In which I am drowning

Metaphorically, of course. Day before yesterday I switched on my trusty computer only to have it spit out a seriously foul burning smell. I presume this is not good. I might have searched for a trusty computer repair guru, but I've had the computer for more than five years and it has a few quirks. So I grabbed the most necessary things from my hard drive--a few photos and all of my documents--and powered everything down and unplugged it. Then darling husband and I headed to the electronics superstore to find the computer I had picked out online.I had a list; I planned to be in and out in ten minutes.

Oh, I can hear you laughing now. I found the computer I wanted, but across the aisle was something bigger and fancier and configured in a way that completely eliminated the logistical issues I had with my previous computer. And it was on clearance.

Reader, I bought it. Along with the external hard drive that my husband has been insisting I need for eons now, and software and a new surge protector, etcetera yada yada--you know how it goes. Throwing all of those boxes into the cart makes me want to tear my hair out by the roots. Do you KNOW how many pairs of shoes I could buy with that money? I was so delirious by the time we got to the check out that I had a hard time refraining from asking the clerk if he knew Chuck. (In my defense, he was wearing a nondescript dark suit.)

Anyway, this new beast is something called an all-in-one, which I never even knew existed--my CPU is apparently built-in behind the monitor and I can touch the screen to make things happen. I am expecting a rather steep learning curve here. Actually, I haven't even unpacked it yet. All we've done is hook up the external hard drive to the old computer to try to grab my iTunes library before the thing decides to blow up. Believe  me, if you smelled what this thing is doing, you'd think it's a definite possibility too.

So, I'm blogging from the husband's laptop and crossing my fingers that I can get the new monstrosity up and running soon and ever so slightly lamenting the loss of the trusty old computer--I wrote four books on it and it served me very well. RIP.