The Printer Is Here. The Computer Has Filed a Missing-Person Report.

Printing one page ought to involve sending one page to the printer. Instead, the computer announces that the printer is offline while the printer sits there with its little light on, looking about as offline as a refrigerator.

I know what “offline” means. The computer can’t communicate with it. Fine. Say that. “I can’t talk to the printer” is useful information. “The printer is offline” sounds like the printer packed a bag and left no forwarding address.

So you check the printer. It has power. It has paper. You check the computer, which is also on, unless you’ve developed the ability to troubleshoot a printer by glaring at a blank monitor. Now you have two working machines in the same room refusing to acknowledge each other. This isn’t printing. This is Thanksgiving dinner.

The print queue is where things get interesting. The page you need is waiting there, along with two more copies from when you clicked Print again to see if the first click had hurt its feelings. Sometimes the queue says “Printing.” It isn’t. The printer has not moved. The page is apparently being printed in a more philosophical sense.

You can cancel the jobs, although “cancel” and “gone” don’t always seem to mean the same thing. You may still find yourself watching the queue, waiting to see whether it has accepted your decision.

Then comes the ritual. Check the connection. Turn the printer off and on. Wait for it to wake up and make those little internal noises, as if it’s clearing its throat before declining your request again. By the time everything reconnects, you don’t want to print the page anymore. You want to know which machine started this.

And of course, once they’re speaking again, the printer may produce all three copies. One for you, one for the computer, and one for the printer to keep as evidence that it was here the whole damn time.

Before I can print the missing-person poster, I need the missing person to cooperate.