Powerpoint, eh?

So this weekend I tried using Powerpoint for our main projection instead of Apple's Keynote. Powerpoint has a presenter view which has a slide view down the left hand side that could allow you to jump to any slide in the presentation that you want. Useful for projecting lyrics, right? What a fiasco. I should say that it wasn't all Powerpoint's fault, but there were two key problems with the way Powerpoint works.

First, while in the presentation mode, Powerpoint allowed the computer to go to screensaver. Keynote never does this, and so I was shocked when I saw my "colour octopus" (as my kids call it) screensaver on the screen. What kind of presentation program lets the computer go into screensaver mode?! If I'm making a presentation, I'm making a presentation, and, hmmm, let's see, maybe I'll need to screen to stay, oh, I don't know, BLACK?! Like the way I left it?! Grrrr...

This wouldn't have been too big a problem, but a few other factors contributed to what was a nightmare. My laptop is set to ask for a password when it wakes from sleep, or when it comes back from screensaver. Of course the person doing the overhead didn't know my password, so I had to clandestinely pass it over to her. Secondly, for some unknown reason, my OS decided to switch from dual monitor mode to mirroring mode. So now everyone is watching what I'm doing on my computer. Think fast. Ok, no problem, I'll switch from presenter view to slideshow view. So I hit view show, and we're back at the beginning of the slideshow. What!?! This is the second major failing of Powerpoint. Keynote doesn't do this. Keynote starts the slideshow at the slide you're on at the time. So that meant I had to page through ALL MY SLIDES to get to the song we wanted. So I'm looking like an idiot up there, paging through all the songs to get to the last one... I should also mention that I was leading the singing, so I have to get back across the stage to lead the song. My blood is boiling, my palms are sweaty, but 'game face on' and into the song.

Afterwards, I took my own advice and promptly forgot about it until now. I received several kind comments about the set, about leading, and so on. Dwelling on the positive helps. I easily can get bogged down in the technical, and what I thought went badly. God still works, the Spirit still moves, Christ is proclaimed. Amen to that.