And The Saga Continues

I had the rant all planned out.  It was pithy and thoughtful, if I do say so myself.  Unfortunately, technology brought the whole process to a screaming halt.

Big Cuter found a machine for $199.  Apparently, without needing super powerful graphics (my Solitaire and Wordle games are fine with a plain processing chip.... or something like that) computers are stupid cheap.  I was surprised and delighted, gave him my credit card, and his magic fingers secured the device.  

After a lovely evening on the couch watching The Awful Truth,  he and Queen T made a shopping run to Wally World to pick it up.  They came back with baby bibs, an ugly Christmas sweater, a doll that crawls and spouts gibberish in a baby's voice (more on this in another post), and my beautiful, new computer.

I plugged it in the next morning, certain that I could set it up myself.  After the first deep inhale and the moan that followed the exhale, my son was at my shoulder.  I've got this, Mom - some of the nicest words to hear when machinery goes awry.

Spot Quiz - do you ever interact with a machine without groaning?

He set the settings to my preferences.  We registered the device with ASUS and Microsoft.  We moaned that Lenore the Lenovo died before I could back up all my data to the cloud (another saga soon to unfold).  I was all set to go.  

I spent the next day with Honey Bunny, coming to the computer when she napped.  I turned it on.... or, more precisely, I pushed the power button on the keyboard.  

I pushed it again, with more force.  I pushed it again, leaning my pointer finger a bit to one edge and then the other.  I called for help, which arrived once I brought the machine to my son's comfy spot in the comfy chair.  He probed and turned and pushed and got the same result as I did - nothing.

I've never seen a computer just die like this, Mom.  Did you do anything......

A brief moment passed as I remembered that he was helping and not deserving of a snarky response.  The truth was that, plugged in or not, the damn thing would not start.  

Sunday morning found me at the Customer Center in the Wally World around the corner from our house.  The young woman behind the counter had a hard time understanding the following:

• the machine was dead, would not turn on, got no power when plugged in or on battery
• I had no receipt because none was offered when it was picked up 

• the email announcing that the purchase was ready for pick up did not have the bar code she was desperately seeking and I had no idea where that bar code might be.
• I was certain that the box had been picked up at their store because my son's name was on the sticker affixed to the box, along with the address of the store.
•  I didn't want a credit, I wanted a new machine at the same price.

Her supervisor and co-worker banded together across the counter, glaring at my inability to provide the damn bar code.  Discouraged but undeterred, I persisted until they found the item in their system.  This was not due to any malfeasance on my part, although you would not have reached that same conclusion by looking at their faces.  There was nary a smile among them.

Next thing I knew I was handed a receipt for the credit to my card.  They sent me back to Electronics to buy a new one.

I strolled and resisted all the cute baby things, arrived at the computer aisles, and found nothing resembling my inexpensive desire.  The sales clerk, her supervisor, and an interested Wally World worker were flummoxed, but I had a picture of exactly what I wanted.

 

After unlocking the shelves behind the register, after pulling boxes and looking at numbers, they found the machine I wanted.... although they weren't sure until I showed them the picture once again.  They ran my credit card, gave me a receipt, and wished me a Happy Day.

Big Cuter and I reprised our earlier scenario.  I took a long walk with Queen T and Honey Bunny.  The baby napped and I continued to set up the new computer, connecting and then disconnecting it from my phone, searching for a way to get Google instead of Microsoft Edge as my default browser (Settings are not easily available on this machine thanks to the Microsoft behemoth's presence).  

The girls and I hung giant ball ornaments from our spiky trees (Queen T took the baby out of the front carrier and put her into the stroller once she got an up close and personal look at the thorns) I made dinner and sat outside to calm my soul, went inside and fell asleep in the other comfy chair at 8:45.  By 9 I was under the covers and fast asleep.

Which brings me to this morning, at 6:34am, when I began typing this to you.  

My rant is still simmering.