My son called me from work, where he was having trouble printing out a checklist of daily tasks. The checklist was 4 pages long, but when he tried to print it, only a half page would print. He kept trying and trying, and every time he tried, the printer printed out the same half page.

I figured it was a software problem, so I told him to check the print settings in the program he was using to try to print the list. He said he did that. I asked whether the print looked faded. Nope. I told him good luck.

He reluctantly called tech support – reluctant, he said, because the technicians always make him feel like an idiot. They asked whether he had checked the toner cartridge. Sure enough, that was it – the printer was low on toner. He changed the toner cartridge, entered the command to print the document, and it printed all four pages!

Although the problem was solved, my son remained perplexed. “Why,” he asked, “would I ever suspect the toner was low when the printer had no problem printing half pages? For all the half pages it printed, it could have printed ten full copies of the document!”

Ahhh, it was finally dawning on him how utterly illogical computers can be.

My printer has its own quirky behaviors. Just the other day I tried to print a document in black and white – no fancy color brochure or anything like that. The printer refused. The error message told me that my printer was out of yellow ink and I had to change the yellow ink cartridge before I could print anything.

If you’ve observed your printer or computer behaving oddly, I’d like to hear about it. Please post your observations here.