Children of a Lesser Blog

Your love is like  a 100 piece tuba band in your living room

Conversations with my Dog 

Me: Hey, why do you come down in the morning, see me in my office, then run back to bed?

Her: I'm just making sure you're up and working. I, for one, know where my treats come from.

Another large corporation that deserves a slow, painful torture session is Intuit, via its TurboTax.

I had to use Turbo Online in the past, because they don't make software for linux and I don't do Windows. It went smoothly, or so I thought. It took forever to get a piece of information to complete the return but we finally got it. Annnnnnnd Turbo couldn't find the return. It listed a return, but couldn't actually bring it up. I went to help, which wasn't. I called, which was yet another exercise in futility. The automated voice suggested I try online (where I just came from) to talk to a human.  Ok, I'll play, I thought. When I finally got to Talk to a Human prompt, Turbo told me I hadn't purchased the Live Human version, which I'd need to get to a human. I'd have to PAY because their software doesn't work. I don't need tax help - I need Turbo help.

If I drank heavily, I'd already be so blasted I could barely type. Mrs. lefty isn't far behind me.

If I did drugs, I'd be so blitzed I couldn't even dial to talk to them for a few days.

I could play the guitar, but annoying an entire block won't get my taxes done.

Why does this have to be so difficult? 

[little did I know, it would only go downhill from here...]

The tax return in question, which Turbo deleted, was listed, so I stupidly believed it existed. A nice phone help guy spent a lot of time helping convincing me the return was gone, blipped out, erased, not taking up space on their hard drives. The next day I got back in and managed to download a copy of the Great Invisible Return. However, no matter what I did, I couldn't get it to bring the return UP so I could finish it. I needed to print something, so my printer took that moment to tell me it had a media jam. I haven't printed 50 pages since I bought the damn thing, so it's not like the printer has worn out. I did everything the instructions told me to do and still there was no media jam (unless you count the one I wanted to jam up HP's buttocks for causing me this trouble). The directions said sometimes the media jam error stays on, but no worry - just take it to a local HP repair shop for a quick, expensive fix!

I gave up on directions and started poking around. Don't worry, I used nothing more dangerous than a flamethrower. I figured it would either burn the media jam or roast the jam sensor. I located a part with 2 screws. I unscrewed the left one and immediately dropped the screw into the printer. Shaking it, I heard nothing. So I went after the right screw, and perfectly recreated my screw-dropping, also with no sound when I shook it. Let no one say I'm not consistent.  So all I had to do was print about 50 pages of tax info to mail. With a disassembled printer (with scorch marks from the flamethrower).  We tried everything possible to send this return electronically, but Turbo kept laughing at me. Then Wife laughed at me. Then I yelled at wife. By 3am, we were all tired of failing and went to bed.

Just for fun, I hooked the printer up and tried again.

Yup, media jam had cleared.

So all I had to do to the printer was take it apart a few times, scream at it, scorch it with a flamethrower (or 2), drop 2 screws in it, threaten HP, and the thing printed like magic! So if you ever have trouble with your HP printer, follow the steps above and you'll be printing in no time!

• FCC prepares $75 monthly broadband subsidies for “high-cost” areas

Ah yes, Broadband Socialism, paid for with your tax dollars.

Every now and then I like to hear the horns announce that I did something special.

Like the other night, I went to bed before midnight all by myself, and Mrs. lefty didn't even have to read me a story.

So the big news is that just the other day, I put something away. By myself. With no prodding. 

We're not entirely sure if/when this happened before that day, but I'll take all the horns blasting I can get.

I just saw it there, thought for a second that it had been there a few weeks, then put it away.

I feel so accomplished, like I can do anything. 

Anything except put more things away.

The car freaked out on Wife the other day. It felt like it wasn't going to accelerate past 25 and it was taking forever to get there. It worked fine for me, but to be safe, off it went to the mechanic. We used to tithe to him, but buying newer cars knocked that down to 9%. The mechanic, a nice guy, said it was the knock sensor. Of course it was the knock sensor - how could I be so stupid?

WTF is a knock sensor?

Were the neighborhood kids knocking on the car's door and the car went into panic mode?

Is the gas we're using no good and the engine knocked?

Does it want me to knock on the door of the hottie on the next block?

This is why I stopped trying to fix cars.

Well, this and the fact that they were getting too sophisticated and I wasn't very good at it.

The fix was only $500. Only.

Oh yeah, further research shows sometimes you need a new engine. You know, small stuff. But it's ok - they come with a 10,000 mile warranty.

I don't do this often, but tonight I drink to you, readers of ThermionicEmissions.

There's been a terrible parachuting accident with my wife.

The chute worked. 

The incandescent light bulb still isn’t dead — but ‘normal’ ones are now truly banned

They will get my 200w Halogen bulbs when they rip them from my cold, dead fingers.

Remember: when you outlaw incandescent bulbs, only outlaws will have them.