Laptop woes

Last night, after writing a drabble for sunday100, the hinge that holds the screen on my laptop finally gave way. It's been deteriorating for a while, and after spewing a few sharp bits of dark grey, distressed plastic, it came apart.

Now of course, it didn't come apart in any way that's convenient to fix. No, the plastic which is pretty much essential to the hinge is gone. Granted, after it failed, I just ripped more of the plastic off, to see if I could get at some of the metal innards, but the screws that comprise the tightenable part of the hinges are apparently stripped, as well...

So the laptop looks like one of the following diagrams:

1. = when closed,
2. |_ when precariously balanced, or
3. __ when open. Gee.

I went to OfficeMax today to pick up some bookends to see if I can't just prop the screen up. If this fails, I'm hoping there's some way of completely removing the screen and propping that up on some platform. Otherwise, I might want a new LCD monitor or one of those fancy web-pad computers.

But that's only after I win first place at the poker tournament next month... :)

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to effjay. Aren't you in town?