We’re crouching on the floor of a Barnes & Noble in Park Slope, an enfranchised enclave of Brooklyn. The walls of our apartment began to throb and press against our skull, so we escaped, in search of caffeine, wi-fi and a/c. In a perch between the archival scrapbooking section and the leather journals, the sun beats a low hum across our arm and slow cooks our laptop. We glance enviously at the Starbucks tables.

Look at them, blithely able to sit, and place objects on the table and interact with them. Why, god, why?

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We know, B&N is evil and destroys people’s lives and we shouldn’t have come here. But we’re lazy, and the place seemed to fit our parameters. Incidentally, that’s also how the Peloponnesian Wars started.

We’re pissed because even though there’s a giant sticker on the front door advertising WI-FI, when you arrive to the cafe area, there’s no outlets. No place to plug in your laptop. You’re just supposed to sit there and peck and then leave after your battery dies. Outrageous!

We pressed the barrista. He suggested we talk to B&N information. The answer desk suggested our current locale, just a few steps down from the “All Occasion” card section. When we asked about the inherent disconnect, natch, between having wi-fi and yet no outlets, he said it might be a safety issue. We could see that, perhaps some tyke feels tempted to recreate Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. We ask if maybe they could install the outlets high up, out of reach? “Yeah, I feel you,” replied info boy, “but we don’t own that space, you see.”

Gotcha, it’s no one’s responsibility but our own that your store is designed by mendicants. Ergo, the next time we feel the urge to emerge from our blog cavern, we will peruse many of the “Find Free WiFi” services out there before leaving the house, places like Wi-FiHotSpotList.com, Hotspot Haven, and WiFinder.

In case you forget to jot down a place before you leave, you can also send a text message to ilovefreewifi, as described here. Avoids that whole key locked inside the safe conundrum.

Our foot is totally falling asleep. We hate that, as when we arise, it might be more difficult to shove up Barne’s and Noble’s ass.