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[Akura]

Ugh, stupid IT people messing around with software for no reason. It was a problem with the laptop hinge, you have absolutely no reason to go rooting through my files, replace my antivirus and upgrade to windows 8.

That was ridiculous. I have to upgrade to windows 10 anyway, but it still pisses me off that he did all this without asking.

Did they happen to charge you for the "extra" services? I've had a similar experience. I once took my flute in for a minor repair, they took way too long with it, and did things like replace the pads under the keys. AND charged us extra for it.

[Bouchart]

I have this handheld radio that runs off an AAA battery.  The battery died this morning.  But when I turned on the radio on my way home from work it turned on, and was on for over an hour and hasn't stopped yet.

It might be one with a hand crank?

No hand crank.  Slightly different model than this one, but it's the right idea.

[Sergarr]

Finally made my little AI program (which moves a unit in order to reach a certain point on the map) to work... well, sorta. It seems to exhibit some really weird behaviour, oscillating all over the place, occasionally stopping at some of them for no apparent reason, and moving on some trajectories way different what I thought it would be doing.

gonna have some fun times trying to fix that

[Rolan7]

I have this handheld radio that runs off an AAA battery.  The battery died this morning.  But when I turned on the radio on my way home from work it turned on, and was on for over an hour and hasn't stopped yet.

Also, eating three granola bars for breakfast wasn't a bright idea.

I think those kinds of batteries recover a little when not in use.  Not generating new power, obviously, but settling such that more is available.  Refrigeration might possibly help, or maybe that's just for long-term storage.

[nogoodnames]

Ugh, stupid IT people messing around with software for no reason. It was a problem with the laptop hinge, you have absolutely no reason to go rooting through my files, replace my antivirus and upgrade to windows 8.

That was ridiculous. I have to upgrade to windows 10 anyway, but it still pisses me off that he did all this without asking.

Did they happen to charge you for the "extra" services? I've had a similar experience. I once took my flute in for a minor repair, they took way too long with it, and did things like replace the pads under the keys. AND charged us extra for it.

No, he at least didn't try to charge for his "upgrades", probably because a lot of them were put in because of him fucking up the hard drive.
It turns out that ALL of my installed programs have been erased. He recovered my other files, but anything that was in the Program Files directories is completely gone.

Needless to say, I won't be giving him any repeat business.

[Sirus]

Shit. I would be demanding my money back in a case like that.

[TheBiggerFish]

I would be demanding my money back in a case like that.

[nogoodnames]

Yeah, that would probably be justified. I just don't feel like it'd be worth the effort. It wasn't all that expensive. I didn't lose anything irreplaceable, it'll just take a while to get things set up again.

[Sirus]

It's the principle of the thing. This person needs to know that they screwed up big-time, and the best way to make your displeasure known is to ensure that they don't make any profit off of you. Otherwise they might do the same thing again to other people.

But I guess it's all up to you, so vOv

[Frumple]

... I'm mostly wondering how the hell they borked things up that badly when all that needed to be done was fix a hinge. That... it doesn't take much technical capability to take apart a laptop and replace the screen hinges, so long as you've got the parts for it. I mean, I guess you could accidentally the hard drive or something in the process, but, uh. It's... not that difficult. You shouldn't be messing up any of the internals during that...

[Neonivek]

I just kind of realized something about fiction...

I am not against easy solutions so long as there is no pretense.

Take the situation of a puddle

"Ohhh no, a puddle! Why always me!?! How will we ever get past this insurmountable obstacle!" *Ten minutes later* "Of course walking over it!"
Vs
"Oh a puddle, whelp I'll just walk over it"

In fact... characters immediately coming up with obvious solutions and doing them is kind of refreshing. Though I guess if I were a fiction writer I'd make the characters try the obvious solutions and have them not work.

[Reelya]

Well, stories about the exceptional are generally more entertaining than the mundane.

For example, sometimes you might get tired of the hero always being the "special" one who has all the luck and gets past all the deathtraps, when 9999 others died before them. So you might think, "why do we always hear the story of the guy who was blessed by the plot and got lucky, where are the other 9999 guys stories?". But then you remember that people generally want to hear the story about the one guy who got lucky, not the other 9999 who fell to their deaths. This is just as true in real life as it is in fiction.

[Neonivek]

Well both my examples had the same solution. Except one didn't beat around the bush emphasizing how impossible the problem was only for the character to get to the solution after much mulling over the problem.

Well, stories about the exceptional are generally more entertaining than the mundane.

For example, sometimes you might get tired of the hero always being the "special" one who has all the luck and gets past all the deathtraps, when 9999 others died before them. So you might think, "why do we always hear the story of the guy who was blessed by the plot and got lucky, where are the other 9999 guys stories?". But then you remember that people generally want to hear the story about the one guy who got lucky, not the other 9999 who fell to their deaths. This is just as true in real life as it is in fiction.

It has a lot to do with why tell the story about someone who just tried and failed unless there is some sort of purpose to it.

[Frumple]

... there's some damn good writing to be found in those 9999, though. It can be pretty nice when a decent author gives slices of the proverbial fallen as part of the general narrative.

Kinda' want to say... System Shock? 2, at least. Did something along those lines bloody well. Just as an example.

Beyond that, there's plenty solid writing in the stories of those who failed, even if all the purpose behind it is to get you into the head of someone on the (short) path to ruin. It just tends to be fairly depressing :V

As for the easy solution not working, you just have to pace it. The puddle can only be a waiting aqueous templated trapdoor spider so many times, heh.

[Neonivek]

... there's some damn good writing to be found in those 9999, though. It can be pretty nice when a decent author gives slices of the proverbial fallen as part of the general narrative.

As for the easy solution not working, you just have to pace it. The puddle can only be a waiting aqueous templated trapdoor spider so many times, heh.

(edited down quote for only the parts I am responding to )

I don't mean there is nothing to tell in a failure story. It does need more set up.

As a obstacle is in it of itself justifies the happy ending of defeating it (if sufficiently dangerous). While failing against it isn't justified on its own unless the obstacle has some sort of greater metaphorical purpose.