After leaving her Kindle idle for at least two weeks, writer Mariana Vieira, 32, had to deal with an infestation of ants inside the device, which lodged in the charger hole and moved around in such a way that they bought books digitally.
The report ended up on the Twitter profile of her friend, Fabiane Guimarães, and went viral. There were already more than 70 thousand likes until the end of this Thursday afternoon (28).
Vieira, a resident of BrasÃlia, says that because of reading a book, she left the Amazon digital book reader stopped for a few weeks on her shelf. Last Tuesday (26), she decided to put it to carry on account of a trip she would take this week.
When the device barely charged after a few minutes, she thought something was wrong and tapped it lightly with her finger. That’s when dozens of ants began to emerge from the reader. “I’m in a story by Lygia Fagundes Telles”, she thought.
The writer left the device at the window and went to work. “A few minutes later, I got a notification: ‘Congratulations on your purchase,'” she says. It was the book Robots and Empire, by Isaac Asimov.
At first he thought it was a mistake, until he checked his Kindle and saw that it was on the shopping page. At that point, the touch no longer worked, and before she decided to take it out of the charger, the movement of the ants bought another book in her name: The Ring of Gyges, by Eduardo Giannetti.
Both purchases were canceled in time.
His friend Fabiane Guimarães was the one who gave the tip that made the device work again: put it in a plastic bag and leave it in the freezer. “I thought it was a little extreme, but since it wasn’t working anyway, when I got home I put it in the freezer,” she says.
Although the technique is not in the user manuals, when Vieira took the reader out of the fridge, the touch was working.
Sought, Amazon says that the device should be avoided contact with food. “Customers should also not use their devices near sinks or wet places (if their model is not waterproof) and should not leave them exposed to extreme heat or cold,” the company says.
Vieira, who wrote a chronicle about the case, says he still doesn’t know what caused the infestation, as there was no food near the device. “My tip is: don’t leave your Kindle idle. Read,” she says.
I have over 8 years of experience in the news industry. I have worked for various news websites and have also written for a few news agencies. I mostly cover healthcare news, but I am also interested in other topics such as politics, business, and entertainment. In my free time, I enjoy writing fiction and spending time with my family and friends.
