My Friend Kate has a marvelous way with words and she seriously brings the funny. So check out the brilliant ...
The Chronicles of Kate ... Part 1
Hey Everybody!!!
My long nightmare is finally over ... the computer is out of intensive care, where it was defibrillated, given a quadruple bypass, a colonoscopy and a vasectomy to finally come home where it belongs! Hopefully I can get another year out of my little HP and use the money we would have spent buying a new one on a mattress which my back says we need in the worst way.
Turns out that the power supply was a goner. The tech showed me the doohickey they hooked up to the computer to read its vitals and there was this glaring red light.
"See that?" He asked me ominously, waggling his pale eyebrows behind his tiny wire~framed glasses. I think he was trying to impress me with the impending doom of the whole situation and he was doing a damned fine job.
Beads of perspiration were threatening to trickle down my forehead and I managed to reply ... "Yep, I see it. Should I be calling a priest for Last Rites?" A vain stab at humor, right? Good old Kate, always trying to wring a laugh out of the most worrisome dilemmas.
Dave <That was his name, I'll never forget it, since he was giving me dire and terminal news concerning my loved one> gave me a rather frustrated look, which plainly read, "Don't even try to be funny, lady. We're talking organ donations here." So, I held my breath and looked at him with my most serious expression of horror, disbelief and absolute awe at his obvious technical mastery. After all, I'm nothing but a puny human being, right?
"So, Dave, my good man, old buddy, old pal," I said in my most obsequious tone of voice, "tell me that you can fix it and it's going to involve a mere pittance and no time at all." All of this said with a tear in my eye and a quaver in my voice, of course. I gotta get to this guy, play on his sense of kindness and compassion.
Right! I forgot for a minute that I was dealing with a cold and nerveless technophile, all about the bottom line and the here and now, forget the fact that people all over the world are going without computers in the cold and dark.
Dave looked at me with his vaguely humanoid face and spoke in a hushed tone of wretched doom ... "I'm sorry, Ms. M_______, but we don't carry the power supply for a HP, no one does. You have to call them and see if you can order it." WHAT??? NO ONE carries something so vital? So earth~shatteringly important? NO ONE???
Soldiering on, I turned to James, and intoned "This is it. We're buying that Dell!" HA! I thought! HA! There ya go, Hewlett Packard, ya bastards! I'll show you, you sneaky, underhanded slimeballs! You aren't going to get repeat business from this poor dejected little peon!
Alas ... my sense of victory over the corporate sleazes was short~lived, abruptly nipped in the bud by good old buddy, old pal Dave.
"Won't do you any good, they're the same way." He replied. Suddenly he seemed almost chipper, chipper verging on orgasmic if you ask me. It was at this point I was pretty sure that Satan was the father of every computer engineer ever spawned and allowed to run roughshod over all us lesser mortals who break into a nauseated sweat whenever we hear words like "crash," "virus," or "the new and improved version of AOL."
So, hanging my head in misery, I allowed as how I would call HP and see about getting the damned power supply and asked in abject terror how much money I might be looking at to get my poor baby back home again.
"Well," said dear old Dave. "It's 65.00 an hour for the labor <you know, he was positively beaming and damned near rolling on the floor chortling with glee now>. The price for the power supply should be 59.00, plus tax, of course. So, barring any unforeseen additional problems, you could get out of here for about 130.00, your first born son, five years of your tax refunds, and a litter of new~born puppies for sacrifice. We'll even throw in a semi~thorough cleaning on the house! How's that sound to you folks?"
How did that sound to us? Hmmm ... I don't know quite what James was thinking, outside of anything to shut my girlfriend up, but I had quite the vivid image of myself, apple in my mouth, tied over the proverbial barrel and waiting for someone to light the bonfire that would turn me into a crispy critter. So, I reluctantly agreed, telling my newest buddy, old pal that I would call HP and beg for the power supply, perhaps offering them a litter of puppies to get what I needed, like some crack addict willing to barbecue her kids for a fix.
Now, this little story has gone on for a bit, so I'll give you all a break before I tell you the HP saga and tell you how I came to be back among my dearest pals. Please know that I have thought of you all often and hope that everything is going well for you all. I simply don't know what I would do without you guys!!!
Love,
~Kate
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