Chapter 5: Setting Up Her House.

The next Monday, by pre-arrangement, Jan went to work as usual. While there, he collected and printed all the materials needed for the day. He also loaded the boxes containing a new laptop and multi-function laser printer into his car.

It was his first-time seeing Flint’s house. Outwardly, there was nothing unusual about it, a split-level ranch style, probably a three-bedroom, typical for this area of Texas. It was notable for being on an extra-large lot, perhaps up to three hundred feet (90 meters) from her neighbors.

Flint directed him to her third bedroom to set up the new equipment. There was a tiny “student” desk in the room next to a small twin bed.

“To work in here, we need a full-sized desk, a proper rolling chair, and a table for the laser printer. You have internet, and air conditioning?”

“Put the printer on the floor for now and print out what you need so I can get it delivered and set up for next week. I have internet, I’ll give you my laptop so you can figure it out. And I have air conditioning, of course, why do you ask?”

“Colonel, this equipment will fail very quickly in this climate if it isn’t kept cool while it runs, that is, ambient under 80° (27° C) in here. I have here your Monday morning printouts to review, while I get everything set up. It will take about two hours, less if things go well.”

Her laptop was old and wheezing, with a “Windows Vista” badge of dishonor prominently displayed. Since there was slip of paper showing the Wi-Fi password, he didn’t bother turning it on.

It turned out, he needn’t have bothered. Her router was ancient, and her service was capped at a miserable 4 megabits per second, so he put everything aside and started over.

According to his Android mobile phone, he was in reach of a 5G tower (barely), so he made his phone a Wi-Fi hotspot.

Then, the laborious process of setting up Windows to conform to the Army’s requirements and obtaining all the updates from Microsoft. Then, installing and configuring the Virtual Private Network so he could at least retrieve and send her @mil email.

Then it was another full hour to get the HP printer working, with all of the necessary software downloaded and installed.

“Elson!”

He jumped, startled by the sudden noise coming when he was up to his neck in a setup screen.

“Here’s a twenty. Go to the Burger King you passed on the way here and get me a Whopper with Cheese combo, large fries, and a large Coke. Buy what you want, except fries, because we’re sharing those. When you are back, you can explain to me why you aren’t finished yet with your setup. On the double!”