Love/hate Relationship

This is a long one so grab a coffee {lol}
Yep, it's official, I have a love/hate relationship with technology. When it's working and making my life easier it's the best thing in the world, when it doesn't ~ I HATE IT !!!
What a morning this morning at work. When I left this afternoon I actually thought I'd been pulled through a hedge backwards!! I'm on my own on a Thursday from 9-1pm (Lauren comes in at 1pm to start her shift) and it is usually hectic with people booking holidays over the phone or just ringing to ask questions. People coming into reception to check in or out of their caravans, getting change for the arcade or reporting faults. People asking about places to visit in the rain with their 3 children and 90 year old disabled mother! The list is endless. Well I got to work this morning and Jodie (one of my girls) had left a note saying that 'Viking' had delivered the stationary order and the new drum & toner had been installed in the printer. It was now working brilliantly and all the big black lines down the pages we had printed had disappeared. We were all ship shape & raring to go :O) Great stuff, I thought, so I put the kettle on (well, not literally, as it wouldn't fit - lol). First job, photocopy some more price lists for the brochure. 2nd job, sort out the photocopier as it developed a paper jam and wouldn't believe me when I told it I had 'unjammed' the paper! The phone went and my phone is awful. I have to cup my hand over the outside of the receiver and put a finger in my other ear just to hear the person on the other end of the line. Never mind, I thought, I'll get on with franking the post. Half way through the job it needed re-crediting. Normally this wouldn't cause a problem but Royal Mail have set up a new system called 'Clean Mail' or something like that and we have had to have a new franking machine. This came last week and as soon as all the credit was used on the old machine, the new one had to be installed. So with great joy I set up the new franking machine all went well until I tested it and two lines of text were missing from the frank mark. Phoned the helpline who suggested I wipe the bottom of the ink cartridge with a damp cloth and then shake it vigorously which I did. Nope, still didn't work. Then she suggested I set the machine to 'clean cartridge' which I did. Nope, still didn't work. Then we uninstalled the ink cartridge and installed the spare one we keep in the cupboard. Yep, success!! 2nd problem, the machine doesn't print our address next to the postmark like the old one did. The helpline lady informed me that we had a credit card sized piece of plastic with a chip on it that would need to be installed on the new machine. So 3/4's of an hour later I found said credit card. Loaded it onto the machine, tested it out and still no work address. Then I realised the credit card I had used was actually an old one that updated the 'rates of postage' on our machine ~ Duh!! We now have 2005 rates installed!!! I phoned them again saying I was unable to find the address card and was told it would be £80 for a new one, OMG £80!! So I then told them a little white lie {smack my wrists} I said that the new rates weren't on the machine. Well, they weren't but I wasn't telling her why!! She is going to send out a new rates card free of charge with a replacement ink cartridge. You would think that was it, but no, my wonderful fax machine stopped working too. After investigating that, I found one of the cogs inside had un-slotted itself so I pushed it back in with a plastic ruler and thank goodness it worked. I must have looked pretty cheesed off as Lynne (the owner & my boss) said I could get a quote for a new fax machine AND a new phone system ~ hallelujah !!! Wish me luck :O)