Age Of Electronics

So, yesterday along with groceries we had to buy some replacement electronics after putting it off for awhile. David has an older laptop that finally gasped it's last battery powered gasp this week. It would refuse to come on, then would give you that rescue screen which is nothing more than a big tease. You push a button and then it has that dohickey that circles around, and around, then nope, goes back to the rescue screen. David went to the back up plan of Magical Thinking in which he would randomly peek at it hoping it had somehow gotten over whatever issue it was having and would be working. It would once again give him false hope and then proudly display it's little blue screen with the buttons on it again - so he did the seven stages of grief and gave up.  Our other replacement item was the printer - we keep it on the floor by the window. Apparently having two large hunting dogs standing on it so they can see the neighbor's cat better with frequent jumping up and down when the aforementioned cat appeared can be somewhat damaging to the internal workings. The last time we tried to use it all it produced was some horrifying clanking noise before dropping dead. 

We bought a wireless printer and David got a Flexbook 10 which is a tablet with a detachable keyboard, since he only uses it in the morning for laying in bed,drinking coffee and going on Facebook nothing fancy was needed. He plugged it in to charge and then went about setting up the printer. David will tell you he did not ask me for any help - this is true. Instead he makes very loud comments while asking me if I know where Manual One is which as far as I can tell, is probably back at the factory under a table or something. He continues this until I sigh, make a comment and start working on it. He then wanders in and out asking if I'm done yet and making pretend offers of help. There is nothing that that makes me more irrationally angry that setting up electronics. If there is a more difficult, convoluted, scattered way of doing things I'm sure they would have employed it - everything is diagrams that make no sense and three hundred steps. There is a Manual Two which says not to use it until you refer to Manual One which is AWOL. I googled and then slogged through online manuals, download,s the correct download, push the button, put in the router key....etc. and finally two homicidal hours later - sucess. I ordered two ebooks a reward to me.

While I was doing this, David was now mucking about with his new flexbook - that he couldn't find the manual for. It was not working of course, but the reason was more he couldn't wait and had unplugged it before it had fully charged. This morning it was not working AGAIN, but it actually needed to update and then he was having fun with it. I ordered another ebook as a reward from not chucking him out the window. That will be all the new electronics for now! And here's something I wish I had known before I started - if you go to Youtube and type in what you bought - there on online videos for EVERYTHING. Who knew!