You know, I always talk about how I pride myself on the accuracy of my gut feelings. Sometimes, when I’m walking somewhere, and need to ask for directions, something will tell me not to ask a certain person. Then I’ll see them do something really creepy. Or, I’ll have to make a choice, and I’ll get an inkling that one option just isn’t good. Then it will turn out that there is a reason for avoiding that choice. But this week, despite my gut screaming objections, I went ahead and didn’t listen to it. And now I have a story to tell, and the moral is, listen to your gut!
Like I said yesterday, I had to take my computer to the shop. It was acting up. Before the fun really started, I heard about this computer store across the street, and I heard from one person that she thought it was a good computer store. But she really didn’t know anything about computers, so I don’t know why I put any weight behind what she said. I had gone in and spoken to the guy in the shop, and he seemed very quiet, but he seemed to know what he was talking about passibly. So I left. Then my computer woes started. So I called him back to ask him if he’d look at my ailing beast. He said he would, if I’d bring it over. I asked him, since I’m blind and don’t feel like a. getting killed crossing the major street I’d have to cross with the computer in my hands or b. jarring the computer while trying to carry it, would he come get it? He asked me where I lived and I told him I was basically right across the street. His response? “Oh just bring it over here, it’s not that far.” That made me slightly annoyed, but some people just don’t get it.
But, every time I thought about taking the computer to him, something told me to hold off on it. Something just didn’t sit right with me, something about the way he talked, something. Finally, I bit the bullet and took the computer to him. He took it and I told him that it was squeaking, it was shutting off, and one of the jacks on my sound card wasn’t working. He said sure I’ll look at it and call you back. So I left, with that horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that I always get when I leave my computer in someone else’s hands. It’s got a lot of expensive stuff on it! I need the thing! All I can think is “Please don’t break it! Please please don’t!”
An hour or so later, I phone back. He says nothing’s wrong with the hardware, so he’s running a virus scanner with AVG. I just about flip. First of all, I already have antivirus software on there, so putting on another antivirus software might be bad news. Second, AVG is pure crap!
So, I let him go ahead and do that, and this morning I call him back and he says, now it works fine, now that he’s cleaned off all the spyware. I’m like, “spyware?” I know it doesn’t have spyware on it, because I’m very careful. He says aside from that, he just blew some dust out of the inside, it’s ready to be picked up, there’s no hardware problem and the sound card works perfectly now that the spyware is off. He’s charging me $25. I’m like ok, at least it wasn’t very expensive.
So, I get in a cab to go get it because there’s no way I’m carrying it home either, and he shows me what spyware he’s removed. They were a bunch of cookies, which do no system damage, and some false positives, things that weren’t actually spyware. I asked him to show me that the other jack in my sound card works, and pointed at it. He put the speakers in it, and lo and behold, it did nothing! He stammered something about not knowing that was the one I wanted tested. Then we figured out the reason he got no sound from the speakers before he removed the sound card. Remember that old disabled sound chip? He plugged the speakers into that! Imbecile!
Then I asked him where the log files were for the anti-spyware program he threw on my computer, and he didn’t even know. The kicker came when I wanted to pay. I took out my debit card, and that’s when he told me he only took cash! I asked him if he even took visa, and he said no. So I couldn’t even pay him, because if I did, I couldn’t have paied the cab driver. So I left, madder than mad. It was then that the cab driver told me there was a sign up in his store that said, “We take cash, visa and mastercard.” but he had scratched out visa and mastercard. I mean, how cheap can you get?
So what did this guy really do for me, kids? He blew some dust out of my computer, something I could have done with a sighty holding the case open and a can of compressed air, which I have. And, if that didn’t work a miracle, I’m going to have to have another tech give it a real going over. You know, the last time I didn’t listen to my gut was when I persisted in going to Canadian Guide Dogs for the Blind even though my gut said no no no no noooo! When will I learn?
