01/15/2021 (Day 15)
I got up early as I needed to make a trip into Austin to the Best Buy store to get my computer worked on. It had gone through one of its periodic upgrades as happens overnight only this time, something had gone wrong, and I mean seriously wrong. I knew we might be in trouble when it took forever to boot up and then a bunch of stuff was missing off the opening screen. Further examinations showed that most of the links were not visible to the operating system. I played around with it, but the technical side of any computer is way beyond my pay grade, so I shut down thinking to myself that I needed to take a trip.
We did our usual walk, and the weather was extremely windy and had turned much colder making it uncomfortable to be outside. Even Sandy was ready to come back to Miss Daisy for us to have our breakfast although true to form, both dogs ignored theirs. Then I put everything in the car that I needed and drove into Austin. The drive was uneventful, and traffic was light, and I made good time causing me to arrive way too early as they do not open until 11:00 am every day, something I was not aware of. I sat in the parking lot watching people try the door, read the posted times on the door and head back to their cars to wait it out and at 11:00 sharp, we all trooped inside. I was the only one in line for Computer Service which made me feel good until the first words that the counter lady said were, “Do you have an appointment”? Not aware that I needed one as I have never had to make one before on the other occasions when my computer needed work, I choked down the urge to tell the person behind the counter what I thought, swallowed my temper and had her book me an appointment at any of the closest stores. Turns out that the Bee Caves store had one open for 2:15 pm, a 3 hour wait but I took it anyway. What else could I do as I was out of choices and my computer needed help.
I filled in the time by going to Walmart’s which was just around the corner and wandered around really for grocery shopping which had been a part of my original plan. I was standing in one of the aisles just blankly looking at what was in front of me when a gentleman pushing a stroller accompanied by his wife and another young boy, obviously shoppers, stopped to inquire what I was looking for. I told him the item was a visor for night driving and he immediately told me where I could find them. Just to be sure, he asked a passing Walmart’s employee and they directed me to where I needed to go. I thanked them profusely and they went on their way. I made my way to the grocery section and did a bunch of shopping finding everything that I needed before we ran into each other again as I was looking at what they had in the way of visors and again thanked him for his help. Unfortunately, they did not have what I wanted in the way of Night Visors, only Night Glasses which I already have. I completed my shopping and checked out and made a slow drive to Bee Caves which is only a few miles up the road but at least, on my way home and sat in the car for 15 minutes until it was close to my appointment. I was early so I checked out the new computers before wandering over to the repair desk and even though I was still earlier than my appointed time, the young gentleman asked me what the problem was and proceeded to go to work doing things that I did not understand at all as he busily typed in instructions that he was reading from another laptop. After a few minutes and a couple more changes, he turned my computer to face me and asked how it looked. It was perfect and what’s more, it didn’t cost me anything. I thanked him profusely and made my way back to Dripping Springs. Deciding that I had got over being mad as Starbucks for their last episode, I pulled into the drive thru only to find that they were closed,,,again, this time, due to shortage of staff. With a heavy sigh I drove back to Miss Daisy to two very excited little dogs. I unloaded the groceries and put them all away before we went out walking. Altogether, I covered 2.9 miles, the dogs not so much as they didn’t get to walk around Walmart’s. A very good day indeed.
Written 01/16/2022 – Read my other blog at https://pondblog2011.com