Wireless Wizard

It's only taken me a little over a week. But, I've finally done it! I have finally connected my... rather I should say - Rod's - Kindle, to the wireless.

The Kindle was a birthday gift that I purchased and gave to him well before his birthday, which is on the 16th of this month, because in all our 24 years together, I've never seen him soooo excited about any material item.

I bought it from the Kindle store online and it came the very next day (no need for express delivery).

I left the package, with a bright orange sticky note attached saying, "Whatever can this be?" on the steps leading upstairs so that he would see it as soon as he got in the front door that night. The excitement in the air was as thick as a 3year old's Christmas morning. "Thanks for my birthday present!" he said as he squeezed me tight and then the totally thrilled birthday boy bounded up the stairs to play with his new toy.

I got him exactly what he wished for; my gift-giving experience was truly joyful and I shouted back with a huge smile of utter satisfaction spread from ear to ear "you're welcome!"

A few hours later I went upstairs expecting to find him caught up in Kindle magic. Instead I found a grumpy guy aimlessly surfing the net; his new toy unceremoniously dumped into its delivery box.

He couldn't get it to connect to the wireless.

The letdown was as drastic as a 3 year-old finding his Christmas toy doesn't come with batteries and all the stores are closed.

"I'm not going to spend hours trying to set this thing up. It's not worth it. Send it back. And, if you don't I will. I don't have time for this s**t." He threw up his hands and glared at the tiny perfect object with disgust.

Through gritted teeth I replied in calm, measured tones, all the while counting to 10, "It's your birthday gift from me. I'm not sending it back. We'll get it to work, other people do. I'll handle it." As I stomped out of the room, I added, "Happy Birthday!"

We didn't talk much that night.

And, for the next few days he greeted me with, "Got that Kindle running, yet? How's it going? (referring to the Kindle)" all accompanied by a knowing smirk, so sure was he that I wouldn't succeed. He passed newly discovered numbers, letters and codes to routers, computers and modems scrawled on colourful sticky notes down to me as I worked in my office at the bottom of the stairs. He was attempting to speed the process along yet he was enjoying the fact that numerous hours of my life (not his) were being invested in this project.

"Nuts to this, from now on you're not getting any birthday gifts until your actual birthday." I took the Kindle out of his den and hid it so that it wouldn't tease him and he wouldn't taunt me any further.

It worked. He hasn't uttered a word about it since and it my work progressed without further input.

And after all my dead end searches, last Friday it took less than 5 minutes to get it connected after a phone consultation with an I T guy; referred to by a friend.

I begged him to just come over and help me set it up; better yet, set it up and let me watch, ask questions and make notes. But to my dismay he would have none of it. I couldn't get him to leave his office. However, acting like a translator of sorts he was able to "dumb down" his techno speak, tell me which questions needed to be answered in a stepwise manner, and ran me through the steps to reconfiguring ones' router and network.

What a difference it makes when you speak the language!

I left a message on his answering machine later that afternoon squealing with delight, "Oh my God I got it to work. I can't believe it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you." I may not be "King of the World" but I am a Wireless Wizard. Yessss!