Thursday, February 15, 2007

Back in Action


I am in Cairo listening to Christmas carols. This is great news because it means I am in Beano's, working on the wi-fi while eating my lunch.

(Yes, Beano's plays a Christmas CD over and over. And Dido's Al Dente—the cheap pasta restaurant near my apartment—only plays Elvis' Greatest Hits. But I have yet to hear Elvis' Christmas Album anywhere.)

Hooray for Appleline! That's the Apple-certified reseller here in Egypt and I wholeheartedly recommend them. Heck, fly here next time you need a repair. Pyramids and laptop packages available, or should be. They have one satisfied customer in me. They took the bezel, rear cover, and clutch cover off an old broken laptop that was lying around and installed it on my older broken laptop for about $90 including labor, taxes, and parts.

It was a disconcerting 48 hours on my own. I had backed everything up onto my Firewire hard drive but had no way to get to it. I had lots of things on my USB thumbdrive, but of course nothing that I needed. I have gone plenty of times without internet access but had no idea how much I'd come to depend on my laptop. I use it for work, for freelance, communications, reference... heck it's essential. On my trip around the world, I used pen and paper but now I just stared at the blank page and thought about how much easier and faster I can type than write.

1 comment:

Marie Javins said...

All right, a VERY reputable source just told me what I would have spent in the States.

$40 on parts and $225 on labor.

Boy howdy. Lucky me to have that break in Egypt!

Course, I'd have done it myself in the States.

And that probably means it would have cost me $1300. Because while I'm good with spudgers and Torx-8 screwdrivers (and nerve), it's a very difficult task and there's a good chance I'd have blown it.

And I'd be gazing with admiration at my new MacBook right now. But that's $1200 more than I need to spend right now.