I'm a pretty easy going fellow. If you asked my friends they'd probably tell you that I'm not particularly quick to anger and that I prefer compromise to conflict. In fact, a few of my friends might tell you that one of the rare occasions on which they saw me actually walking around angry was when I had a problem with my PC.

PC problems are one of those exceptions to my general "It doesn't do much good to sit and steam about it" rule.

It was several years ago, and my PC just decided it was going to be retarded and not run Explorer when it logged into Windows (which basically means you could do nothing, since Explorer pretty much IS the interface to Windows). I don't know what precipitated this decisions--perhaps spite for not spending enough time with it, or jealousy over me looking at newer models online, or just teenage rebellion. Regardless, I spent several nights in a row trying anything and everything to get it working again. When I came into work the next day, the frustration was evident on my face. I try very hard not to be short with people, but I remember that day (that couple of days) I had no patience for anyone or anything. All because of a stupid problem with a piece of technology.

I eventually got it fixed (Windows Repair Disk FTW) and never did figure out why it crapped out (my suspicion was either an install gone terribly wrong, or a hard drive issue). But in retrospect it's funny how the problem destroyed my mood. It's not surprising--I was practically born with a keyboard in my hands. I've been working on computers since I was a kid, and learned to program at an early age (10 PRINT "BASIC is cool!" 20 GOTO 10). Today if I could have the Internet shunted into my brain, I probably would. So needless to say a PC problem makes for a very unhappy Kato.

Silly to let it get to me? Probably. But at least I stopped short of turning green and ripping my shirt.


The preceding was part of the first annual WITFITS Suggest A Topic Week, where the readers suggested a topic for me to write about. See here for details.