It's been a busy week - the kind where work doesn't stop at home or even when I'm asleep. Pressure of work invaded my dreams and gave me sleepless nights.
One big rush is over now but my laptop, evidently feeling the pressure as much as I did. is having problems. It lacks power and runs out of energy rapidly - just like me. Worse, it's taken to emitting frantic squeaks on occasion. They must mean something - or perhaps there's something satisfying in sitting down and squeaking loudly. I may try it one day.
I'm going to see if one of the technicians at work can help. The technicians are amazing. I used to think that they had brilliant technical knowledge and expertise but in the last couple of years I've realised there's more to it than that. They have magic powers. I was unwilling to believe this but the evidence is overwhelming. For instance, I can be struggling with a bloody-minded printer for more than an hour. It will spew out paper in a frenzy or sulk in the corner of my desk, refusing to do anything at all. Finally, in despair, I will phone a technician. As soon as he or she arrives, the printer responds. Sometimes the technician will just walk in the door. On other occasions the magic words are required. I know the magic words - they are, "What seems to be the trouble?" - but they don't have the same effect when I say them. But on the arrival of a fully-initiated technician, the printer gives a little shrug and complies with my requests at once, turning out page after page of perfectly printed script.
Sometimes I wonder about the training of technicians. There must be secret rites and rituals from which other mortals are banned. The technicians never reveal the secret.
I hope they can save the laptop. My fear is that it will behave perfectly in their presence and then return to its customary ways of neuroses and rebellion. Computers can be like that.
