Fiction · Laptops
HOA Minutes: A Laptop Takes the Minutes Without a Plug
The HOA tests a 3 pound Microsoft Surface Laptop as its minute-taker at the mailbox cluster, where there is no outlet and no excuse.
Recorded by the HOA secretary
4 min read · November 1, 2026
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Microsoft Surface Laptop 13.8" Snapdragon X Plus 16GB 512GB
$1099.46$1499.99
Price as of Nov 6, 2026, 2:55 AM UTC. Details
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Call to Order
One folding table, one folding chair and a flat box still sealed with tape stood on the asphalt beside the community mailbox cluster at seven o'clock, and President Mags Delacroix-Burke called the assembly to order from behind them.
She noted that the agenda had one item: the first day of the Microsoft Surface Laptop, which the HOA intended to use for its minutes. She had chosen the mailbox cluster because all news on Maple Lane begins there, and because it has no outlet of any kind, which she called a controlled condition.
Mr. Ferreira stood at the back with his arms folded, in the posture of a man attending the christening of a rival's child.
Old Business
Mr. Ferreira renewed his standing objection to every appliance he did not build. It was filed beside its predecessors, which are many.
Mrs. Kowalczyk read the previous minutes, written in pencil on a legal pad. The President called them durable but unsearchable. Mrs. Kowalczyk replied that the pad had survived two spilled coffees and a rain, and asked that this be recorded before anyone said something unkind about paper. She then entered the laptop in the Lending Ledger as item 1,207, borrower: the HOA.
The Cat-Owners' Caucus, whose members hold that living with a cat is the highest form of human existence, entered its record of achievements for Admiral Biscuit (Held the Sunbeam, Reviewed the Laundry Basket from Within, Convened the Hallway), each of which Mrs. Kowalczyk, asked to verify, found to be a nap.
The Caucus asked that the record be the first thing typed on the new machine. Admiral Biscuit, present on the second folding chair, was asleep, and the Caucus entered this as a fourth achievement. Mrs. Kowalczyk asked whether it was the same one. The Chair ruled that it was under review.
He stated that he could build that.
New Business
The President opened the box. The Surface Laptop has a 13.8 inch touchscreen in a thin body, and she lifted it with one hand, then again with the gavel in the other, to show both could be done at once. Its listed weight is 3 pounds. Mr. Ferreira stated that a tool should weigh what it is worth. Mrs. Kowalczyk replied that this was a theory, and the Ledger had no entry for it.
ORACLE, asked how long the meeting would run, forecast 6.42 hours, conclusion in Portugal, and attendance of 14.76 residents on a lane with eleven houses. Mrs. Delacroix-Burke thanked ORACLE and observed that six hours is a long time to go without an outlet. The listing gives up to 20 hours of battery life. She moved that the 39W power supply stay in the box. The motion carried, and the power supply sat in its cardboard like an understudy.
Mrs. Kowalczyk was then invited to read the Caucus record back from the screen. The sun was low and aimed straight down the lane, to the lasting grievance of everyone with a porch. The display reaches 600 nit, and she could read the whole record from her chair, with one reservation: the finish is smooth and possibly glossy, and for the first line she was reading her own face. She moved her chair. The reservation was withdrawn.
The Chair asked for particulars. Mrs. Kowalczyk, who had read the listing twice, reported a Snapdragon X Plus processor, 16 GB of memory, a 512 GB solid state drive, and the label Copilot+ PC. Mr. Ferreira asked what that meant. Mrs. Kowalczyk said the listing described AI features built in, and that she would not be taking questions on the rest. Everyone looked at ORACLE, which was looking at the Pacific.
Mr. Ferreira was invited to try the touchscreen. He prodded a word with one finger, as a man checks a melon, and the word moved. He stated that he could build that. Asked for a start date, he said he was busy.
The President moved that the laptop connect to Mr. Ferreira's old monitor and to a second one from the community room, so that nobody would have to lean. Mrs. Kowalczyk reported that the machine supports one external display, no more, though it has three USB-C ports for other business. The motion was amended to one monitor and carried, Mr. Ferreira dissenting on principle, the second monitor reclassified as a spectator.
Mr. Pike, passing with the day's mail, stated gravely that there was again nothing for Brenda, the domesticated bear, in care of the porch at No. 2, and that he had begun to take it personally. The President noted that Brenda had filed no change of address. Mrs. Kowalczyk asked that the Ledger show Mr. Pike had checked.
Adjournment
The assembly adjourned at seven thirty-one, well short of ORACLE's forecast and entirely within the battery. The power supply was never called.
The President carried the Surface Laptop home in one hand and the gavel in the other. The empty box stayed on the folding table, and Mr. Ferreira asked leave to take it home and measure it. Leave was granted. He was seen later on his porch with a tape measure, informing the box that he could build one.
In this episode
Maple Lane and its residents are fiction. The story was written with AI from the product's listed features and checked automatically. The product, its price and its price history are real. How the stories work
Previously with Mags
- Gus and Doris feud over where his fence ends and her hedge begins until Mags prints both their photos borderless on one 13-inch sheet and the line turns out to be shared.
- With the projector dead before the Appreciation Dinner, the Menons' ASUS ROG Strix monitor carried Mags's slideshow while Tamsin distrusted the dining room lights.
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