the laptop wars
a while back cam decided to buy a laptop for me. he did some research and determined that dell offered the best deals, so he built one to his specs (inspiron 8600, i think?) and presented it to me within a few days. it needed a carrying case, so i started the hunt and was astonished to discover that decently attractive laptop bags for laptops that size were kind of hard to come by. i wasn't looking for girly, i just didn't one that screamed "freebie" or worse, "best buy special." besides, i couldn't exactly do girly because i imagined that cam would be carrying it from time to time. i managed to locate a nice unisex one (by stm) and it's great, but the whole thing was really kind of a pain in the ass.
anyway, time passed and i realized that the laptop had never actually been mine at any time except in name. as soon as it showed up, cam monopolized it under the guise of "setting it up" (because i'm either too dumb or too lazy or because i live with a former IT guy, you choose). then he started using it for his work. whenever i'd want to use it, i'd feel uncomfortable because it was so clearly his. when i commented on this, he was immediately defensive. "no, it's yours! use it!" he'd insist, secretly writing his name with puffy paint beneath the snap-on green cover.
recently he admitted that he had stolen it from me, but only because i mentioned something about wanting to buy a laptop to my specs. i don't have the computer needs that cam does, so why did i need a laptop that did everything but cook dinner (virtually, of course)? so we pored over the dell catalog and cam said he'd look into deals, etc. for the ideal laptop for me -- infinitely simpler than the one we now have. remembering how hard it had been to find a carrying case, cam thought he had come up with a brilliant (and unintentionally insulting) solution:
cam: why don't we do this backwards?
me: huh?
cam: find a bag you like and then see what size it'll hold.
me: oh... thanks.
cam: what?
me: i'm just that shallow, huh? that's like saying, "hey, find a pair of shoes you like and we'll cut off parts of your foot to make it fit."
cam: no, no, i didn't mean it like that!
so... one of these days i will have a very stripped down laptop. i don't need much, really. and then cam will have his and i will have mine and then paul will clamor for one of his own -- and then we'll just be one big happy and dorky-looking family. i think i need to convince cam to wear his glasses more often.