Thanks, Granddad.

Hooray for the way things work out sometimes.

As a writer (among other things), having a printer that actually works is vital. I don't really have an office at home; I have a laptop, a coffee table, and an end table on which rested the recently defunct P.O.S. printer that was old, dirty, and finally, dead. This thing wasn't a top of the liner to begin with, but most of the time it still worked. Up until about a month ago.

I forget what I was trying to print out, likely a copy of my résumé in the continuing search for new employment. Instead of a list of my accomplishments, I get random spewy data that I can make neither heads nor tails of. Long live the printer, the printer is dead.

This was on the advent (bwa ha ha) of the Christmas season, and so I reluctantly asked my Dad if he could start looking around for cheap printers. I was planning to do the same. Not two weeks later, my Granddad's own scanner went kaput. His son, my uncle, convinced him to get a new printer/scanner that was one in both. Which left him with a relatively new (less than two years old) printer to dispose of.

Well. I picked it up from my Granddad last week, and despite a few hitches (making a second trip for the power cable, downloading needed software), it works like a charm. I printed out a copy of the different colored versions of the test page for Tuxxer, and the printer (an HP Deskjet 5550, discontinued line) handled the colors like a dream.

Granddad even threw in extra ink cartridges.

I know I like to complain. There are some good examples of my complaining prowess on this page, further down the line. But I ain't complainin'. Right now, I'm just thankful.

Thanks, Granddad. I owe you one.