My Printer is a Big, Fat Baby!

Ordinarily, I'd have been at work for a few hours this morning--ah, the thrilling life of an administrator! But I actually like being at work during the quiet times. However, I worked extra hours on Thursday, so I didn't go in today.

I looked forward to a lovely morning, relaxing, listening to NPR, drinking coffee made perfectly by me (because I can make it in my kitchen), and then working on some poetry projects.

What did I do instead? I went to the grocery store early, and then I went to the computer. I discovered that the printer wasn't printing. Foolishly, I thought it might be an easy fix.

It makes noises like it's printing, but white pages come out. I've tried all the obvious things: I looked for things in the printer queue, I traded out printer cartridges, I turned the printer off for awhile, I rebooted the computer.

Then it was off to Google, on the quest for a simple answer. Some days, Google comes through. Not today.

I even called the help phone # for Lexmark. It's not every day that I get to talk to someone in the Philippines for free. I hoped that I helped him with his learning-English-process, because he certainly didn't help me with my problem. My printer, which we bought in 2000, is no longer supported by tech support. But I could send someone an e-mail. Sigh.

I want to just type a message to my printer: "What do you want? How can I help you? Is it a simple fix or have you given up the ghost?"

It reminded me of a summer day when my nephew was hot and irritable. These were the days before he had language that any of the rest of us understood, so we had to just guess what he wanted.

But even he did a better job at communicating: I was sitting beside him, drinking some water, and he reached up and had me pour water on his head. No such communique from the printer.

What a frustrating way to spend a day that I had hoped to spend writing.