The Man Who Gave Our Computer Cancer

My family has never been great with computers. It’s not that we don’t like new technology; we were the first ones on the block with Prodigy (or so I assume- God knows we don't talk to our neighbors), but we still refer to our computer as "the box." About eight years ago, we asked an acquaintance of my parents to come work on our box. The goal was for him to install new programs, clean out viruses, organize the computer cords, etc. I think he came once a week for about two years, and he was paid by the hour. Was he successful? Let me put it this way- we will never again call him by his name. We call him the man who gave our computer cancer.





As you can see by the photo of the box's underpinnings, the man who gave our computer cancer utterly failed in his attempt to organize the cords. Did he misunderstand the request? My mom was trying to plug the cord from her new catamaran-shaped fax machine into Medusa last weekend, and we could not 1) find an open outlet and 2) find the cord to the old fax machine.



Even more confusing, the man who gave our computer cancer left his designated area and ventured upstairs to my room. He installed what I like to call the snake hole. I believe he thought that he was making room for cords to come through the wall, when in reality he was just making it very easy for a corn snake to sneak into my room while I slept (don’t pretend like you haven’t seen that episode of Home Improvement.)

Aside from Medusa and the snake hole, the man who gave our computer cancer also downloaded enough viruses to shut down all activity on the box. High-speed Internet became irrelevant; you can’t do anything when opening up a new window causes the whole system to freeze and shut down.

In reality, the man who gave our computer cancer was a genius. Each week, he would cause a new problem that he would return to fix the next week. He made $35 per hour, he got away from his family for hours at a time, and sometimes, we even gave him a glass of water. For free.