Whimper

The laptop I use during the day, for posting and other internet-related good stuff, is a piece of trash. Literally. N, who is a computer geek by day, was told by his boss that it wasn’t worth fixing and to just throw it out.

N brought it home instead.

He formatted the hard drive, installed the necessary virus and spyware programs, and viola! A free laptop! Nothing to complain about there. Well, it does have some major issues a few annoying quirks, but whatever, it works.

One of the annoying quirks is that the internal wireless card doesn’t work. This would be a major problem if N had not managed to get his hands on an external wireless adapter (I don’t ask where these things come from; it’s better that way). Having the external adapter means I can ignore my kids while looking at naked men accessing the internet just fine. Alas, the wonderful, wonderful external adapter is dead.

Dead!

I am cut off from the internet! No email, no entertainment gossip, no yahoo groups, no checking in on my favorite blogs, no posting my own genius blather!

Apparently either a child or a dog stepped/jumped/fell on it, bending it rather nastily. And as my husband rather bluntly informed me, bent electronics = no workey.

Jonseing for my internet fix, I tried using my desktop computer yesterday to take care of business. The desktop is in my bedroom, so I waited until the munchkins were engrossed in their movie of the day, then snuck out of living room. It took less than 10 minutes for them to notice.

“Mommy! Why aren’t you watching the movie, mommy?”
(I’m working, honey. You can watch by yourself for awhile.)

“Mommy! Are you done yet?”
(No, babydoll. I’ll be done in a little bit. Just watch the movie, okay?)

“Mommy! JT is sitting on me!”
(JT, share the couch! Sit next to your sister, not on her!)

“Mommy! Tucker is licking me!”
(Tucker, come! Good boy.)

“Fish-ee, fish-ee, fisheefisheefishee fiiiiiissssssshhhhhhhhheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”

This last one came from JT, who ran into my room wailing and scared out of his little 2 year old mind. Apparently the diver-capturing-Nemo scene is overwhelmingly scary for toddlers. Who knew.

So I’ve resigned myself to posting less, which blows because I’m already having a blast with this blog. I’ve got ideas for posts coming out the yingyang. (No, not that yingyang! Minds out of the gutters, people!) Anyway, I’ve got a lot to write about and no way in which to write it.

My diabolical sensible plan, for the moment, is to type posts on the laptop in Word, save them to my thumbdrive, and post them from the desktop computer after the kiddos have gone to bed. We’ll see how that goes. I’ve had problems going from Word to html before, mainly that the formatting goes all to hell and it’s a complete pain in the ass to fix it. Hopefully blogspot won’t be as craptastic as my other posting forums.

I’m working on obtaining a new external adapter. We’re on a tight budget, and this is definitely not on the list. Santa might bring one to me, but if he does then that’s about all I’ll get. I’m not sure I’m willing to sacrifice the child-like glee experienced upon opening present after present on Christmas morning, but I just may grow to be that desperate. Until then, just know that I love and adore all of my (three) readers, even if I’m MIA. Don’t forget about me.

Oh, and if anyone has a Wireless-G Notebook Adapter just lying around, please send it my way. Karma will shower many blessings on you (and I’ll worship you forever).