Afraid of the vacuum. . .

Taking a post break from The India and Nepal Edition.

My work laptop is afraid of the vacuum.  Every morning at around 9:00, the cleaning lady vacuums the hallway outside my office.  At about 9:05 my laptop suddenly shuts off and won't reboot until the vacuum is put away.

When I told the IT guys that I had a suspicion my laptops power problems were connected to the vacuum, they tried not to laugh, said my computer probably had a virus, and rebuilt it.

After the rebuild, the power problems continued.  So, Sami stood in my office while the vacuuming was running. . . and it didn't shut off.  As soon as he walked out the door, it promptly died.

They thought it might be a problem with an electrical circuit.  They bought me a heavy duty surge protector.  And it died.

So, we decided that each day when the vacuum turned on, I would just unplug everything connected to my laptop, everything connected to a power source, and continue working.  Although this would be a bit of a hassle, it would save the cost of buying a new laptop.  Next day, I sit with my laptop completely unplugged as she begins to vacuum.  And it died.

Obviously, my poor computer has had some sort of traumatic experience with vacuum cleaners in the past.

Today I arrived at work to find a shiny new laptop with all my files and work transferred over to it.  And it's not afraid of the vacuum.

Although we had a good laugh about my vacuum-a-phobic computer, this is Afghanistan and situations like this are not that uncommon.  Like the light switch that stops working, or all of a sudden starts to turn on the light in another room, or the shower that randomly loses all water pressure (conveniently right when you're all lathered up).  Dangling wires, faulty electricity, no electricity, no internet. . . all things that we're quickly getting used to here.  For now, I'm just happy that I won't have to be obsessive about hitting control "s" whenever I hear a vacuum.