August 23, 2009
Here we go again! Yet another edition of Techfail has struck my world! As regular readers of my blog will know, this happens to me periodically: any electronic devices (and mechanical, too, sometimes) I come in contact with go on the fritz. It’s a weird but very real phenomenon, and it drives me crazy. This latest bout started Saturday, when Wendy and I bought a flat-screen TV at Best Buy. I set up the TV Sunday morning, got it all ready to roll, plugged it in, tried to turn it on…and nothing happened! Several tech support calls later, I realized there was nothing to do but take the TV back to the store. This was especially annoying because the store is 45 minutes away! So, we drove out, asked for a new set (and a couple bucks off to cover our fuel costs), and we still had trouble. The sales people went through four sets before they found one that wasn’t smudged! But at least, when we got the set home and installed it, it worked fine.
Then, this evening, when I finally got time to work on my short story, my computer acted up. Text randomly selected; pages scrolled without my controlling them. Words and lines even deleted themselves! Soon, the answer became clear: my wife’s new wireless rig in the office downstairs, directly below mine, is interfering with my setup in the office above it! Her wireless mouse works so well, it takes control of my laptop, too! So now I’m at a loss. I’ll have to talk to some IT pals at the office tomorrow and see if one of them might have a solution. And I’ll do some googling for answers, too, I’m sure.
So that’s two techfails in this current outbreak. Which tells me I need to stay away from tech for the next few days…which isn’t likely, as I work with it both at my day job and my fiction writing. I guess I’ll just have to stay cool and hope for the best. That’s one good thing about techfail outbreaks: sooner or later, they run their course. I just have to try not to blow anything up in the meantime. See you soon!
