Requiem for a Compaq

OK, it's been a stressful week. First, the backstory: my 'new' laptop (less than 2 years old; as opposed to the 'old' laptop that I'm using now) just quit on me about 3 weeks ago. It was still under warranty (I bought the extended one), so I sent it to the company (lousy idea, where you have to mail them the dumb machine, leaving you with NOTHING) for the warranty repair. Well...last Friday I get a call saying that the warranty had been voided because they found BUGS inside the case. BUGS! That, evidently, is considered owner abuse or something. Like I can control where bugs can get into! And it's not like I left it in a 3rd world country or in the grass at the park or something; it was in my home and in my office! Anyway, the motherboard is fried, so the thing is basically a paperweight now. The one bit of good news is that my hard drive is still intact, so I can at least access the stuff on there. In the meantime, I've been trying to re-build my email list, some critical documents, and the like, while I wait for my NEW-NEW laptop (as opposed to the NEW-DEAD laptop) to arrive in the mail. I am a bit excited; I decided to go with Dell, since I've had nothing but trouble with the two Compaqs I've owned (or that have owned me...you decide), and because I've heard rave reviews about their warranty service (I bought the 4-year extended warranty on this one; if I can just keep it hermetically sealed so BUGS can't get in). In the meantime, I'm limping along with this one, slow of processor and void of memory. I did get the paperweight back in the mail yesterday; now to decide whether to rebuild it on a new motherboard (about $200 on ebay) or just cabbage it for parts (one of my more favorite endeavors). We shall see...

Sorry this isn't more 'spiritual', but I am beginning to agree with our Bishop, that these machines are instruments of the devil...