Attitude About My Latitude

On my first day of orientation I received a Dell Latitude laptop. That was in the Spring of 2004. Several years later and I still have the same piece of equipment. I am in desperate need of a new one since mine is now showing its age through various symptoms that include but are not limited to:

Logging In
I timed it today...13 minutes 42 seconds to log-in. I come into work, power up my computer, go to the restroom, go get coffee, say my hello's and by the time I'm back to my desk I'm still waiting to punch in my user id and password. I need to ask our accounting department to generate a charge code for logging in.

Mr. Van Winkle, we're ready for your user id.

The F'in F Key
The "F" key ejects when my fingers prestadigitatiously spell certain words and terms. The faster I type, the more likely it is to happen. Particularly with words I use in business emails like "Fuck", "Fuck you", "Fuck me", "Fuck Off", etc. My digits come to a screeching halt when it happens and everything immediately turns to slow motion when the "F" key goes airborne and flips end over end as it struggles to find its rip cord. After it crashes onto my desk, I jam it back between the "D" and "G" keys with my thumb only to look back at my screen and see, "ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff". Yeah, F you F key.

Crumbs
My keyboard has approximately 1/2 pound of food in it. I eat at my desk for lunch, often. This involves perusing the internet while scarfing down a foot-long Blimpie's sub and some Cheeto's. This event repeated continuously over a three year timeframe has resulted in an obscene accumulation of crumbs nesting under my keys. I actually saw mites in there the other day with their own Blimpie's. They were making a killing.

Where does the line start? This place is packed.

The Fan
The fan that cools down my laptop runs continuously and voluminously. I could be on an Antarctic expedition with my laptop and the fan would keep humming with sub-zero temperatures. Why I would have my laptop on an Antarctic expedition is rather odd. But I'd bring it just to prove my point. And the noise the fan projects is impressive. It sounds like a chopper preparing for liftoff. I keep waiting for propellers to jut out from the USB ports and start spinning to elevate my laptop out of the cubicle. Bye-bye laptop, safe travels.

Told you the fan would still be on.

I might pull a Filbert. Next thing you know, I got a brand new laptop with keys that don't pop out and quick access to the internet.

As for the mites, well, they're going to have to franchise because I'm opening up a new store.