What Happens When You Drop a Laptop?

May you never know what happens when you drop a laptop.

Most people would not, in the ordinary course of things, drop a laptop. I mean, I can see dropping a cellphone, like into the toilet, for example, but not a computer. I suppose if you were running with a laptop you could poke your eye out. Similar to running with a scissors. And just for the record, I once jumped off a bar with a pair of scissors in my hands after cutting out paper decorations for my 7th birthday party and stabbed myself in the chest, a scar that remains today.

Yet I never thought I would drop a laptop until yesterday. Perhaps slide off the ottoman is a better description. Onto a ceramic floor, about 20 inches away. What did I learn from this experience? For starters, balancing a laptop on a small slippery pillow is not necessarily a good idea. Even though I paid an extra $1,500 to buy a Mac Pro with a solid state hard drive, which is not supposed to get hot in your lap, my laptop still heats up; hence the pillow.

Plus, this laptop and WordPress do not work well together without a mouse to scroll categories. Yes, I figured out how to fix my touchpad in Boot Camp with each new update, but the touchpad doesn’t always work for WordPress on the Apple side, and shopping online? You can develop carpel tunnel fairly easily if your eyes don’t dry up first. Which means when I work on my laptop, I also plug a mouse into it because bluetooth doesn’t always work for a wireless on this.

The position is important. I don’t know what happens if you manage to drop a laptop with the screen closed, but mine was open. Screen at a 45-degree angle to the keyboard. I had reclined in an oversized chair at our house in Hawaii, feet up, typing away when my cell rang. I always get up to pace when talking on the phone because it helps me to focus, and I’m not tempted to answer emails. This is my wor-cation in Hawaii, and I’m still selling Sacramento real estate a good part of each day.

When I got up, my foot caught a cord and BAM. I spun around to witness the horror; I had managed to drop a laptop. It landed like a tent. All I can say it’s a good thing I was not talking to a client and instead was speaking to Barbara Dow, my team member, and she’s not easily offended. F-me, F-me, F-me. And a few other choice words.

Then my laptop started to scream bloody murder. It sounded like the drop-and-cover drill alarms from grade school. Loud, short blasts. The sound filled my living room. I frantically tried to shut it down but none of the keys responded. Poor Barbara is asking what’s wrong, probably imagining the worst. I can’t talk to her. All I can do is stare at my laptop hollering at me. Bad Sacramento Realtor, bad Sacramento Realtor.

You know, just in case you’re so preoccupied doing something else that you did not notice you had managed to drop a laptop onto a ceramic floor. Which can happen in real estate.

And then, just like that, my laptop shut itself down and rebooted. Except for a small dent in the corner of my cover, the laptop seems just fine. I ran Disk Utility. All is OK. I wonder if there is a Hawaiian God I can thank for this. Or maybe the spirit of Steve Jobs.