Friday, January 21, 2011

Stuff and Nonsense


The afore-mentioned cold bloomed like a hothouse orchid and had me down on the couch almost all of yesterday. I say almost because I ran up and down to check emails and orders and respond to same (oh, maybe twenty times or so), but otherwise I was not exactly a high stakes player in the book game. I did, however, make it to NOBS Wednesday night and, in fact, told Eric on the way how much better I was. But then I got there and suddenly that universal sensation my youngest daughter always called “the chilly-willies” came over me and I sat for the duration in a stupor, struggling to make sense of voices that sounded like Charlie Brown’s telephone callers. Yet, even so, I’m invited to another meeting next week about the antiquarian fair, so I’m pretty jazzed.

It does, however, seem to me rather unfair that a person afflicted with a second sickness in the same month should also be plagued with the two things she hates most – numbers and technology. The numbers are the dreaded Ohio sales tax. I don’t mind paying it, I don’t even mind pulling the numbers together. What I mind is being forced to file it online. Every time – EVERY time – there’s a problem and what should take ten minutes takes a whole morning and has me on the verge of emotional collapse. Today it got so bad that I broke down and called them. The first office wasn’t especially helpful, but the second had me chirping like the cricket in Times Square. The woman who answered the phone did everything but offer me a Kleenex and a cup of herbal tea. And the second one did even better than that – she let me opt out of online filing and get on the list to receive a form in the mail. They probably wrote “taxpayer too stupid to comply with request” in my file, but that’s okay. Whatever it takes.

The technology thing actually worked out okay too, but added greatly to my distress. Last week my not-so-old Canon printer required me to bring it to a service center for the replacement of its ink absorber. To say that I hate that printer, which forced me to buy ink (both color and black even though I use only black) at VERY short intervals at a cost of $48 a pop, would be like saying that it’s been a tough winter. Duh! So there was no way I was going to throw good money after bad. Eric and I went to Office Max and bought a compact laser model on sale that only requires black ink, performs to the beat of a hummingbird’s wings, and prints something like four times as many pages before requiring a refill.

All was well until yesterday when I tried to print an invoice provided by one of my sites. I had printed from this particular site successfully twice, but now was getting an error message that said the printer was offline. What did it mean “offline”? The thing was sitting cozily at my elbow humming Sweet Caroline! But I checked the connection, turned the printer off and on again, restarted the computer, upended  the printer to see the serial number, called the help line,  opened  this, closed  that, pressed  this button ten times, another button three times, and stood on one foot and tried to touch the floor. What I didn’t do was try to print something else before I called. Turns out, all of the above was the result of an error on the page!

I know, I know  --  all I’ve done is complain about a whole lot of nothing. But you know how it is with nothing -- it’s nothing as long as it’s not yours. Anyway, something great happened too, so let’s end with that. A couple auctions  ago I bought some wonderful  technical books on the clay products industry. All were in good condition, save one which had a break in the text block, but not at the hinges. I had read how to repair this, but wasn’t sure I should undertake it. Finally I decided today that since I wouldn’t list it as is, it didn’t matter if I screwed up because  I’d still be in exactly the same position. So I carefully measured and cut a strip of light card stock the length and width of the spine, glued one side and carefully inserted into the spine up against the text block, supported the book spine down, and waited for it to dry. Then I tightened the hinges at the top and bottom and – voila! – no more cracking at the center of the book and no evidence of the repair. I was so tickled I actually twirled around a couple times, which given the condition of my sinuses and equilibrium, might have ended in disaster.

Anyway, if you are looking for a take-away message from all this you may have to search under the rug because I’m not sure there is one. The fact that I’m here at all when my head may  implode at any second is probably message enough. In other words, I thought about you today, as always.

3 comments:

Cheryl said...

ARRRRRRRRGH! Printers ! I also have a new one. Mine stopped working right after installing new cartridges. I am trying to treat this one better by turning it off more. I left the other one on as long as my computer was on which is constantly.

tess said...

Yu're not supposed to do that, huh? Well, who knew? :-)

Anonymous said...

Yes I have a Canon too...sigh. $84 and rising for ink as we speak. I think Staples and Office Max must have stock in the ink cartridges. The refilled ones can cause real havoc with your computer. I print as little as I can, and use it for a copier mostly. With your business you have to have it working. Mine if mostly medical stuff for my husband, but if one of the 4 colors is out, I hate that the two blacks, both full don't work. You know all this. That is why you changed to laser. Smart move. Hope you are feeling better everyday.