The Sickness

Laptop is infected. Or it’s just lost its mind. I don’t even know what the hell is up, but something ain’t right. I tried "fixing" it, but let’s be honest… I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing. Shit got real. I…. it wasn’t pretty. I think I damn near came about a butthair away from throwing the damn thing against the wall. F12 and F8 and start up scans and whatnot – about three hours in I was just hitting buttons to see if they did anything.
After forcing a hard restart for the one hundred and seventy-second time I was like – fuck it. Let’s do it live. Had Shaun dig in my old filing cabinet for the operating system disc and tried to reinstall that – full wipe out. I don’t give a damn style. Realized it was a disc for my old laptop that ran on Windows XP somethingorother (this one’s Vista… dude… I know. 2008, yo. My laptop’s no spring chicken. Just – I know) after the fact and ended up with two operating systems somehow. Tried creating a back-up, because, apparently, I’ve not ah one on the whole fucking laptop and… low and behold, found out that I’ve not enough room for a backup.
Music files, man. That’s quite frankly the only thing I have on that damn laptop.
Microsoft Office. A picture or five. Music.
Shit’s full. Bar’s on the red. I’d tell you how many gigs or bites or terra things were free, but I don’t know the difference.
The free space was about the width of an ATM card, if that helps an-

-allahyouz computer speakin indahvid’uls out there are probably shaking your fist at me right about now. I get it. It’s cool-

I don’t think I’ll ever be one of those people who… understands… that language. I just plain don’t speak it and haven’t ever really wanted to, to be honest. It’s boring as hell (personal opinion, mind you – quite possibly stemming from the fact that I don’t understand it and have thus written it off as stupid to make myself feel less like an idiot and more like I had a choice in the matter) and there’s a million other things I’d rather learn about.

For instance, last night I watched a documentary on the endangered Siberian Tiger.

The night before, I watched a documentary on The Appalachian Trail.

And before that, a documentary on pinball. For the third time.

Now THAT shit’s interesting (and give me a break on the whole TV thing – I’m not moving much these days, remember? I don’t ordinarily watch this much TV, you ass. And I’m having to slow down on the reading on account of the fact that books aren’t fucking cheap.).
Anyway – what I’m trying to say is that computer programming has never sparked my interest other than – hey man, ain’t it fancy how a bunch of metal and plastic and electricity and all that other shit in there, like, actually… thinks, kinda… like magic. And it’s only in instances like this – when I can’t get the goddamn thing to fully boot up or do anything useful, that I get to thinking – oh, hey, I guess it would be kinda handy to know how to fix this shit.
Imagine that.
Cuz fixing the shit ain’t cheap.
Got on the phone with Dell customer service and the guy wanted a hundred dollars just to walk me through a preliminary systems check. Over the phone. Which means… I still had to do the work. And I couldn’t even understand the dude. Plus, I could totally tell he was reading off a goddamn trouble shooting script, which is annoying as hell because they’ll read the whole damn paragraph before they stop to make sure you’re still with ‘em (which you never are). And even the “thank you”’s are scripted.
What the fuck is that about?
Goddamn.
This is why you should always include a computer programmer in your posse. I mean it, really. Like – there is a small handful of people that you need to have access to. The short list (in no particular order) would look something like –
Carpenter
Electrician
Mechanic
Veterinarian
Tattoo Artist
Nurse/Medical Professional
Computer Geek
Bartender
Finance Wizard
<span style=”font-family: Arial”>Seamstress
I mean – that’s my… thirty second list (as in, half a minute… not- I’m not making actual lists here, you know). But off the top of my head, I’d say that these are the top ten people you need to make good with – have at least one source that specializes in each category that you can go to when shit hits the fan. Or, you know, you want a new tattoo or something.
See – I used to have a computer programmer buddy but he moved far far away and it makes me sad all day.
The other thing that makes me sad, now that I think about it, is that I myself kinda suck in that I do not fall into any of these categories. Essentially, I have nothing to offer a posse.
Woe is me. I’m a sucky friend, by my own standards.
I mean… I can, like, use fancy words and edit grammar and make you sound intelligent on your resume (I know what it looks like, reading this shit here, but I promise… I can do it) and other shit like that so… maybe that’s my ante but – I don’t know, mang. Practically speaking, I’m really not worth my keep.
I should work on that. Learn a skill or something.
Should’ah gone to trade school, I swear.
 
You can relax, though. I gave up. Sent the laptop in to our IT guys at work and they’re gonna have at it. Luckily I actually backed up all my music and my pictures on an external harddrive (not sure how I did it, but I did… somehow. Magically.) so they can take that laptop back to the stone age and I’m not losing anything.
Its outta my hands.
But/so until it’s fixed, however long that takes, I’m kinda laptop-less, as I would be.
Ain’t you the lucky ones.
That’s all I really had to say, actually. Didn’t mean this to be a multi-pager. Just – laptop gone haywire. It’s getting fixed. I may be sparsely present on my phone only in the mean time.
Other than that. Uh – so… the stupidity of Californian’s can officially be likened to that of North Carolina-ians. That makes me…. So excited. To admit that. Really. I mean it. There’s no other state I’d rather be lumped together with. None.
I’m pissed, actually. Case you didn’t get that. But mostly I’m just sad. Been reading/following the whole Amendment One thing and just – the shit the supporters are saying – it’s so hateful. I know I never get political on here, and very rarely do I ever talk religion (unless I’m cursing… in which case I bring up Jesus Christ a lot), and I’m not about to start really, but this just really bums me out and I hate that I can’t just… flip a switch… on some of these people. Turn them into decent human beings.
Good ‘ole Bama, though. That made me happy. His announcement, I mean. First President to openly support gay marriage while in office.
It’s a step forward, at least.
And. Uh – that’s all I have to say about that. Out loud. Here.
Oh – hey, boss will be out tomorrow and Friday and I’ve not much to do in the office. Give me something to talk/think/debate about if you feel like it. Help me pass the sixteen hours without gouging out my eyeballs with my uniball pen.