"Put it in the garage," my husband said. "It will cool down there."
"But we have the snow blower and leaf blower there, filled with fuel and cans of paint. Bad idea, no?"
"Would you rather have it blow up somewhere in the house?" he fired back.
I ran down the stairs and set it on the garage concrete floor. It was still screaming in terror. I ran back into the house. My heart pounded as I thought about the years of photos I stored in the laptop. I ignored my own incessant nagging thoughts that reminded me I should back up the computer. It had been over 400 days since I last backed up the laptop's memory. And then in an instant, because of my silly vanity table writing idea, it might all just evaporate with the computer's processor.
The desk was near the baseboard heater. I had stored the laptop inside the vanity under the mirror top that I flipped open to use when I brushed my hair and put my makeup on in the morning. I never had an issue for the past 14 days. But then again, I usually put the laptop in hibernation mode at night. I must have forgotten to do that the night before. I probably just flipped it shut with the processor running all night. The laptop couldn't run its fan effectively while trapped inside the desk with no ventilation. It was very careless of me. Thank goodness we were home. I shudder to think what might have happened if it kept racing its energy like that while no one was home.
So much for cultivating my little writing corner. I was so excited that because of the desk and dedicated space I had achieved the impossible -- written at least 3 pages every day for the past two weeks. But these are the realities of technology. They may allow us to reach breakthroughs but at the end of the day, if the operator is flawed, the technology will fail. Just this morning I heard about the self-operating Uber vehicles that crashed, not due to their own limitations but due to human operated vehicles in their path.
I hear that typing on a keyboard may soon be obsolete. Think about it. Everyone is texting with their thumbs in shorthand. Many are using voice to text commands. But I find that only my accomplished typing can truly keep up with my thoughts. My handwriting is too slow now to catch every thought in time. My wrist and finger muscles quickly ache after half a page of writing. And yet, the longer I type, the more pain I cause my carpal tunnels so I have to wear those special wrist guards to sleep so my numbing hands stop waking me in the middle of the night. I just can't win.
Fortunately, after an hour, I pressed the power button as I held my breath. Please power back up, please function, I prayed. The screen lit up gray and spun, my hope alive. After what seemed like ages, that familiar intro audio struck its chord. I exhaled.
I immediately hooked up my Seagate Time Machine and backed up over one year's worth of new memories. I was redeemed.
Moral of the story: when inspired by creativity, some experiments fail, but you have to just make adjustments and forge ahead. In my case, I continue to write in the same quaint spot. Now I make sure I shut down my laptop at the end of each night. It needs a deep sleep to go into REM just like me. No more napping at the desk. It could literally be deadly!
