The woman in charge of computing for the Whatley family passed away a couple of weeks ago. After deep mourning, making final arrangements, and what I thought would be the unbearable task of finding her replacement, I can finally speak of her unexpected demise.
Approaching thunderstorms caused me to pay her a visit one evening and make sure she was properly bedded down. When I went to wake her the next morning, she was gone. Had I known the moments I spent with her the night before would be her last, I would have backed up the contents of her vast mind, thanked her for many years of service, and held her hand as the power light dimmed. She saw me through countless school projects, online forum debacles, the balancing of my checkbook, and the forging of many new friendships. She brought me out of my shell, and I will miss her.
The term “motherboard” is thrown around often in our technologically advanced times. Prior to last week, I had no clue what one really was and furthermore, didn’t care what it did. I have since learned it’s a piece of equipment encased in the CPU that ties everything together, allowing all the parts to receive power and communicate with one another. Is there any question, ladies, why it’s called a “motherboard”? I think I know why she felt weary enough to cross over to another dimension.
She could have confided in me regarding her troubles. I’ve become adept at talking myself off the ledge when I get that “why must I do everything around here” feeling; I would have helped a friend in need.
Upon finding her lifeless, denial quickly began to rule my emotions. Convinced I was missing something electrical, I summoned my personal fix-it man. He almost always makes everything better in my world. His diagnosis: “your computer is fried”. I said “almost”. Not what I wanted to hear and I was plenty mad at him for not breaking the news in a gentler fashion. A girl needs to be coddled sometimes, and this occasion rightly called for such treatment. Did he not understand the gravity of his words? Hundreds of pictures were gone if that were true. Sensing the murderous intentions of a female about to shoot the messenger, he removed himself from my presence.
Overcome by emotion and blinded by tears, I dialed 281-628-5099 to reach the business of Texas Computer Guru, owned by fellow columnist Aaron Barbee and his wife Sherri. Upon performing the CPU’s autopsy, they discovered the cause of death: dead motherboard. They handled my delicate mental state with the greatest of care. On top of that, they hooked up my hard drive to life support and retrieved the six years of photographic memories I feared were gone forever. There aren’t words to express my gratitude.
In addition to providing in-home or business computer, server, and network service, Aaron and Sherri are the proud new owners of The Cartridge World of Baytown. At Cartridge World, located at 5055 Garth Rd., the Barbees remanufacture laser ink cartridges. Used cartridges are given some new parts, cleaned, refilled with ink or toner for reuse, tested, and 100% guaranteed to perform. Drop by the store, or call them at 281-421-8987 if you’d like to utilize that service. It’s a great concept in that it keeps those reusable cartridges out of the landfills, and conserves the oil needed to make new ones.
Thank you, Aaron and Sherri, for easing my pain during a difficult time. I’ll heed your advice and pre-plan the funeral of my new computer by keeping things backed up.
© 2008 Natalie Whatley
Tags: cartridge world, computers, motherboard, texas computer guru
November 9th, 2008 at 7:47 am
Dang tootin! The Texas Computer Guru will “git er done”. He’s local and fast and a friend of mine.
Get an external USB hard drive and back that thing up (the computer that is).
BB
November 9th, 2008 at 10:18 am
This is great–both entertaining and informative! I love the new look and colors on the page. Very creative!
November 12th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
That was a great write-up on the death of your Mother-Board. You’re lucky though…usually it’s the hard drive that takes a dump and is much more difficult or sometimes impossible to retrieve the information from it. I do quite a bit of computer support and keep telling people to backup, but they don’t listen until it’s too late. Like Baytown Bert says, Backup to an external hard drive. I back mine up to a 250gig external. Now, if you don’t have that and you have a CD burner, you can format CD-RW’s and back up your files to CD. Beats the crap out of going to 3 1/2 in floppies which most computers don’t have now plus it would cost a fortune in disk by the time you completed the backup. Well, before I write a story I’ll get out of here…Great write up!