Tea Blog

Your fave “Tea Princess” had a teensy weensy bit of a breakdown recently. No, I didn’t succumb to the screaming meemies, but I did struggle valiantly for over a week with a temperamental computer that finally died. Even expert assistance could not revive it. Sigh!

Somehow I made it through this trying and traumatic time, thanks to tea.

The whole breakdown started slowly, with the computer being balky and not wanting to boot up fully on the first try…or even the second…and then the third. After awhile, it would freeze up in the middle of a sentence. I’d type “The tea had a flavor that was…” and could go no further. The thought would have to be completed in my head and then written on a little piece of paper. Sometimes I would be looking things up online or trying to send out a tweet or post an item on Facebook about tea when this icy behavior would kick in.

Not the sort of thing that makes the day of a Tea Princess a very pleasant one. The solution: walk away and have some tea.

There is nothing — absolutely, positively nothing! — that isn’t more bearable when faced after steeping and savoring a pot of tea. From finding out that what you thought was wallpaper paste was wallpaper remover to getting a call from the podiatrist saying that you need to come in RIGHT NOW to get that thing on your toe attended to. (Don’t worry, my toes are fine; I’m just making a point here about the mellowing qualities of tea.)

I moseyed back upstairs to my office and checked on the progress of my “breakdown.” My cup ofAssamwith just the right splash of milk and the perfect touch of sweetener — actually, the second cupful — was in hand, and I sipped as I ascended to deal with whatever awaited.

To make a long story short, I switched to using a laptop running Windows XP and with a 35 GB hard drive. Email loaded at a snail’s pace. Going online was a virtual nightmare. The … page … lo…ad…ed … so … s…l…o…w…l…y…zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz — oh, sorry, must have dozed off there. And my teacup is empty. Maybe if I get a refill, the page will be loaded up when I get back.

The malfunctioning computer was at the local repair shop (no way would I take it to those folks at the big box store), and the technician was valiantly administering the equivalent of CPR to it. Finally, the dreaded call came: “It’s dead!” Okay, time to find a replacement. But first, I stopped by the repair shop to retrieve data off of the hard drive. While there, the technician recommended something that was reasonably priced, not loaded up with a lot of software I didn’t need, and could run the software I needed. Off I went to the big box store to buy one. Back to the repair shop to get it set up and the data transferred. Then, home and a cup of tea. Phew!

Two days and countless pots of tea later, all was up and running and back to what I needed. First things first here: finish that sentence I started typing. “The tea had a flavor that was reminiscent of rays of sunshine gracing my head after a cold breeze had chilled it.”

Yes, the Tea Princess was back in business after her technological breakdown!

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