First, the graphics, which had printed so wonderfully on pervious occasions, began to "fuzzify." I played with them for an hour, changing every available parameter with no success. I finally put them back to their original state - and they printed beautifully. Go figure. I finished typing the copy (which, thankfully, had been provided to me in advance, eliminating the need for me to come up with it on my own) and sent the first batch to the networked color printer.

Nothing happened.

After waiting what I felt was an appropriate length of time, I cancelled the print and tried again. Still nothing, and Tech Girl was stumped as to how to help me. I decided to throw in the towel and print them from my personal printer, and my print heads promptly gave up the ghost. Meanwhile, Tech Girl changed a few settings for network printing. Success!

Yeah, right. No sooner had I begun to print than the printer began to take issue with my paper, yanking through three pages at a time and refusing to do anything legibly. After fighting for twenty minutes, I went to Boss-Lady and made a suggestion: "I think we should go to Kinko's, hand them a disk, and say, 'Please.'" She agreed.

So, after finding the files too large for a floppy; installing a Zip Drive; gathering the files, the paper, and the few prints I had managed to successfully make; and traveling across town to the copy shop, I found myself being informed that my paper was unacceptable for their printers. Moreover, even if they were to use their own paper for the job, I would be charged almost two dollars per page for the privilege. I called Boss-Lady; she said no. Back to the library with me.

There was one other color printer in the building. We illegally installed the needed software to open the files on that computer (hey, it wasn't me who made that decision), and I began to print. Halfway through the job, the printer ran out of paper; when I tried to add more, it went nuts, printing:

&f&f&f&f@@@&f&f@@@
    fffff
       fffff
&&&&&

on every page as fast as it could. I cycled power; it kept going. Finally, I shrieked, "Stop!" Tech Girl came running and took over as I struggled mightily to keep from bursting into torrents of hormonal tears. Finally she got it working again, and I sat down to babysit to the end. I worked overtime for an hour, simply because I wanted so badly for the task to be done; I did not want to come in the next day and work on it again.

And so I came in the next morning, refreshed and rejuvenated after being pampered by a sympathetic husband, to find the finished package sitting on my desk. Atop it was a note:

Sob...

• None of the calls I made about houses were successful,
• I have to work on Saturday, since we're having a Preschool Fair - for this, I do not get Friday off, as is usually the custom;
• I still haven't decided on a digital camera, and Eric keeps making noises about using the money for a couch instead, and
• The midwives yelled at me for not eating enough protein.

Not enough protein? Are they kidding? I live in America, the land of beef! We eat more protein than any other culture on the planet! How is it possible that I could not be getting enough protein - me, the Queen of Carnivores?

Okay, so red meat hasn't been my number one craving since becoming pregnant. It's also true that since I've been trying to watch my diet, I've been focusing on upping my vegetable intake, and perhaps I've been overcompensating for my usual desire to eat cows. I'd actually been pretty proud of my diet; being told that I apparently need more hamburgers gave me a bit of a start. I've been eating cheese; shouldn't that be enough?

And to think that I've been deliberately ordering green peppers instead of pepperoni on my pizza...

Eric's thoughts on the matter: "Now, we're not going to rent the first place we see." Of course, I'm fully aware that impulse renting is a bad strategy, but he's really got my number here; I hate comparison shopping. I'm a much happier camper once decisions have been made and I'm out of the market. Hearing him tell me that this place will be effectually excluded from our choices irritated me a little, to say the least.

But he's right. He's probably going to be the only thing that will keep us from raising this baby in a rundown roach motel. I appreciate him, yet I'm nonetheless rankled. I'll try to take some pictures tonight.