The Past 48 Hours . . .

wherein the Matron has had opportunity to utilize all of her God-Oprah-Allah-Buddah-Universe-given talents!

Wednesday evening, she managed to LOSE the adapter for her ThinkPad T500.   This mishap pretty much reshaped her entire life the past two days.  First, she LOOKED for the damn thing.  Conveniently, this meant retracing far flung footsteps throughout South Minneapolis, east of St. Paul to Midway, to home.  Local readers will already know that this meant hours.

Abandoning all hope, the Matron purchased a universal adapter for the tune of $129 only to discover, at home, that her laptop is not universally adapted, no sirreeee.  Special as all get out, indeed.  She needed to turn to the manufacturer:  IBM. 

After spending 20 minutes in the Automated Nightmare, she got a real person who sighed and said he could not help her -- she needed to call a different 1-800.  She did, only to be instructed to go the internet to get the information she needed in order to secure said part.  All in all, she spent two hours trying to order the adapter or talk to another human being.  

She gave up.

Last night, at about 10 pm, she decided to call the 24 hour line and give it another go.  She was half-listening while waiting so wasn't quite sure what that extra fee was about?

Operator:  "Can I further torture you?"

Matron:  "What was that extra fee for ordering after hours?"

Operator:  "Three hundred and ninety-nine dollars."

Here is where the Matron had her first real, full-throttle belly laugh all day (she is NOT making up that number!).

Three hundred and ninety-nine dollars.   This added insult to injury after the day spent, flogged and quartered, at this monolith's hands. 

Yesterday also included a police photo-line up of criminals that the Matron caught--and found our fair Damsel following would-be thieves in her mini-van.  Yes!  If the laptop loss didn't suck up all her time, the Matron's newly discovered Detective Talents took the rest.

There have been a string of neighborhood burglaries, all during the day between Certain Precise Hours.   Thanks to a very active neighborhood email list and residents who have startled said thieves and posted descriptions, the Matron was on the lookout for a tall skinny African-American teen wearing black and red.

She saw him!  Standing in front of her very own house!!  As he walked by, the Matron called the police and followed the perp (that's police talk, friends) so they wouldn't lose them.   Let's consider the wisdom of this later.

The short version?  When the police stopped him, they discovered he was carrying all the mundane household items one requires on a neighborhood stroll:  several knives, leather work gloves and a screwdriver.

Later, the Matron identified his accomplice in a photo-line up.  Who knew she was so sleuthy?!

Now if only she could deploy those skills on that damn adapter!  And readers have her husband to thank for this post.   Fifteen minutes into the IBM cesspool, the Matron burst into tears when she heard the following:  "If you want to identify an ID part number, please call (insert meaningless cruel hoax number here)."  

She immediately burst into tears and asked John to take over.  Within 5 minutes he'd located two adapters on craiglist.    Two days out of her life and he did this in 5 minutes. . . . she hates him?