Electronic Death

I have no idea what the problem could be...

"Dad, the kid's computer is making funny noises and I can't log in..."

After a great dinner and a movie with my wife, these are not the words I am excited to hear. I just had a conversation earlier in the day with the wife about when we'll get the Macbook "paper weight" repaired. We set a date for early September. It goes back to my old saying "Don't commit to fixing something because the other appliances will get jealous and break.."

Sure enough, the kid's computer's (my old Mac G5) hard drive seems to have bit the dust. I can't get it to even recognize that a hard drive exists. I know enough about the systems that I am fairly confident, almost certain, hoping that it is true crossing my fingers that I can take it in and get all the data pulled from it and buy a new hard drive for it. It could use an upgrade with the amount of photos and songs that the kids have put on it since I turned them loose on it. I'm sure that the computer would have been just fine if I hadn't talked about fixing the laptop in the same room as this.

We should have carried on the conversation about the computer like we do when we are talking about Christmas–on a date. It should have been a conversation over dinner somewhere and it would have gone something like "The lasagne looks good, I think it is time to get the laptop fixed. Or maybe I'll get the chicken..." After 16 years of marriage, anything we can do to spice up the date night conversation is a score in my book. Alas, I forgot the rule and mentioned it in front of not one, but four other computer related equipment: the G5, the printer, my new rockin' iMac 27" and Macbook Pro.

The iMac and Macbook Pro know that they are the current top dogs in the electronic pecking order so they are good from a self-esteem point of view. The printer and the G5 however were on shaky ground. They've both served us well, but were getting up there in years. I think the idea of being dropped lower on the food chain finally got to both of them. The G5 gave up the ghost last night. Once the G5 went out, the printer was left. The added pressure was too much for the printer to handle. It went the direction of the G5 and stopped functioning also. We performed some radical life-saving techniques that involved a variety of screw drivers, cotton balls, cussing and were able to revive it. I think it is on life support.

I hadn't even considered this...

With these two items non-functioning I have a couple options available to me:

1. Send both of the to Goodwill so that I won't feel guilty about throwing them away. Someone else can do it for me.
2. Open them both up and tinker with them. My profession has nothing to do with tinkering, but maybe as a novice I will invent a transporter or warp drive or something.
3. Open them up, fill them with dirt, plant flowers in them and give them to my wife as an anniversary gift use them as decoration on the deck.
4. Put them on the side of my house and see if they'll sprout new baby computers.
5. Leave them on a neighbour's door step in a bassinet with a note about how I couldn't take care of them anymore.

No matter which option choose, I will be purchasing some new equipment soon.