Incompatabilitygook

Imagine a world where you come home from work and last night's dishes have been unloaded from the dishwasher.

Imagine a world where people change the toilet roll.

Imagine a world where you can plug a new printer into a computer and it just works.

I feel a song coming on.  I thnk my lyrics would rival John Lennon's.

Anyway, re the new printer....this is how it goes: you do a bit of research about printers; you read something, you talk to some people and then you ignore all of that and buy the cheapest one available on-line, very late at night, when the red wine box suggests that it's a great idea.  Huge box of printer arrives 5 days later.  You put it in the kitchen and fall over it for 10 days, waiting for the signs to be auspicious.  You order some ink, which costs more than the printer.  Ordering ink makes you feel like a grown up.  Over a period of time you edge the box closer to the table.  One day you clear all of the rubbish off the table and lift the box onto it.  You don't open the box yet, because venus has to be in a particular alignment for the signs to be auspicious.  You buy a chicken, complete with giblets, and examine its entrails.  Then - joy!  The stars and the chicken guts and your personal biorhythms come together and it's time to open the box.  This involves wrestling polystyrene and you break into a sweat.

In the box is a huge black machine, a disc and a leaflet.  The leaflet has no words, just alarming diagrams and pictures of the machine.  You are in a Fahrenheit 451 world - life with no written words.  The pictures don't look like your machine.  You turn it round and now it does, sort of.  You unpack ink cartridges, leads, plugs.  This needs scissors and a kitchen knife and generates a huge amount of waste.  You cut your finger on sharp plastic and bleed on everything.  You get the first aid box (under the dog food) and attempt to find the right size plaster.  Blood drips into the sink.

You make a cup of tea and add a spoon of sugar, for stamina.  You tell yourself to think positive.  All over the world ordinary people are connecting new printers to their pcs, and they don't all have IT degrees.  Just because every single printer you've ever had has made you weep.....doesn't mean this one will. 

You put Madonna on and have a motivational dance around the kitchen.  Madonna wouldn't be beaten by a printer.

In a rush of enthusiasm you plug all of the bits into the various holes, press all of the buttons (one must be 'start') jam in the ink cartridges and put the disc in the drive.  Things whirr and click.  You click on 'yes' and 'continue' and 'allow' and 'next'.  You start to think that it might, just might, possibly be OK.

Then it happens....there's a clunk and a message pops up telling you that internet explorer is incompatible with the new printer.  You feel that internet explorer has decided this way too quickly.  It has only just been introduced and it's already decided that there's no future in the relationship.  You tell internet explorer to be nice.
"How much did you pay for this printer?" he asks.
"That's not relevant," you answer.
"I can just check," says internet explorer.  "I can do that.  I have your histoy here."
"£19.50," you mutter.
There is an awkward silence.
"There must be a fix," you say.  "Please find one."
Internet explorer gives  a huge sigh, but finds you some help screen.  This is like Relate for IT.  It can fix the impaired relationship between internet explorer and the new printer.  There's a price.  You have to agree to all kinds of stuff before the fix can be downloaded.  "Will you give your firstborn child to the witch next door?"  You click on 'allow'.  "Will you sign over all of your possessions, house, car, pension and future earnings to the software company just so you can get your cheap printer to work?"  You click on 'whatever...just get on with it.'  (They really should have a box which says that!)

Then suddenly printer is talking to internet explorer.

But you're not home yet.  There's a new message on screen:
"The pc cannot detect the printer" it says.  You give the pc a slap.  You unplug all of the stupid wires and then connect them again.  "Nice try," you are told.  "but the pc still cannot detect the printer". 
"Look," you shout, swivelling the laptop so its screen is pointing at the printer.  "It's right next to you.  It's that huge black thing."
"How much did you pay for that?"  the pc sneers.
"Don't you start," you say.  "You were thrown in with a phone contract.  You don't have any right to get snooty."

You switch everything off and on again and then the pc tells you that it CAN detect the printer.  You stick some paper in and something prints! 

It' only taken an hour and twenty minutes.  That's a record.  You clear up all of the packaging and wipe the blood away.
You didn't weep.  You only lost a little blood.  You are superwoman.  You can do anything.  And next .....retiling the bathroom!

She even fits on the shelves!