Rhode Island - Day 23

Fishermen’s Memorial State Campground

Tuesday, 23 October 2018

Today was a stay-at-home day, but a very very weird one.

The first major event was that my computer froze.  Just froze.  I’d never had that happen before with this computer – and actually I only remember it happening to me at all just once before – but I didn’t remember that this morning when it happened so couldn’t figure out what on earth to do.  So when in computer trouble, I always call my brother, poor thing.  And as always, he came through for me.

But him not being here was the first problem – he wanted to know what model mine is so he could look it up online, but the model number was curiously elusive.  I read him all the numbers I could find anywhere on it, especially that label on the underside full of Chinese characters and technical information, but none of those fit what he was finding in his research.

So then I had a hunt for the owner’s manual, which I knew I must have saved because I save all those things.  I found the one for the travel alarm that’s so old it isn’t made anymore (it’s analog, made by Radio Shack), and for the electric toothbrush, and lots of other non-computer-related products.  But no Dell owner’s manual.  Finally, finally, in desperation I started reading every piece of paper and found the little tissue paper “quick start” leaflet for the computer, which is apparently all I’ve got.  But – yea! - it had the model number on it, so David could look it up online.

He’d already told me the solution was to unplug the battery to let it all reset, but we’d already gone over the whole body (him listening to me describing it over the phone, always awkward) and were finding no possible way to get to anything inside except to remove the 8 screws holding the back of the computer onto the front.  David was sure there must be a compartment somewhere that would have a slide opening with a battery inside, but this thing is very nearly solid and nothing seemed available to slide.

But now with the model number, David could tell me with disgust that I was indeed going to have to take out the 8 tiny screws on the back to take off the back to get to the battery inside.  Then I had to pry off the back (David said the instructions said I was supposed to use a plastic something or other, which I obviously didn’t have, so I was stuck with using a screwdriver to do it and try not to inflict serious damage).  The inside, once revealed, reminded me of an aerial view from a sci-fi movie like Star Wars (the original ones, of course, with primitive visual effects) showing a town from way up above.

The only thing remotely battery-ish was this black rectangular thing that, after close examination, might be plugged into something else, and we decided that had to be it.  So unplugging it took two hands so I had to hang up (I’m sure not a moment too soon for poor David).  I was so afraid the strength it was taking to unplug it was going to damage something, but it turned out I wasn’t pushing the right part because by accident, I did and it came unplugged.  Good grief.

So after waiting a bit and plugging it back in and screwing in all the tiny screws and turning it back on, presto! it was a working computer again.  Somewhere in there I called David back so he could enjoy the triumph.  (He said I should write all this down so next time I’d have it available.  I said since I couldn’t find the owner’s manual in the first place what made him think I could find my notes.)  He also said next time I should get Anna to help because she had been in charge of her company’s IT program at her last job.  I said Anna WAS the IT program at her last job (a small family-owned 2-store company) but if he wanted me to spread the burden around, I could understand that.

So while all this unscrewing and unplugging and rescrewing was going on, I could hear it was starting to rain outside, coming down pretty hard for a bit, and thought that would delay me taking the dogs out for a while.  It completely slipped my mind that I’d put all the dog beds outside on the picnic table to air out for the day.

They didn’t just get aired out – they got washed out.

By the time I remembered what I’d done, they were wet and it was late afternoon.  The nights are getting pretty cool these days and I knew it would be seriously unfair to the dogs – especially to Dexter who doesn’t have much of a coat – to have to sleep on wet beds.  So I turned the heater thermostat up really high and put the beds right in front of it and mopped up the water they oozed and turned them over several times, and after a few hours of much higher heat than I was comfortable with and a humidity level that approached sauna-level, two of the beds were mostly dry.  But what a mess for the poor puppies.  (Yeah, sure, I’m responsible enough to take care of 2 kitties too.)

And to cap off the day, the wind picked up so much, wind gusts started shaking the RV during the evening, which always makes me a little nervous, though I don’t tell Gracie that.  She gets nervous enough on her own.

What a strange day.