Saturday, May 09, 2009

The phrase "sleeping like a baby", of which I have spoken often, infuriates me.

It is maybe the cruelest phrase in the English language. Although the words evoke images of angelic newborns blissfully slumbering while dreaming of giggles and kisses, the reality is that the sleeping pattern of babies more closely resembles sadism than anything else. Generally speaking (yes, I know every baby is different like goddamn snowflakes), babies wake up many times during the night and they take these frequent opportunities to engage in their favorite hobby: screaming.

The next time you want to describe someone who is sleeping deeply and peacefully, I suggest using the phrase "sleeping like a drunkard" or "Pappy lived a rich and full life, but now he's dead."

My point here is that we just bought a new PC. Although years ago I swore I'd never buy another Windows box, we did just pull the trigger and buy another one of these bloated monstrosities. I'm now the owner of Vista box that barrages me with constant reminders about virus scanners and software updates. It's relentlessly annoying, but it runs some software that we need to run, and we already have a good Mac in the house.

On the list of defects this computer has, RIGHT OUT OF THE BOX, is that each time I'm done with it, and I put it into sleep mode, that lasts about 20 minutes and then the infernal machine just freaking wakes up. I come downstairs in the morning, and the monitor is blazing away with the computer eager to show me the latest security warning. My computer sleeps like a goddamn baby.

I have not yet tried jiggling it back to sleep, or giving it a white noise machine, but I think tonight somebody is getting a benadryl.

10 comments:

Sue said...

Macs rule.

meg said...

Much like I kept repeating when watching WarGames, UPLUG it! And isn't Windows coming out with a new and improved (sic) operating system?

Sorry - up to late waiting for Emily to come home from Senior Ball.

Ack.

Mike said...

Sue, they are great and I own more than one, but I needed a Windows box.

Meg, I surely could unplug it, but the point of putting it to sleep is to avoid the way-too-long bootup process. Who's got that kind of time?

Anonymous said...

I feel your pain, Mike.

Imagine using a Windows machine on the set of a hit TV show.

The Hero has a gun/knife/egg beater to the throat of an international terrorist. He flips open his phone, calling for help from his trusty Computer Gal. She hacks into the Top Secret Database of the government of Bananastan and is about to extract the Crucial Information. *ping* Turns out an upgrade is available for the Vista 1701-slash-zed Spyware Protection System.

Someone yells CUT and someone else is pretty sure he's about to get fired.

Hypothetically.

Mike said...

Bones, I can't believe they yelled "cut". That would have been a great scene as-is!

And I'll Raise You 5 said...

Try strapping it into a car seat and driving around town in the middle of the night. Always worked for us.

dkgoodman said...

Some computers are configured to wake up when the mouse moves. If your mouse is in a location subject to vibration, cats or frisky neighbors, you can try disabling that and see if it helps.

In the device manager, in the properties for the mouse, click the Power Management tab and unclick (if it's checked) the "Allow this device to wake the computer" checkbox.

Good luck. :)

(I arrived here via Smarter Stuff.)

Mike said...

Monica, that only works for getting the computer to sleep. How do you KEEP it asleep?

Hey Dave, I think I've actually identified the culprit. It's the stupid Viva Pinata game that my daughter plays (a Microsoft game, btw). If we leave the process running, the computer wakes back up. Weird.

carey said...

Sledgehammers work pretty well.

Mike said...

Carey, we'll call that Plan B.