Sad Happy Sad Happy Sad Happy Sad Happy

Sad: our printer has been busted for a few months now. 
Happy: We're not printer snobs, so when we heard there was a Lexmark all-in-one printer/scanner/copier on sale at WalMart for $45, I ran out and bought it.  45 bucks!  That's less than it'd cost to fix the old printer!!  Then I did some online research on it.  By most accounts, it does photos pretty well (something we don't bother with) but, because it's only a one-cartridge (tri-colour) deal, reports that it doesn't print black text very well (looks faded and brownish) weren't very encouraging to me.  Still, for $45 dollars, let's give her a whirl, eh?
Sad: Try to install the printer drivers onto the computer and get a message saying that the cartridge that came with the printer isn't the right one.  Also, the "all-in-one" software that enables ease of scanning doesn't seem to be there.  So, I can't print due to the erroneous cartridge message, scanning is a pain since it can only be done through Microsoft's own laborious software program, and if I could print it would likely turn out brown and not very professional looking (which could be an issue at some point when we need a more professional looking print-job).  So, I resolve to return the printer and search for another one.
Happy: Tonight my wife calls and says a friend has a printer that she no longer uses and we can have it.  It's an upgrade from our busted HP printer, so I'm looking forward to it coming home tonight.  When I see it in my wife's arms, it looks very nice.
Sad: Something is dripping from it.  What could possibly be dripping from a printer?  Why, the answer is ink.  Black ink (at least it's not brown) has dripped its way to the kitchen lineoleum to the living room hardwood floor to the "office" carpet.  To the task of cleaning.  First my wife does a quick dry-cleaning with a cloth to get rid of the liquidy drips, while I try and stop the actual dripping of the printer (it seems like the printer has had a leaking problem for some time.  The inside of it looks all sprayed-ee, and I'm guessing there's a pool of ink that's congregated on the bottom of the printer.  When my wife was carrying it in, it got turned sideways and started dripping).  There are curious new kittens in the house, and first priority is to try and alleviate the potential for black-ink paw prints all about the house.  Once the majority of the ink drops are dry-wiped, the cats become far too curious to be a non-nuisance, so she goes about the task of catching them.  One has a bit of ink on her paw, so she's easy to track down, but no so easy to catch.  Finally, though, both get coralled into the bathroom, and, luckily, the cat paws didn't do too much extra inking.  And so, the cats a-hidden, and the dripping now a-stopped, I go about the task of wet-wiping the quick-dried spots.  With Mr.Clean to help, the ink comes off the lineoleum and hardwood very easily.  Not so easy from the carpet.  It's a crappy old carpet anyway, so we're not too worried about it being a bit stained.
Trouble with ink and other stain-inducing liquids, though, is that they seem to never quite stop appearing.  Almost magically, they show up in places that were, moments ago, ink-free.  Also, cleaning ink off of floors and printers gets the ole hands pretty dirty, and cleaning them is not easy.  A few washings and rinsings with a pasty water-bleach-salt mixture, followed by a number of regular soap rubbings gets the hands looking at least presentable (tough to get it out from under the fingernails, though), but feeling rather raw and chemicalized.
Happy:  Finally, though, it seems all the damage has been cleaned.
Sad: Of course, such an event at such an hour in the evening causes frustrations to percolate to the surface a bit, and, while there were a few moments of voiced irritations...
Happy: overall, I think we got through the ordeal pretty well.
I don't know if the printer is salvageable.