Farewell, Apollo

It was just over four years ago - just after Labor Day 2001 - that I bought my first printer for the home.
That probably sounds relatively late in the game, but before that I was my own newspaper owner/operator; I didn't need a printer at home when I had a nice laser printer at the office.
But when I folded the business, I gave all its assets to a creditor. I didn't have a printer with my home computer, so I went out and bought a Xerox inkjet printer.
Big mistake. It was defective from the moment I opened the box. It had a nasty habit of dumping the entire contents of a cartridge when it was ordered to print.
Needless to say, that was expensive.
We tossed it in the trash, and I went to the local Office Max to buy another printer.
This time, I got the cheapest I could find. It was a little H-P clone, called Apollo. Made in Mauritius.
Well, that printer proved a gem. It lasted until last month. Over four years.
Between Patricia's homework, projects and assignments, and my printing out stories, we beat the heck out of it. It finally developed problems with its paper feed.
The brave little printer didn't give up until right after Patricia finished her last thematic unit for the fall semester.
We got enough $$$ in gift cards at Christmas to buy a new printer. We went to the Target in Texarkana on Thursday and bought an H-P three-in-one. It not only prints, but it copies and scans.
I think Steve Utley got one of these for his birthday back in November. He mentioned it in an email. I dropped him a note in the mail and made a copy of my cover of "Lone Star Universe" as a test of its color copying.
I've brought the Apollo into my office at home. I may see if I can hook it up to my personal PC; it still can print one page at a time.
Because the new printer can scan, I can now add stuff to my web site. I've just started a new item called "Lou's Library" where I can talk about books. Maybe I'll do a few reviews. You can check it out at www.cedarhillsentinel.com
It was warm enough on New Year's Day here in East Texas (about 80 degrees) that by the early evening I had to turn the AC on in my office at home.