Today I am facing the challenge of seeing how much I can write before my mom shows up from her Christmas card shopping to ask me what I am doing. I’m at PJ’s in Clearview Shopping Center, and although the table is uneven and I should have put more sugar in my coffee, I am as happy as I can be at this moment.
I have been trying to use my nice little laptop at my parents’ house and it has been terribly frustrating. All I needed was a relatively quiet and private flat surface near a phone jack. Ha. Ha, I say.
The first night, my mom pulled the kitchen phone out of its jack so I could try that. With the modem/phone cord stretched all the way, I was able to sit in a kitchen chair with the laptop on my knees, and my feet on tiptoe so the laptop wouldn’t slide off my lap. My email and IM’ing was accompanied by the sounds of my mom’s humming as she worked in the kitchen. It was pretty miserable and I asked if we couldn’t please find a better option next time. Maybe in the computer room? Only the phone jack in the computer room is in a terribly inconvenient place and there was nowhere to reach it. Not only that, but the computer room is a total disaster area. Even if I could reach the phone jack, the bed is the only clear space in the room.
So the next night we pulled the cordless base out of its jack next to the TV in the den. No one was watching TV at the time. However, I realized quickly that I was using my parents’ sole phone connection during prime calling time, because a little dialog box popped up every few minutes telling me who was calling and did I want to ignore it (of course I did) or answer the call? I relayed the call info to my parents, thinking they could then call these people on one of their two cel phones … but no, they would just wait until I was done. And oh, could they see what I was doing, anyway? And then my little brother wanted to dial in to his ISP so he could check on his eBay auctions. I gave up. Besides, my back was starting to hurt from leaning down from the sofa to the coffee table to type.
Next time I need to bring a longer phone cord. Or better yet, remind my mom to get someone to activate the phone jack in the back room where I am sleeping. That would be the ideal place to connect, since it’s peaceful and private. I might even get some work done.
Even with these annoyances, the laptop has been a very welcome resource. I used it to watch DVDs in the airport, to listen to CDs in the back room, and to show my mom a bunch of photos I’d taken with the digital camera. It has been worth lugging it on the airplane, certainly.
But I realize I have become incredibly spoiled by the setup at home, where we have wireless and I have a nice desk where the laptop usually lives, with a bigger keyboard and a proper mouse. And if I want to go sit on the bed and use the computer, I can. Or the back patio. Or the kitchen. Whatever. I had been planning to do some freelance work while I was here, but even in the nice back bedroom, there isn’t a decent table-and-chair setup. I would have to work from bed, and while that’s fine for surfing, it is difficult for dealing with fidgety CSS.
So now there’s yet another reason for me to be happy when I am home. I miss my boyfriend a whole lot, I miss my house and my bed and my own damn thermostat. And I miss my wireless access, I really do. Thank heaven for PJ’s, which is giving me the nicest break from family stuff that I have had this whole trip. Maybe I can sneak back here tomorrow, too. Yeah.
My boyfriends and I use wireless. We just spent a week at my parents’ home, where they still use dial-up access. It felt excrutiatingly slow! Amazing how perception changes; I remember when 14.4 seemed fast.