Arrrrrgggghghghg!
My luck runneth out: I've always been one of those fortunate souls whose computers hold up through thick and thin, rain or shine, through Colorado's cataclysmic thunder storms and random power outtages. (Well, there was the time my laptop died on a client site in NYC--we were going to take it to Letterman to see if he'd drop it from the top of the Ed Sullivan theater. And the time Mitch had to spend the day reloading my harddrive.) But really, with the exception of a few glitches from old temperamental laptops, we've been mercifully free of computer disasters.
Until Wednesday. I pushed my CPU's "on" button with my big toe as I do every morning and it made its normal grinding sound, but held its pitch as opposed to sliding up the scale to the high-pitched whine indicating proper booting. I pushed the button with my toe again. Nothing. No power down. No silence. It wouldn't shut off. Oh dear, I thought. I pushed it again, getting serious this time and using my index finger. Again nothing.
"Sh*t," I said.
Well, to make a long story short, I spent about four hours closeted with Dennis, a champion whistler and exotic pet owner with a tattoo on his forearm that reads, "Buck you." After much tinkering, he recovered my key data and diagnosed the box--dead mother board. "That's bad, isn't it?" I asked.
"Yup, that's bad."
"What does it mean?"
"New computer," he said, blowing cigarette smoke out the side of his mouth.
I came home, Mitch loaded my data onto his old laptop, then I took to my bed. I'm still riddled with blog glitches--no photos until I can solve some problems--but at least I'm functional. (But then again, that's a matter of opinion isn't it?)
9:24:29 AM 
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