technology

We have a lot of computers in this house.  We have a Mac in our kitchen that the kids use to play games on and for their homework (it's in the kitchen so we can keep an eye on what they are doing on the internet).  We have a desktop on our office.  I have a laptop, and an old laptop.  Kathy has a work laptop. 

Yet, yesterday, we had one computer in the house that actually worked -- the desktop in the office.  A while ago, I or someone else stepped on my laptop and broke the screen.  Yesterday, I fired up my old laptop, and was reminded exactly why I got a new laptop in the first place -- it took nearly 20 minutes to boot.  And the battery holds a charge for 0 minutes.  And it has no wireless internet.  There is something wrong with the wireless router, so the Mac is fine if you want to look at star wars pictures the kids have downloaded or play chess, but that's about it, since it has no internet.  Kathy's work computer was conveniently left at work.

Since Kathy worked from home yesterday, she had dibs on the functioning computer.  Which meant that blog posts went unwritten, mortgage refinancing rates went unresearched, and I generally had nothing to do all day but pace and do chores (and bother Kathy).  I even went so far as to try to use my phone to google whether I could use the old laptop as a monitor for the new laptop by hooking them together somehow.  (The answer seems to be no, at least with my existing skill set.)

Then, yesterday afternoon, I was on the phone with my sister, who will be staying with us for a couple of days before she moves to London.  She mentioned that she might need to work from home a little bit, and I said, "Oh no, there's something wrong with our wireless router." 

"That's okay," she said.  "I can just tether my laptop to my Blackberry and get the internet that way."  Um, what?  I had no idea you could do that, let alone how to do that.  Then, when we were talking about her borrowing the car, I said that we would be sure to leave the GPS in there, so that she could find her way around.  "Well, I have GPS on my phone, too," she informed me.  Now I had her, though.  I also have GPS on my phone, but the GPS for the car is way easier because it automatically re-routes if you make a wrong turn, and it talks to you so you don't have to look at your phone while you're driving.  "The GPS on my phone does that too.  And it has traffic info."

At this rate, I am going to be one of those middle-aged people who take classes in Microsoft Word at the community center, I swear.  It's so embarrassing.