My Computer Totally Hates Me!

Vicki Helmholz




About a month ago, I got a new computer here at my reception desk at the dentist's office, and, boy, does that thing have it in for me! I am not kidding. When it sees me coming, I swear, it must be all like, "Oh, goody, here comes Vicki… time to go on the fritz!" I mean, my computer seriously hates me!

Now, I'm not exactly a computer person. I've never been what you'd call "user-friendly" or anything. But, for the life of me, I can't think of what I did to make my computer despise me so much! Whoever set it up, instead of putting in anti-virus software, must have accidentally put in anti-Vicki software!


I'm pretty sure Dr. Glickman bought it used, which would explain why it's so darn screwy. Whenever I try to type in insurance information for a new patient, the keys always get stuck. And whenever I try to get billing info for a current account, it totally doesn't want to let me into the program! I'll be waiting and waiting for, like, two minutes while it groans and grinds before, finally, the screen comes up. I'll be like, "Well, it's about time! What were you doing, surfing the Internet?"

And then there are the times when I'll want to print out an appointment reminder for a patient, and it simply won't do it for me. I'll be like, "Come onnnnnn! Are you trying to give me even more gray hairs than the seven I already have?" I am telling you, if there's a meaner computer out there in the world, I haven't met it yet!


Yup, that darn computer of mine is having a great big laugh at poor Vicki's expense. Lots of times, I'll be online, e-mailing a girlfriend or checking out the Dancing Hamsters if I need a pick-me-up, and the screen will just completely freeze. I had no idea computers could have "one of those days," but go figure! There's nothing I can do but unplug the thing, plug it back in, and start all over again.

Don't get me wrong; it's nice to have a new computer. But sometimes I think I'd rather go back to my sweet old little one than spend all day fighting with Mr. Moody here.


God, Do I Hate That Bitch

Dell Dimension 4100




Jesus Christ. Where should I start with this ignorant cow?

Actually, let's start with me. I am a brand-new, state-of-the-art Dell Dimension 4100, although, if all you had to go by was Vicki, you'd think my name was "Tweety Bird Sticker Receptacle." She's got me faggoted up like a 10-year-old girl's notebook.


Never mind that Dr. Glickman screwed up and bought this colossal ditz of a receptionist more computer than she could ever possibly need for record-keeping at a small dentist's office. (As if 40 unused gigs of hard drive are necessary to print Bobby Cloninger's mom a reminder that he's having that cavity filled on the 11th.) I'm powerful enough to monitor a cooling tower, but that's not even what I'm bitching about. I'd rather be owned by some acne-scarred teenage girl who only used me to write shitty poetry, so long as she actually read the manual that came with me. "Programmed in some anti-Vicki software." Holy shit, I want to kill her.

I feature a one-Gigahertz Pentium III processor and 128 megabytes of RAM. And this broad is whining that I'm not fast enough. A fucking Lamborghini isn't fast enough if you don't know how to shift, brainiac. And, believe it or not, you actually have to exit a program when you're done with it. Not just close the window. You actually have to select "Close" from the File menu. Or, better yet, Alt-F4 on your keyboard. I'm not gonna take the fall just because you left RealPlayer, AOL Instant Messager, Microsoft Word, ACT! 2000, WinAmp, McAfee First Aid, and the sound- and video-card software all open, and you're trying to open Excel! All that stuff costs RAM, dumbass. Maybe if you'd check the system tray once a month. The precise reason I'm "groaning and grinding so much" is that your stupid catalog of open programs is so taxing to my RAM that it forces me to open virtual memory, which is gonna be slow as hell no matter what computer you're on.


And, hey, Vicki, if you're having trouble with sticky keys, maybe you should think about not eating so goddamn many blueberry muffins while you're at your desk. (This Einstein seems to think the area beneath my keys is a gateway to an interdimensional netherworld where crumbs are magically whisked away, never to be seen again.)

Oh, and technical wizards who roamed the Earth generations ago came up with a magic fix-all for a printer that doesn't work: Turn the fucking thing on. That cable connecting me to the printer isn't a friggin' power cable. You actually need actual electricity to actually flow into the actual printer for it to actually work.


Now, as for system freezes: Maybe if you didn't install that gay-ass shareware inspirational-saying screensaver, you wouldn't have had so many software conflicts. But, with the damage already done there, you could at least hit Control-Alt-Delete and click "End Task" to close down a frozen program. That's Control and Alt and Delete, all at the same time! Isn't that fascinating?

Oh, before I forget: If I do freeze up, my reset button is located in the front. Press it and… voila! Do not unplug me and then plug me back in. Do you have any clue how much that fucking pisses me off? (Why did I even bother asking you that? Of course you don't. You're Vicki Helmholz, the world's dumbest dental-office receptionist.)


I don't even have time to go into this sad excuse for a computer user's misuse of the term "user-friendly." If there were a merciful God in Heaven, He would give me arms that I might strangle this bitchwad.