That $&@! Laptop

If you are reading this, it means I am writing this, which means Jim and I are no longer auditioning for the next production of “Scenes from a Marriage” or threatening to throw the new laptop—or each other—out of the tenth floor window. 

You blog readers  must think it’s always unicorns and rainbows with us on vacation, and it usually is (check out past  blog entries) but yesterday we made the marriage of Jimmy  and Rosalynn Carter look like a Kardashian union.

You know how men get with their upgraded gadgets, men like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos,  who purchase flying phalluses or undiscovered planets because it’s macho and cool to do so? 

That’s how my techie husband is with computers,   and he got this new state of the art laptop that he was convinced would rock my blogging world.

Suffice to say it did not.

I hate the mother f*cker and it hates me right back.

I usually blog when Jim is in the shower or at the gym, and it takes about twenty minutes to write and another ten to proof read, even ‘though I still manage to miss ninety percent of the typos.

Well, yesterday my blogging attempt took three times longer than usual because of some built in sadistic mechanism akin to a form of autocorrect if autocorrect was a sociopath.

I’d be on a roll, capturing funny or blog worthy moments of the day, when, for no reason at all, the line I was currently typing would disappear, or show up in a severely butchered form in a previous paragraph.

I swear, the thing had a mind of its own.

I’d attempt to type something like, “after lunch, we took a short walk and shared a lemonade” and it would read, “after lunch, we autocorrect Kardashian and hoppydo”

WTF!!???

But here’s the rub..when JIM would type something, it did NOT happen.  His fingers are slimmer than mine—hell..Godzilla’s fingers are slimmer than mine, but it kept happening, and things got ugly.

JIM:  I don’t know what your problem is..everything is fine when I’m typing, or when I’m watching you type, but if I turn my head for one second to blow my nose (again..I’m  married to a  honking goose) everything is screwed up

KAREN:  So you’re saying I’m typing things like “Godzilla screwed blow nose” just to fuck with you?”

JIM:  You will NOT ruin my vacation.

KAREN:  But it’s OK to ruin mine? I can’t share anything with  my Facebook friends the whole time we’re in Alaska because you need to show off your prowess at buying gadgets? Would YOUR vacation be fun if I took away your camera? Coffee? Fitbit?

JIM:  What do you want me to do?  I sold the old laptop—the one you knew how to use.

KAREN:  Troubleshoot. Pretend you’re at work.  Find out if the ship has an Internet Café. (FYI..it does) We are in the biggest tech city in America,,we can buy a new laptop tomorrow, 

Maybe one made in 1986

JIM: I’m not spending my last day in Seattle shopping for  a new laptop that we have  no luggage room for

KAREN:  No..you’re just spending it trying to summon non-existent Ubers

JIM:  How come I typed three whole paragraphs without any problem?

 

KAREN:  Can we Uber to a divorce lawyer in the state of Washington?

What did I tell you? It got ugly..coyote ugly

BY THE WAY, IF ANYONE READING THIS HAS EVER WON A BATTLE AGAINST A MALICIOUS AUTOCORRECT PROMPT, PLEASE SHARE YOUR SECRET

Jim finally set me up on a different service, Microsoft Office, that he  paid seventy dollars for.  He retyped my entire blog last night without incident.

And I’m typing on it now and please, for the love of God, DON’T TELL JIM..it’s still not working.  It’s still putting sentences haphazardly into places they don’t belong. 

So it’s me. (gulp) It’s definitely me.  And a keyboard that despises me.

It’s not the mouse or mousepad or Steve Job’s fault. My keyboard is possessed, but only when I’m the one using it.

To make things even worse last night, we spent so much time trying to fix the unfixable that we went to dinner late and cranky and unshowered.

The restaurant with the delicious omelets was closed. We had to eat in the bar, where the only table that  wasn’t a high top was right in front of the band.

Thankfully, they were dismantling even ‘though it was only a little after nine, but we were  luckily treated to the wonderful sounds of loud drunken sorority girls. 

Jim ordered a glass of wine that came only a quarter full and paid what he’d pay for a new laptop.

I got salsa and chips for ninety nine cents, but if we hadn’t been scrapping for the two previous hours, I would have been stable enough to see they were loaded nachos with sour cream and beef and lettuce and cheese and were no way going to cost less than a dollar.

I should have had them wrapped and tossed in a  bin with the used masks and diapers.  I’ m sure Dancing Hot Dog girl from earlier in the day would have  enjoyed it.

Please..let me know if this blog ever shows up and if I sound coherent.

This is no longer a laughing matter..