My computer died! The HP maladie done her in.

Well, I must apologize to the two or three readers of this blog. I have been away for several days because the bubonic plague of computers, i.e. HP's shoddy workmanship, has struck again.

One day everything was fine: I finished a long translation, shut down my computer, saw the snooze...er, excuse me, I mean the "news" (more about the 8 o'clock news here in France on another blog), and went to bed at the usual 11:30 time.

The next morning, I went to my studio bearing a cup of tea and a cheerful disposition. I pushed the start button...nothing. OK, so I pushed again....rien! nada! nothing! zilch! ZERO! My computer sort of sighed, turned on its little lights, and like a dying bird went still and its little lights dimmed.

THEN: PAAANNNIC! Ran around the room, ran around the room, threw my hands up in the air, tore at my vestments like the trojan women when they saw the body of Hector being dragged around!

What can it be? What can it be? OK, stop running around and think. Perhaps it is the power supply! Yes, that's it! I put the computer in a bag, rushed to the car.

"Where are you going in such a rush," asked the alarmed wife.

"No time to talk," got to run. Get in the car. Come with me," I yelled.

In the car I explained the situation to my wife. "And I have to turn in this large translation job tomorrow!" I cried.

"Of course, you made a back up," she said.

My hands grasped the steering wheel even tighter. Of course, I had not!

We went to our local repair, spare parts, used computers, cheap accessories shop. Luckily there was only one customer in the shop. But, he was a Frenchman so, of course, he talked and talked and asked for all sorts of information, and mentioned the weather, and said his kid was doing well in school, and that he was thinking of going to the mountains for his vacation.

I could have killed the guy but my wife kept stroking my arm as if I was a rabid dog that needed to be calmed down.

Finally, Mr. Friendly went away and I plunked my computer down on front of the repair shop guy.

"It's dead," I said.

"Ah, we will just see about that," he replied cheerfully. He plugged it in, pushed the start button. Nothing.

"Perhaps it is the power supply," said the genius. He got another power supply, plugged it in. Nothing.

"Le disc dure," he pronounced. He got a hard disk case, took the hard disk out of my computer, put it into the case, took the USB cable and plugged my disk into his computer. All the stuff on the disk was there. "Pas de problem," he said. "Your computer is dead."

I felt like Romeo being told that his beloved Juliette had kicked the golden bucket!

"Glummmp," I swallowed hard. It felt like I had just dropped a golf ball down my throat.

"Don't worry," consoled my wife. "We have my spare computer at home and your data is OK, so you can send your work tomorrow."

"That'll be 40 euros," said the computer guy.

We went home. My beloved computer, with its HUGE screen, large keyboard with a numeric pad, its many, many USB ports, TV port, extra monitor port, card reader, DVD writer, etc. was dead. I put it in the back of a closet. It felt as if I was burying a beloved dog in the back yard.

Sniff, sniff. Now what?

"You can use my spare computer to finish your job," said my wife, "but you will have to buy something for yourself."

I grumbled but she was right. We are going on vacation in a couple of weeks and we will need computers for both of us since we are sent translation jobs even when we are on the road.

This year we are going to Vic-en-Bigorre, a lovely little town in the Gers where we will stay for a few days so we can go to the Jazz festival in Marciac. Then we will drive up the heart of France, avoiding the auto-routes and passing through beautiful towns such as Montauban, Brive-la-Gaillarde, Limoge, Chateaureux, Orleans, perhaps Chartres, as we head on to Paris. Since we plan to stop along the way, we need our computers to check mail and so forth.

Well, I wasn't going to buy another new HP, that's for sure. "The quality eet ees not so good, for these computers sold in ze supermarkets," said the computer guy when I told him I had bought my HP in a large supermarket's electronic department. "They are cheeep becauwze they are not so careful wit the quality, hein!"

So, off we went to a shop called Cash Converters. People take things there to be sold and the store takes a cut of the deal. Sort of like a brick-and-mortar Ebay. It is always chock-full of stuff and of people buying and selling stuff.

A salesman saw me looking at the glass display case that held a nice laptop, with wide screen and all the goodies. "It ees nice, eh?" he said. It was like looking at a puppy in a pet store: love at first sight. "It ees new," he said. "The fellow who brought it in got a Mac for his birthday; he had just bought this, so now he sell it." That is what they are told to say, just as used car salesmen are told to say that a used car was owned by an old lady who only drove it on Sundays to go to church.

I bought the thing: 369 euros! Then I came home, plugged it in, fired up my WiFi router and keyed in the key for the network.

Windows 7 came up and then. THEN, THEN---IT STARTED TO DOWNLOAD 91---YES YOU READ RIGHT---91 UPDATES!!!!!

HOW IN THE WORLD CAN SO MANY SMART ENGINEERS AT MICROSOFT, WHO ARE HIGHLY PAID INTELLIGENT PEOPLE, MAKE SUCH A CRAPPY OPERATING SYSTEM.

WINDOWS 7 IS A PIECE OF CRAP JUST AS VISTA WAS/IS! AUUUUGH!

I swear: as soon as I win the LOTTO, I am going to buy a Macbook Pro!

Tomorrow I will write about the eight o'clock news.