Where the animal crackers go to die

Today I was busily typing on my laptop while my darling child entertained himself. All of his toys are right around the area of my recliner and side table that is home to my laptop so I can easily watch him. Lately he has become bored with his toys and has zeroed in on the squeaky toys in Rocky's cage. So of course, I heard him squeaking the dog toys the moment I looked away. I retrieve the toys and return them to the cage.

Bear, in the meantime, has scrambled up in my recliner. He often engages in diversionary tactics to get Momma out of the recliner so he can scramble up into the recliner and explore the Mecca that is my side table. On this table rests my laptop, a lap, 2 picture frames, and more often than not a glass of iced tea. This weekend he nabbed a coke off the table which luckily did not get on the laptop but did get all over the carpet. Today he scrambled up and immediately started messing with the laptop. Mind you, I am only approx. 10 feet away securing the dog toys. So I run over and scoop him up. During the scooping he drags his little fingers over the keyboard popping off 2 keys. Not just the keys but also the little white plastic tabs that hold the keys on.

I take him into his room and lay him down for a nap and return to the laptop to contemplate my options. So of course I turn to my trusty friend Google, which kindly showed me that people have WAY too much time on their hands. There were step by step instructions on replacing the keys and several YouTube videos. I checked a few of the videos but they were poorly lit and blurry so I turned to the step by step instructions. I found http://www.laptoprepair101.com which had pictures and instructions. I managed to get one key back on after about 15 minutes of figuring out how the impossibly tiny pieces of plastic fit together. So I go to put together the plastic pieces and one tiny clear piece pops free and disappears. #$@%^*!!!!!

So I get down on my hands and knees and start feeling for the piece on my biege carpet. There are toys all around so I move the toys and the chair. I learned that this particular area of the living room is the animal cracker graveyard. So I have to decide, do I crawl around on millions of crumbs or do I vacuum and risk sucking up the impossibly tiny plastic computer piece? After 15 minutes of searching I get out the shop vac and start sucking up pieces of cracker while feeling for the plastic piece with my other hand. After 30 minutes my carpet was clean and the plastic piece was nowhere to be found. So I visited my other trusty friend, Ebay, and paid way too much for a new H key to be delivered with plastic clippy pieces. So for now I am typing without the key on the H and I am becoming painfully aware of how many times I use the H key in a day.

The moral of today's story?

1. Animal crackers are the handiwork of the devil.
2. Children and laptops don't mix
3. I am in the wrong line of work. I need to start an Ebay business selling keyboard keys. I would be rich. Rich I tell you!