Y is for Yuck

 It's been a long week.

And it's only Tuesday.

Yesterday morning, I was on it. I got up and worked through the short list of tasks I wanted to accomplish before class, checking off more than I'd expected. Then, as I was about to complete my final task, correcting an error on a document I needed to post, I reached for something.

And promptly spilled half a glass of iced tea onto my laptop.

I was pretty sure it was a goner before I even left for work. The screen was unresponsive and when I restarted the machine, the promising Apple icon was quickly replaced by a circle with a line through it.

It might as well have been a tombstone.

A trip to the Apple Store that evening confirmed my fears, and fanned the fire of the one upside of this whole fiasco.

A new MacBook. 

This was not in the plan, but it's definitely turned into a sorry/not sorry situation. I'm sorry I knocked the iced tea over, sorry I made a mess, sorry I fried my laptop (hard drives apparently don't appreciate being marinated in iced tea).

But I'm not sorry I have a new MacBook.

As someone who only recently traded in the car she drove for 17 years,  I'm not easily tempted when it comes to bells and whistles, especially those of the electronic variety. I am, in fact, the poster child for keeping things for as long as they keep running. I may find it hard to let go of sentimental stuff but, when it comes to the expensive stuff, I get my money's worth.

The upside to this is that when I do upgrade, I'm rarely disappointed. I am ridiculously excited by the fact that my new laptop has been unplugged for 12 hours and its battery is still 66% charged. I spent several minutes this morning enthralled by the crispness of the images on its screen. Perhaps I am easily amused, but I prefer to think of myself as appreciative.

Some days, we go about our business, checking items off our lists, mired in the mundane, and missing the little things that make life shimmer.

Other days, we upend a half-empty glass of liquid onto an expensive piece of equipment.

Amazingly enough, even that can sometimes be a glass half-full situation.