The last few weeks have been spent shuttling files round trip from my little Sony laptop to an external hard drive to my old Dell work laptop and back again. About a month ago the power cord on the Sony started to wiggle and it had to be contorted into various acrobatic positions to convince it to recharge the battery. The second power cord I kept for those rare occasions when the laptop migrated upstairs into the bedroom worked a bit longer but finally succumbed to the same malady. Turns out the little yellow power connector thing on the back of the laptop was loose. I did manage to get all the necessary files off before the battery took its last gasp.

Because of our poor record with electronic devices any more sophisticated than a meat thermometer (come to think of it, even that went haywire), I bought the in-house-service extended warranty on the Sony. I called their customer service center and, after no more than 20 minutes on hold, explained the problem to the call center representative who was probably somewhere in Azerbaijan. He blithely told me that they’d send out a new motherboard and contact the company that would provide the actual service who would contact me to schedule an in-home appointment. The thought that the little yellow power connector thing seemed a fair distance from where I presumed the motherboard to be flitted through my mind, but did not alight for long enough to make it to my mouth before the Azerbaijanian signed off.

They sent the motherboard and accompanying the technician, he was here for about 3 hours, 2.75 of which were spent on the phone to his company and Sony trying to convince them that it was the little yellow power connector that was broken and it was not located anywhere in, on, or near the motherboard, fatherboard, or funny-uncle-who-drinks-too-much-at-family-gatherings-board.

It took another few days, but they finally sent a replacement little yellow power connector thing and a replacement technician (I don’t know if it was the dogs or the 2.75 hours on the phone that scared him off, but the first one had a wild look in his eyes when he left, muttering something about never coming back). Fifteen minutes later there was no more wiggling of its yellow bits and the Sony was back in the pink. Until the next time something starts to shimmy or jiggle. I’ve ordered a language course in Azerbaijani, just in case.