth is unassailable because I can’t prove it.

The third one, I can prove, but the shop owner is refusing to take action.

It’s very frustrating and I am quite upset by the lack of news rel

And at that point all my text disappeared. I started a new blog post with the words below.

After writing over 300 words I have just been confronted by a blank page and a message “This block has encountered an error and cannot be previewed”. So much for the new and improved version.

If I were writing a story about one man’s struggle with technology even I wouldn’t make up a system so malevolent that it wiped out an hour’s work just like that.

I saved the draft and was surprised to find the whole post had been saved, including the two paragraphs I had written on a blank page after the first part disappeared.

Unfortunately, although I had typed them in a Classic Editor Block, they aren’t in it now and I can’t get the tool bar up. I have tried several times, but it won’t work.

It shouldn’t be such a struggle just to write a blog.

No photos tonight. I am losing the will to write.