Wednesday, July 23, 2014

The Key of D


You know Global Warming? Local warming is about all I can handle right now, although I’m a staunch advocate for the environment. No arguments, please! My blog, my point of view. You can write a blog if you want, right?

OK, now that that’s out of the way, this local warming thing cropped up yesterday. It was a warm and strangely, for Northern California anyway, muggy afternoon. I had a big plastic cup of ice water on my desk to keep body and soul together. And I was working.

I was on the phone, nothing unusual, and trying to explain the next step in a process.

Mom used to tell me that if she needed me to be quiet, all she had to do was ask me to sit on my hands. Sad to say, I resemble this remark. As much as my feet and my brain seem to have no relationship with each other whatsoever, rendering me hopeless as a dancer and probably leading to my many unscheduled flights down stairs all over the USA, my hands apparently are directly connected to my mouth.

This flailing about has gotten me into some small trouble all my life. I was always first to tip over my orange juice on the kitchen table in the morning at breakfast. My one satisfaction about this is that the “flail gene” seems to have come from my father’s side of the family. One time my half-sister was visiting our Dad while I was there too and she tipped over her orange juice at the table.

“Hey!” I shouted, shocked, jumping up to grab the paper towels. “Hey, that’s MY line!”

“You, too?” She asked in dismay and realization that what might have been dismissed as sheer coincidence was now confirmed to be a familial curse.

Well, you can probably see where this is leading. As I was in animated discussion with a co-worker about the workings or non-workings of a particular aspect of the system, it happened. I hit that cup of ice water and “thar’ she blows.”

I’m still on the phone, ever the professional if not completely coordinated, grabbing my brand new work laptop up from the storm surge of ice water. I unplugged it immediately, turned it upside down on my chair to let gravity be my friend—for a change—and completed my phone call.

Then dashing to action like the Knight of Swords, I grabbed the electronic brain in soggy distress and headed to the bathroom.

I know this is counter-intuitive. Just bear with me.

From past experience, since sadly this isn’t the first time that electronics and liquid have met under my wild gestures, I have learned that speed is essential in rescuing the drowning laptop.

I grabbed my hairdryer, tilted my victim on its side and applied heat and air until the drips stopped and no evidence of moisture gleamed.

Back at my desk I plugged that baby back in and was pleased there was no smoke and all the keys…well, there was the issue, you see.

That D key felt funny. It wobbled. It slipped off its moorings and into my hand, leaving the stump of the tooth exposed like a raw nerve.

Since denial is the first stage of mourning, I tried to fit the D back in place, then inspected it more closely. It had melted, a case of “friendly fire” during the drying out process and was now too deformed to sit securely in place, let alone be usable to type the letter D. Salvaging what I could of the situation, I was happy to learn that in spite of the button being ruined, the stump of the key will produce the letter D reliably. I hadn’t actually ruined the computer, only that one letter.

Well, now, how to remedy this?

I called the Help Desk. You know Help Desks. They are populated with eager people from other countries whose accents or volume are such that a deranged technology victim cannot understand them. This leads to the victim often being rude to the poor Help Desk person. I work hard not to be rude to the people who are trying to help me.

“You want deekee?” the earnest young woman in Costa Rica asked me. “What application on your laptop is deekee?”

Many answers spring to mind, none helpful.

“No, I need the chicklet that says D.”

“You need chickee deekee? I do not know that application,” she says, uncertainly.

“No. Sweetie. Look at your own keyboard that you have under your hands right now. Find the letter D. See the little plastic thing with the D on it? I need that, just that.”

“When you will in Irvine be? Technician will give you deekee.”

“No, that won’t do. I’m an 8 hour drive from Irvine. It’s like two whole countries away. I need you to send me a D key. I’ll put it on myself.”

“Oh, I can only have technician fix your deekee,” she says, and I wonder how on earth I can keep a straight face with this conversation. “You have to order deekee yourself to do yourself.”

I’m silent for a moment. At least my hands are still and there is no ice water nearby. I consider finding what’s left of it and pouring it over my head for relief.

“I close your ticket now, ok?”

“Sure. Thanks for your help.”

I go to the self-service application and find that I could order the D key or a whole keyboard at any rate but they will not ship it to my home. It has to go to one of my company’s offices. That’s the 8 hour drive. I reminisce on how technology was going to make people’s lives easier.

I send an email to my co-worker Alicia in North Carolina, begging her to send me a replacement D key. She refers it to her local Technician who good-naturedly offers to mail me the necessary item. I thank him profusely, noting that he would not believe the hilarious conversation I had with the Help Desk.

I now await delivery so I can fix my D key myself. I think I need a break.


Best wishes.

2 comments:

  1. Hilarious! And thanks for the instruction on how to save a drowning laptop. Hopefully I won't need it, but you never know...

    ReplyDelete
  2. The D Key is restored to full functionality. Whew.

    ReplyDelete