Feeling stressed and in need of relaxation, I chose to read my own book, Once Upon a Christmas. It had been a long time since I had read it, so it would be like reading something brand new, and I knew it would be a fun, heartwarming read.

I retrieved my Kindle, only to find it had a dead battery, evidence that likely my grandson had been playing with it. I plugged it in and waited over night.

Next evening at 4pm, I retrieved the fully charged Kindle, with anticipation to sit with my afternoon tea and read.

I opened the Kindle to discover it wanted a password. Hadn’t I disabled the password?

Oh, well, I typed in what I thought was the password.

Oops, that wasn’t it. Really?

I tried again, thinking I had made an error.

No, not the password.

Oh, yes, didn’t I just do 1, 2, 3, 4? The Kindle required a code because I had at one time had the grandchildren Freetime accounts on it. Hadn’t I stopped that?

Well, that password didn’t work, either.

I tried again.

No.

Aggravated, I tried it again.

No.

I resisted throwing the Kindle on the floor.

I went through the procedure to change the password, which required my going to my computer for the Amazon account password. My tea was getting cold, dark closing in outside the windows, time ticking by.

New password accomplished, I got into the Kindle to discover that indeed grandson had been playing some sort of war game on it. How had he gotten in through the password? I delete the game and find where I can disable the password. Whew!

Now. I go to the library, find Once Upon a Christmas. It is, however, on the cloud and needs downloading.

It won’t download. “Please try again.”

This message about six times, along with a message to contact customer service.

Told myself I could not smash the device on my desk. Sigh. And sigh again.
Do I even care?

It is my book. Paid for. I want to read it. What if other readers have had this trouble? Alarm propels me.

At the same time that I am explaining my difficulty with the customer service agent, the book decides to download.

Finally. I apologize to the agent, feeling like a fool.

I take the Kindle to my chair. The tea is tepid. I have to stop reading and go out to close the chicken house and check on my mother and get supper.

Very often the modern space and energy saving devices do neither. Had it been a proper paper book, I would have pulled it off the shelf and sat down, tea still warm, and happily begun reading, without all the annoyance.

I do hope to get the book into paper by next Christmas.

And yes, I find the story well worth all I went through. It is lifting my spirits and calming me at the same time.

Blessings,
CurtissAnn