About ME
My name is Tommy Thompson and I live in a small town called Albemarle in North Carolina, USA. I have been an educator of some sort my entire adult life. I love learning about technology and science and I have a passion for old classic cars or automobiles. When I get the opportunity, I enjoy watching MMA, even though I am not a violent person, and I think fishing is very relaxing.
I recently taught science and an occasional social studies class before I had to take a break from teaching. A few years ago I developed Asthma and that put a damper on a lot of the things I that I did. I know that most people with Asthma are still able to teach and do things that most people can do. I only have one arm and it stops just below the elbow. There are two fingers on that arm and only one of the fingers have knuckles. So I do most of my typing and grabbing objects with one finger. Before I developed Asthma, it was already a task doing the daily routines of loading and unloading my book-bag each morning and evening. Not to mention how slow I am dressing myself each morning. So if any women are reading this and they have someone tell them that they are the slowest person getting dressed, tell them that I probably have you beat and for them to stop complaining.
I don't think there's any greater feeling than watching or helping someone learn something new. When I taught 6th grade science I spent hours at home working on my webpage just to make sure that my students had the material they needed to be successful in science. Here's a link to my old science website: https://sites.google.com/site/tathomp2/home and my social studies site http://nsms6thgradesocialstudies.weebly.com/. I stayed up late grading papers and creating new learning materials for my students because I wanted nothing but the best for them. I tried to keep my photo off of my educational websites because those sites were not about me, they were all about my students. If you look through the photo sections and video sections of my science webpage you'll see the students learning by doing hands-on activities. When someone is engaged or taking part in the learning process, it makes learning easier and a lot more fun. So giving up teaching was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do.
I used to love to work on computers for people, but now that is difficult to do that as well. I also decided that with all the problems I was having on my Windows 10 machines, that I needed to look for an operating system that didn't cause additional problems every time they received an update. My Windows 10 machines would also just randomly reboot from time-to-time for no apparent reason. My Windows 10 Event Viewer report looked worse than my test results from my lung specialist. Here's a copy of the most recent Event Viewer on the only machine that still has Windows 10 on it. It had 3 Critical events, 200 Errors, 2,582 Warnings, 3,804 Information events, 1,961 Audit Success, and 11 Audit Failures all within the past seven days. Remember, this is the results from my best Windows 10 machine that still has Windows 10 on it AT THE MOMENT. I still need a Windows 10 machine so that I can make more accurate comparisons between Windows 10 and Ubuntu Mate.
<Things will soon be changing.>
I recently taught science and an occasional social studies class before I had to take a break from teaching. A few years ago I developed Asthma and that put a damper on a lot of the things I that I did. I know that most people with Asthma are still able to teach and do things that most people can do. I only have one arm and it stops just below the elbow. There are two fingers on that arm and only one of the fingers have knuckles. So I do most of my typing and grabbing objects with one finger. Before I developed Asthma, it was already a task doing the daily routines of loading and unloading my book-bag each morning and evening. Not to mention how slow I am dressing myself each morning. So if any women are reading this and they have someone tell them that they are the slowest person getting dressed, tell them that I probably have you beat and for them to stop complaining.
I don't think there's any greater feeling than watching or helping someone learn something new. When I taught 6th grade science I spent hours at home working on my webpage just to make sure that my students had the material they needed to be successful in science. Here's a link to my old science website: https://sites.google.com/site/tathomp2/home and my social studies site http://nsms6thgradesocialstudies.weebly.com/. I stayed up late grading papers and creating new learning materials for my students because I wanted nothing but the best for them. I tried to keep my photo off of my educational websites because those sites were not about me, they were all about my students. If you look through the photo sections and video sections of my science webpage you'll see the students learning by doing hands-on activities. When someone is engaged or taking part in the learning process, it makes learning easier and a lot more fun. So giving up teaching was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do.
I used to love to work on computers for people, but now that is difficult to do that as well. I also decided that with all the problems I was having on my Windows 10 machines, that I needed to look for an operating system that didn't cause additional problems every time they received an update. My Windows 10 machines would also just randomly reboot from time-to-time for no apparent reason. My Windows 10 Event Viewer report looked worse than my test results from my lung specialist. Here's a copy of the most recent Event Viewer on the only machine that still has Windows 10 on it. It had 3 Critical events, 200 Errors, 2,582 Warnings, 3,804 Information events, 1,961 Audit Success, and 11 Audit Failures all within the past seven days. Remember, this is the results from my best Windows 10 machine that still has Windows 10 on it AT THE MOMENT. I still need a Windows 10 machine so that I can make more accurate comparisons between Windows 10 and Ubuntu Mate.
<Things will soon be changing.>
I didn't mention any of that for anyone to feel sorry for me. I am very independent and I live by myself. (Now I'm starting to sound creepy. :-) I worked very hard for everything I own. It was just recently that I took time off from work. I am not making this website or videos on YouTube to make money off of anyone. I miss helping people learn and I think this is one way for me to fill that void. I spent so much time creating websites so that students could learn the material I taught them. So I'm sorting doing this to help people learn a new operating system if they are starting to get tired of the one they are using. If I am able to help someone online, they would be helping me in return. They would help make me feel useful again.
I know that's not a great picture of me, I wanted the person taking the photo to make sure they got the entire car. Not everyone can say they got their dream car when they learned to drive, but I can. My 1968 Firebird made me feel like I was "somebody" in high school and college. When people starred at me, I knew they weren't starring at me because I was different. They were starring at something that was rare and could go very fast. At the moment my car is not in great shape. A few years ago I took it to get it restored and the photos and the rest of that story can be found at https://goo.gl/ylutly. All this was happening around the time I was being diagnosed with Asthma, so it was a lot to deal with. I kept things bottled up inside and that only made things worse. So I created the website about my car so that I didn't have to hold it in anymore.
Ok, I think I've got the Windows 10 and problems with my car venting out of the way. I will try my best to not bash Windows 10 as I compare it to Ubuntu MATE throughout this website. I have been using Microsoft products during the days of DOS all the way up to now. I thought Windows 98, Windows XP, and Windows 7 were great operating systems. So I can't bash something that I have been using for so long. I liked and chose Ubuntu MATE because the looks of it hasn't changed much over the years, so you don't have to relearn how to use a new operating system every time there's a new version. Plus, Ubuntu MATE doesn't cost an arm and a leg every time there's an upgrade because it's free. As you can see in the picture, I'm running a little short on arms at the moment, so Ubuntu MATE is a perfect match for me. :-)
I am very grateful to Martin Wimpress, Alan Pope, and the rest of their crew for creating a wonderful distribution of Linux. I hope that I can help people learn and enjoy the product they created.
I still have a lot of work to do on this website and a lot of help videos to create and load on YouTube, so please be very understanding if it takes me a while to get everything completed.
Take care,
Tommy Thompson
Ok, I think I've got the Windows 10 and problems with my car venting out of the way. I will try my best to not bash Windows 10 as I compare it to Ubuntu MATE throughout this website. I have been using Microsoft products during the days of DOS all the way up to now. I thought Windows 98, Windows XP, and Windows 7 were great operating systems. So I can't bash something that I have been using for so long. I liked and chose Ubuntu MATE because the looks of it hasn't changed much over the years, so you don't have to relearn how to use a new operating system every time there's a new version. Plus, Ubuntu MATE doesn't cost an arm and a leg every time there's an upgrade because it's free. As you can see in the picture, I'm running a little short on arms at the moment, so Ubuntu MATE is a perfect match for me. :-)
I am very grateful to Martin Wimpress, Alan Pope, and the rest of their crew for creating a wonderful distribution of Linux. I hope that I can help people learn and enjoy the product they created.
I still have a lot of work to do on this website and a lot of help videos to create and load on YouTube, so please be very understanding if it takes me a while to get everything completed.
Take care,
Tommy Thompson