My Enemy-The Personal Computer

My Enemy- The Personal Computer

Why couldn’t Bill Gates preoccupy himself like other young men with girls, masturbation, television programs or sports instead of making the world smaller and my brain taxed, by inventing the computer platform for Windows? Computers have influenced and changed commerce, education, communication, research and almost every aspect of human existence. This is an over simplification of the reality of it. A new world of business and education has grown into a mega billion dollar era of progress for war and peace.
This is in spite of the computer ineptness which I excel in.
In 1989 I bought my first IBM clone. I bought it and set it up so that I could sit and write at home while I recovered from a double hernia operation. I wrote many pages that had to be destroyed because I had what was called ”widows and orphans” . I would start a sentence and it would start a new paragraph or indent and cause me to be frustrated. I wanted it out of my life. I don’t remember dollar amounts but I sold the darn thing to a friend who wanted it for his wife for about a third of what I paid for it. I was delighted to get it out of my house.
I resisted buying a new computer for a few years, during which time the Internet was created and developed. An employee of mine helped me buy my next computer which was a Compaq . It had dedicated proprietary parts and computer repairs could only be handled by the company. I was a dolt with it and called Billy Crocker my computer knowledgeable employee, for help from time to time. His wife was a high tech government computer software designer for the military. What he didn’t know about computers, she knew.
I spent long hours into the night calling up far away places with strange sounding names for service and help. Just about that time I found my old camp buddy and missing pal Harold Grossman. He’s the friend I lost track of since 1951. I told him about my frustration speaking to folks in India who spoke English words and not sentences. I told of my frustration and how I called Hewlett Packard and told them that If I can’t speak to a person in the United States that I would never, ever, buy an H-P product again. They offered me a free twenty five dollar certificate for H-P accessories. I told them to shove it where the “sun don’t shine” and hung up on them.
Hal Grossman told me about his son in law Michael Martinez who was a self taught computer expert. He was in the business of making and selling computers by himself. He also tutored computer incompetents like me. We were introduced and he really was remarkable. He took my computer and gave me a few bucks for the parts. Michael then proceeded to build a wonderful computer for me. It was upgraded and rebuilt about six times over the next few years for very healthy sums of money as technology grew. I was his personal cash cow. I always wanted the newest and best.
His business started to grow exponentially when he met a television personality and his famous actress wife. He built a whole system for a couple in their Connecticut home and on their boat and was on call to them 24/7. He also wired and alarmed all kinds of gadgets and gizmos for them for home and water craft. Michael also was introduced to their friends and got them as clients as well. He had to sign all kinds of legal privacy documents not to discuss them or where and how they lived. He became the computer expert for the stars, and a putz named Bernie Cohn. Eventually his work took me too far out of the way to service my needs. out of my life.
I met up with a young Asian fellow who was recommended to me in Glen Cove, New York. He was a terrific young man who I befriended and he sold me a lap top to have fun with as well as my first digital camera. He outfitted me with my first Dell PC’s for Florida and New York. All are old news by today’s standards. In fact the two PC’s crashed and died from being off and idle while I was away from each home. I also still have a laptop for simple tasks and games for my wife. It is a relic by today’s standards. Danny Chong and his business disappeared when the Big Box stores got too close to his business.
My second Dell computer in Florida as of late was in computer hospice and so was my printer . They were both near death. I went to Best Buy and fell in love with, of all things an H-P laptop which I can take back and forth and use all the time at home in Florida and New York. I did not want to buy from Best Buy because of all of their bad press about restocking fees. A Russian engineer shopping there told me that the particular model we were looking at makes all other computers out of date. I had to have it. Damn the torpedoes and full steam ahead. I would not let cost discourage me.
I went online with H-P shopping and found out that most stores use proprietary numbers, but I described the one I wanted and they custom designed the options and they shipped it. I had to call for help a few times to have some questions answered and spoke to people who sounded like Alvin, Theodore and Simon, the chipmunks, in the Phillipines.
This computer is their Pucci Manulli of laptops and has everything in it you can imagine. I also learned that mine apparently came with an alcoholic mouse with the Dt’s. Over the last weekend this new computer started to act up. The mouse gets tremors when more than three windows are open or, when I wanted to change screens, it refuses to move.
I waited until night here and called at 10:15 PM Monday evening for tech support. At night there is less phone waiting time. It was mid morning in the Pacific time zone. I spoke to a woman whose name was Shadap. I wasn’t sure if it would be appreciated if I ask if that was last name, or if her first name was, “ Aw”, hence “Aw Shadup”. She and I were on the phone until 2:30 in the morning, during which time the computer over heated and shut itself down. I overheated with annoyance as well. She spoke with am heavy Indian accent and I was getting very annoyed at her inability to solve my problem despite her cocky demeanor. The new computer crashed four times featuring the blue screen of death with accompanying sounds. Many times Shadup had taken over control of my computer from Munchkinville by remote control. I granted permission for her to do that. Even that did not go smoothly. She “futzed” around enough with the computer to no avail for four and a half hours.
I told her that I am not young like her and am crashing myself and that I would call to customer service next day and demand a new computer. She tried to persist in wanting to fix it the next morning. I said “Fugetaboutit”. I fully expected her to say that “Fugetaboutit” is on the other phone helping someone else, a la Abbot and Costello. I was about to ask her if she had another friend named “Shove-it”.
I was too over tired to fall asleep and took a Xanax. I was still up at four in the morning. I got out of bed at seven A.M., took a shower, and called H-P. I got yanked around to two extensions before I reached our friends to the north in Canada and told Rowley, my Canadian correspondent in no uncertain way that I was sending this computer back. He agreed readily and I reordered the same model sans HDMI TV tuner and Blu-Ray player. I should save $400.00 and am ready for the next round of being stepped on by Mr. Gates’ &^&)@ invention Hopefully I won’t have to deal with” AwShadup and won’t have to Fugetaboutit” anymore. Amen. If this doesn’t please me I will get an Apple which I still have resisted.