Sunday, October 31, 2010

LOST TRACK AGAIN

It's been one of those months again! When things start moving here, they make a speeding bullet look like it's in neutral, and time just gets away from me! I got a new 'super' computer because the game I play would not under any circumstances download a patch to the old one.
It took over two days to finish on the new one. Of course the game was still more glitchy than playable, but that's another whole story. My beloved geek came over to activate the new Windows and couldn't, so he put the ol;d computer back in place and took the new one to sort it's sorry butt. He's putting in a new and better CPU to compensate me for time lost! I was quite miserable at the thought of being without my game for several days, then made the discovery of the century. This computer came back on line with a Windows update notification to download service pack 3. I started jumping up and down in my chair because I remembered seeing someplace that the new patch requires SP 3 on XP machines. I installed and started the patch. It worked. Nowhere on any of the forums or tech pages did I see that as possible solution to the problem, and not one of the myriad tech types I talked with ever thought to ask if it was installed! Well, it is now, and I managed to get into my game. There are still some horrendous glitches, not the least of which is a very low frames per second rate of 4-9 and record breaking high latency rates of over 10000. That's right 10 thousand. But I could get on to play for a while before getting disconnected.
The other and even bigger distraction was getting all the places I owe small fortunes to thanks to Shmaryah to agree to a final settlement amount. I sicced Homeless on them, which meant I was getting calls from him all the time. Be that as it may, he did a great job and the big debts have been cut pretty much in half. That bit of business should be cleared up for once and for all this week. Then, I'll have my life and bank account back! I will admit that those are not the best excuses for not posting, but they are the reasons. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
One night last week, one of my high school pals threw out a question that started a fairly large group of os on a lovely stroll down Memory Lane, reminiscing about all the old places we remembered in town that are no more, and a few that still are. It was a wonderful way to spend an evening and it sure did make me miss them all and mostly my childhood. I've said it before and I'll say it again; my class at Brunswick High School was special. There was something about the town and the schools that made us into a great bunch of kids who still feel strong tugs on our heart strings when the past comes up. Very few of us had a mean bone in our bodies. In fact I can't think of anyone who did. (except maybe me), but I developed that here, not there.
I think part of it might have been because we were a Navy town and new kids were always showing up and others leaving. We locals just seemed to accept the new kids as if they had always been there. In fact, quite a few of them who left before graduation, still consider Brunswick their home town and BHS as their high school. Today I'm not even completely sure who the Navy kids were. They were/are all classmates to me, as well as to most of us.
Every time I get all nostalgic I have to remind myself that I can't go back. Oh, I can go back to Brunswick, all right, but not to my wonderful childhood. I take great comfort in being able to be in touch with so many of those great kids. They might all be as old and gray as I am, but, in my memory, we are still in our teens! Forever Young, to quote a song that has been co opted by Israeli advertising copy writers!
My pal from the Jerusalem on scooters jaunt was in a horrendous accident last Wednesday. A car ran into him at an intersection and sent him and his scooter flying. He came out of alive (thank G-d) and with a broken vertebra or two and a semi smashed pelvic bone. There's not a lot the docs can do for him as the breaks are not in easily accessible places for them to pin and plate (or so they say), so he's stuck in hospital on pain killers that don't help much. They are talking about months. Poor guy can't move a finger without pain. It looks like I'll be going up there to visit him frequently. The hardest part of my numerous stays in hospital was having so few visitors, but I learned early on that it was best to avoid that hospital and get to better ones that were farther and farther away each time I got a DVT!
I won't be going up today because I have sort an issue with my hated new mobile phone. I HATE IT. It never works when I need it to and the blue tooth 'ear' refuses to hold a charge, and the phone doesn't either. With my beloved Motorola Razor I could go a week between charges on both the phone and ear. I don't use it that often, but when I do, I need it to work. Have I mentioned that I hate the new one? Well, I do. And the idiot techies say they can't put my number back in my Razor because it uses a different system to the hated new one. I don't believe that for one minute and Homeless will sort that one day soon. One project at a time is almost more than I can handle with him! I guess I'd better get up there and sort the ear. All it needs is a new battery.

Tuesday, October 05, 2010

HAPPY HAPPY GIMP

Here we are at Tuesday already. It started as a fairly strange week on Sunday. I ended up sleeping most of the day and only got up at 1530 or so! I have a feeling that I was so tired from the stress of waiting to hear from the lawyer about the final payment from Dad's estate. I'm not a money grubbing female by any stretch of the imagination. I just want to get out from under the mess I made by being so stupid as to believe one thing Shmaryah said and get it all paid off. The email withe details came last week on Wednesday before I had downloaded a PDF reader. So, I did that and almost passed out on the spot. It's all over except the shouting. Somehow I got the printer to print out one copy and took it and my absentee ballot along to get the former photo copied and the latter mailed. Wednesday evening was the start of one of our holidays that I loved as a kid. I got the WoW installment going and then the download that lead to getting this monster computer going. After the holiday I got back into the game after a week of being away. On Friday I got to thinking about all the fall holidays that I had enjoyed so much as a kid and decided to take a look around Facebook to see if I could find some of the major players from those days. I did, and we exchanged lovely catch up mails. He and his brothers might be all grown with grown kids of their own, but they will forever be the kids we were then to me!
I guess everything just hit sometime Sunday night and when I finally got to sleep, I just kept sleeping until I got all caught up. I'm still a night owl and it is not at all unusual for me to fall asleep at around 0300 and get up at 0900. It works for me. Then, on Monday night I fell asleep just after it got light out, around 0530 and Homeless started looking for me and got all ftutzed when I didn't answer any of the phones. I just didn't hear them. I was asleep. So he sent a mail and said that he almost called the cops to have them check on me. Good thing he didn't. The last thing anyone needs is a run in between me and cops before morning coffee! I finally dragged myself out of bed and instead of getting things properly sorted on the new super computer (yes, I do know that it's already long out of date) I just played WoW all day and most of the night. I might have gone out on a fag run. Oh, now I remember. I went to the bank and got enough money to pay for new batteries for Harley. Savta and McGyver were there too and they gave me an escortt to the battery place because I was carrying a fair amount of cash. So, there we were, three cripples riding along in a line, with me in the middle. How we would have handled a would be thief, I have no idea, except that McGyver has a stout stick close to hand for marauding dogs! It was kind of like the Great Trip to Jerusalem, minus 2. We reminisced about that while waiting for the batteries and entertained the other customers who were waiting for things there too! Much fun and silliness. Yay. Harley has new batteries and I don't have to worry about getting stuck with the old almost dead ones, which lasted for just over two years. An amazing feat in scooter terms!
Then, my character on WoW went and fell for a Paladin there and she's dragging me along with her. He's so sweet. I do wonder if anyone could really be like he seems to be? I guess time will tell. With my luck, he'll turn out to be even a bigger con man than Shmaryah. I do hope not.
So, all in all, I'm a very happy gimp this week, and life seems better than usual, which is saying a lot.

Sunday, October 03, 2010

I CAN SAY I TOLD YOU SO TO MYSELF, RIGHT?

I knew it! I just knew it! I told myself and I was right! It is going to take close to forever to get this new computer sorted the way I like it. On the upside, it did let me get back into my game, which was the sole purpose of getting this monster! This thing is faster than anything I've ever seen or even imagined. Even the move to Windows 7 has been pretty much painless despite dire warnings to the contrary. Windows is Windows! So far I am quite enjoying it and am ever so glad that I skipped Vista. I have quite enough tech issues without adding that to the list! It's a good thing that my memory is still pretty good and that I remember most of what was in the old one. I can add things as and when. And wonder of wonders miracle of miracles, my idiot annoying e mail prog actually configured itself with absolutely no problems. That saved me hours on the phone with my server trying to get it to work!
Good old Harley ran for over 2 years on the batteries I got him not long after the jaunt to Jerusalem! I don't know how they lasted that long with all the running around I do, but there it is. I just hope these will last as long. Herley batteries are not cheap. I did get a good deal on these because I didn't get them throght the company where they cosst twice as much as I paid for these! Now I can happily scoot around town without worrying that they will quit suddenly. Happy gimp with wheels-that's