Instruction MANuals

"Plug and Play" is a phrase I like.  It implies minimal effort.  It positively oozes simplicity and this is something I like.  Simple, effortless stuff.  Like lying in bed reading on a Sunday morning.  No instructions required.

So this week, after three hours trawling through the reviews on Web-Cams on the Amazon website, I gave a sigh of relief when I finally found one that had 39 five stars and only 4 or 5 less.  The comments were pretty heartening too.  Everyone said they liked it, it did what it said it would and apart from a couple of eejits who didn't realise they had to take a lens cap off for it to 'see' anything, it was perfect.  (actually I'd also have been one of those eejits, had I not already read this... lens caps are tricksy little buggers, aren't they? )

And the price was right.  anything over £15 to me is expensive - even for clothes.  No, seriously.  I get sweats (more of those in another post) and I have to endure a full-blown argument with myself over the merits and drawbacks of such a purchase until I either end up getting it and never using/wearing it because I didn't quite justify the decision properly in my head, or else taking it back because I didn't feel I 'deserved it' in the first place.  Acts of rashness, for me, are few and far between. I'm surprised I'm not a Catholic.

So, the Web Cam.  I almost floated when I got it, because it also arrived in the same box as 'Tell Me Lies', the Jennifer Crusie book I decided I deserved (as it was 0.01p probably, I can't remember, but I like those prices and I don't mind giving the Post Office/Amazon packers £2.75 for 'handling' it for me.  A delivered book is worth it's weight in stamps as far as I'm concerned.  In fact if I were on a desert island, my one item of luxury would be a letterbox.  Or loo rolls;  I'm undecided).

And it reminded me of that cutesy little film trailer before the first Toy Story Movie, you know the one the dancing Pixar lamp?  So it was love at first sight.  And I assumed Plug and Play would also be much the same.
Not so.
Three hours later and after sticking it's (two - one for image, one for audio) leads into every available orifice visible on my pc tower, I grudgingly gave up and The Girl and I spent most of this time miming, laughing noiselessly, typing (vintage Skyping, no doubt) and lip-reading after I'd worked out that all I was going to get was vision.
Until the Hubs came back from a job and found me pulling out hair and slumped in heap of snarlingness over the keyboard yesterday morning, after another two hours of  Plug and (no)Play.  20 minutes later, he'd worked it out.  Because he'd followed online instructions.
Pardon me?
So I've now amended the useless little piece of paper that merely says 'plug and play' to something similar to those washing machine instructions in that picture up there.
And he's already reminded me how clever he was.
He's going to be insufferable this week.
But then I did *wish* for a man who was good with his hands AND his head.

More of this soon, promise, Michele!