Vale laptop

Sigh.

The other day Naughtyman killed Mrs Zen's laptop by throwing a cup of water on it. Now mine has died. I don't know why. I mean, I know how, but I don't know why.

The DVD drive has not been working. I sent it to the menders under the warranty and they refused to fix it. They said there had been water damage. This was news to me, but of course it was possible, because the kids aren't watched 24/7. I was furious but what can you do? This is Australia. People simply don't give a shit how distressing it is that they welch on a guarantee: they just love to find an excuse not to fulfil it. The laptop was a bit dirty, and I think they jumped on that as a reason not to fix it: aha! it's dirty so claim it has water damage and bob's your uncle.

So this evening I took the back off to see whether I could find any water damage, and perhaps fix the DVD drive myself. I was a bit wary of doing it, because I don't know much about laptops.

I undid all the screws and carefully prized off the back. It wouldn't come off completely but I didn't force it or anything. There was not a hint of water damage, of course. I put it back together and bang, the power button doesn't work. The machine has power: the lights are on. But the button that switches it on no longer works.

So I'm fucked. I can't get it fixed under the guarantee because the menders won't do it. I hate getting a repairman to look at it because they are fuckheads: they insist on being paid even if they have no idea what they are doing. I've had repairmen look at PCs before, and it has been shocking: you say there is something wrong with the display card and they claim there's a problem with how the hard drive is mounted. No amount of protesting that the hard drive is fine works. The truth is that the guy has no fucking idea what the problem is but doesn't want to admit it and wants to piss away an hour because that's a hundred bucks in his pocket.

Can you imagine taking your car to the garage and the guy charging you a couple of hundred bucks but not fixing your car? Can you imagine a mechanic not having a clue what's wrong with your car?

That's the thing: mechanics might be thieves but they will generally fix your car, and each is as reliable as the next so far as that goes. But with computer guys you can end up paying two, three guys to look at your PC, and none fixes it!

***

Everything is like this. I found the money for a nice laptop, and it promptly stopped working. I try with good intentions to fix it myself and now it's fucked.

I am sick of good intentions. I do everything for the right reasons and my reward is that things turn to ruin. Evil cunts are getting paid all over the place and for me it's totally uphill.

Yeah, I know I'm not a bonded landsman in Africa or dying piece by piece in an Indian wrecker's yard. We are spoiled by our good fortune, and take it for granted. But everything is relative. The milk that sours tastes bad to you and others' not having any milk at all does not make it any the sweeter.

Oh well. I will add it to my list of fucked-up things that I don't want to worry about but will have to. I have to go now. I cannot sit in my office and hope that Brisbane gets nuclearised so that I don't have to get up tomorrow, or at least that it all just fucks off, because it won't.

posted by Dr Zen @ 7:22 pm