Through the circles of technology hell

I somehow missed this nugget of information about how Barnes & Noble no longer lets you download ebooks you have purchased to your computer to load onto your ereader of choice via the USB cable. You have to download it on your actual device. So today I bought an ebook, only to wonder where the hell the download button is.

Okay, so I have to turn the wireless on on my Nook. Fine, whatever, I'll just turn it and its battery-draining qualities off as soon as the book downloads.

It doesn't download.

After some investigating, I find that this would be because my B&N account is under one email address, while my Nook is apparently registered under another. God forbid.

"You can read it on your iPhone or iPad or Android!" the site chirps at me when I query what to do. Well, that would be great if I had any of those pieces of technology. I do not. BECAUSE I ALREADY HAVE AN EREADER AND A LAPTOP.

Well, maybe I can lend it to myself. Haha, wait, what am I thinking, that would require something to actually work and not throw errors at me when I try to use the function, which is apparently not B&N's forte.

Last ditch effort: Google a way to merge accounts. Miraculously, find that there is a way! It appears to require signing up for a Microsoft account of some stripe, and the fine print probably requires payment of my soul, but whatever, sign up, verify, back to the page for merging accounts. Click.

"Connection was reset. Try again?"

Congratulations, Barnes & Noble. You have just ensured I will never buy anything from you ever again.