We left Indiana Dunes and had a lovely drive to Illinois Beach until I tried to shut down the computer. I usually put it in hibernate, shut the lid, pack it in the bag, and then plug it in once we have the electricity going in the Airstream.
So, I did my usual, but when I started to plug it in after unhitching, I noticed that something had gone wrong. The laptop was VERY hot and the LCD screen still showed "preparing to hibernate." I couldn't turn it off any other way, so I did a hard shut down and waited to reboot. When I rebooted, the LCD screen was totally wacky. I couldn't read anything on it.
I immediately called Sony since the computer is only four months old and hit another snag. They couldn't send out a repairman unless I could give them the ID number which was supposed to be on the bottom of the laptop, but which for some inexplicable reason was not on mine. The only way I could find out the number was to put it into BIO utilities which I could do, but couldn't read because of the messed up LCD screen. So we packed up everything, including the dog and drove into Chicago to Adam's house to see if we could hook it up to an external monitor and get the number. That did work, and then after contacting Sony again, we found we had to mail it to their laptop facility in San Diego. That put us without internet access in the trailer.
We did find that Zion had a nice library which was very friendly to visitors allowing them to use the computers for email etc.
Other than the computer glitch, we enjoyed our time at Illinois Beach again.
 Lake Michigan when it's angry |
 This is a LAKE? |
.Look at the two videoclips to really see the contrasts.
Jeff had his audiology appointment and CALLOO, CALLAY - he's going to get some hearing aids - that's the good news. The bad news is that they won't be ready until October 17th, so our leisurely trip back to Texas will be a fast one, and we'll be here in the midwest for a little bit longer.
