uberreiniger: (Fallen)
This weekend has been very busy for me, but I still manage to feel like I haven't done as much as I'd like. Come to think of it, this entire week has been pretty chaotic.

We had a bad thunderstorm Sunday night into Monday morning that fried out my surge protectors. All my electronics were spared except for my trusty old warhorse of a desktop computer. The power source took the hit and died. This will the second time I've replaced a power source on that computer, but it's easy enough. Where it gets interesting is according to the package tracking, said power source has already been delivered. I don't have it. I am hoping that it's either in the apartment office or at the post office on account of the box being too big, but I won't know until tomorrow. Strangely, I am not as panicked about this as I could be.

Angie had to go to the ER this week. She was diagnosed with diverticulitis and is still recovering. I am just trying to be the best partner I can and take care of her. I am thankful for my own relatively robust health and I hope it persists that I may keep caring for the ones around me.

Another problem we have been dealing with are our upstairs neighbors, the Porch Dicks. We named them that in honor of a villain from The Walking Dead: a smarmy, abusive father/husband whom the fandom nicknamed "Porch Dick." The called him that because he was first introduced creepily staring at one of the main characters from the front porch of his house. Anyway, our neighbors fit the comparison because they are violent and abusive to one another and we hear every word through the ceiling. They also have a bad habit of blasting their surround sound movies and music at all hours of the night, resulting in hours of lost sleep on our part. The apartment office tells us they are being evicted, but that's not something that happens overnight. In the meantime, we just try to make the most of it by enjoying the free Jerry Springer show going on above us.

I have worked a lot on music this weekend. The work is paying off. I'll talk about that in its own post.

Today I helped my parents bring my old chest of drawers down here from their house. While cleaning it out I found a few things I've been trying to find for a long time so that was a most welcome surprise. I also managed to score a few incredible deals from a local hardware store that is going out of business, and I treated myself to a visit to the homebrew store as well, coming away with a fresh carboy and airlock to begin a new batch of mead with.

Today was also the racking of the first batch. Racking is where you drain the fermented liquid off the sediment, or lees, that forms at the bottom of the vessel. It turned out to be a lot of fun, but the apartment now looks like a serial killer lives here on account of the rubber tubing hanging above the sink as it dries.

It doesn't feel like I did a lot, but typing about it sure has been exhausting!

uberreiniger: (WEEE!)
It's after 3 am so when I talk about "today" I guess I really mean "yesterday." But on this past day here is what happened:

-Got new brake pads on my car. Devastating financially but great for peace of mind.
-The long-awaited replacement PSU for my computer arrived. Never got notified that it shipped like I thought it would but I won't gripe.
-Had another productive and super-enjoyable practice with my band.
-Got to go for a long relaxing walk wearing my new hoodie that I like very much.
-Discovered a great band I had never before heard of and am now in love with, Powerwolf!

I feel it has been a very good day.



uberreiniger: (ICS Vortex)
After what felt like ages, (it always feels like ages when you're broke,) I got paid yesterday, meaning I was finally able to pay the shipping to send off the power supply for my computer. Warranty covers replacement but not shipping. The delay in sending it out means the new one probably won't get back to me until the end of the month, which kind of sucks because there could be a lot of things going on by then. Not necessarily the optimum time to try to repair a computer but we don't always get to pick and choose.

Today after months of scrimping and saving I finally bought a Peavey Vypyr guitar amplifier. I had been wanting a 100 watt 2X12 and Guitar Center finally got one in. But today when I got there it was gone. So instead I bought the 30 watt 1X12 that they did have. Given that this amplifier is just barely louder than a JET ENGINE BREAKING THE SOUND BARRIER I think I may not have needed the 100 watt after all. Plus it was cheaper. Now I need to take a few hours to figure out how to operate the thing. Modelling amps are nowhere near as straightforward as what I'm used to. Have to look online and see if I can download the manual (I got it used so no manual.)

I'm a person who hates spending any amount of money. I feel guilty about this purchase even though I've been without an amp for years and carefully saving for months. Oh well, nothing for it now. I suppose the best way to shake the feeling is to put the amp to work and get lots of use out of it.
uberreiniger: (Default)
My motherboard and power supply are arrived, installed, and the PC now runs better than ever. My PC is slowly turning into a Ship of Theseus but that's okay. It's fun to upgrade parts.

This means I am freed up from using my mom's ancient computer which turns firing off a FB or LJ comment in 20 seconds into a ten minute ordeal. I can now do things in a timely fashion.

It's too bad my WoW subscription ran out and I can't really afford to renew it until next week :( 
uberreiniger: (Death of Ironhide)
The subject line is my favorite Onion headline of all time and has nothing to do with the post.

Well it's not the power supply on my computer. It's the motherboard. Our Tech Kid (heretofore known as OTK,) can't figure out why the board will accept power but not boot. But it's definitely not a power supply issue. So now I have to order a new motherboard. Apparently no one sells the one I currently have, not even Amazon or New Egg anymore. Which I guess is good because it crapped out after only three years. We found another one that will fit and I'll be ordering it tomorrow when I get paid. Since I have a month of free shipping with Amazon right now I'll overnight it and have OTK put it in on Saturday and hopefully, God willing, that will be the end of this whole sorry mess. I JUST WANT MY COMPUTER BACK! I MISS WOW, AND DRAGON AGE, AND MY PICTURE FOLDER, AND BEING ABLE TO WORK ON MY WRITING!

I had carefully planned to start putting money aside to buy the guitar amplifier I want, starting with this paycheck. I guess that's gonna have to wait one more pay period now. That's fine. Whatever it takes. I just want the damn thing to work again.
uberreiniger: (theatre)
Or, since I'm here, I may as well make an actual update.

These past two weeks have been stressful. Not enough time to do what I want. Writing has suffered. Progress on Seasons in the Abyss has slowed. I'm not in danger of abandoning the story as I have in the past but the pacing issues feel like they're getting worse. I am going to need to trim a hell of a lot of fat off this beast before I can turn in a final draft. Apocalypse Woman was long for an erotica novel at 350+ pages and SItA is shaping up to exceed that and I don't really want it to.

However I did manage to finally fix my registry error-riddled computer all by myself. Got Windows re-installed, got drivers updated. It took a couple of days but I am now surfing the web in a degree of luxury I have long since forgotten. Once the software problems were fixed, however, I discovered a hardware problem. Somewhere in the last few weeks my CPU fan died. I've ordered and received the new one but I'm not confidant I can replace it myself so I'm waiting for the techie kid who keeps my family's comps up and running to get some free time to come help me. It's always something. He urged me to order just the new fan from the manufacturer for $4 but... the manufacturer is in Hong Kong, their website is in Engrish, the shipping address fields they provide don't let you put your address in in the manner American addresses are usually written, and the part isn't even in stock anyway. So I bit the bullet and spent $25 I couldn't really afford to get the whole assembly off of Amazon. Better to pay a few extra dollars to make sure you actually get the thing. I just want to get the thing installed so this whole saga of computer repair will be over for a while.

This week is Lilies' War and the performance of the comedy skits we've been laboring on for the last few months. It sucks because I work every night this week except for the performance dates. My friends are already out there having fun and I'm stuck at home dealing with plumbing problems and general B.S. I'm going to try and make it out there during the daytime the next few days just so I won't feel like I'm missing out. And since I've got to pay the same heavy parking fee whether I'm there two days or ten, I may as well take advantage of it. I've got some classes lined out that I want to take over the course of the week. If I manage to make it to half of them I will be very proud of myself.

I'm planning to head out there tomorrow morning. I really could use a day away from the house. Expect lots of grumpy facebook updates from me if I don't make it :)
uberreiniger: (Futurama Bender Dance)
I have installed a brand new graphics card in our computer. I am insanely stoked about this. Just ask my wife. I have been insufferable to live with all weekend on account of how high I feel for having done this.

You have to understand, I have never been a technical guy. I don't know how to fix ANYTHING. This is the first time I have ever repaired any machine of any degree of complexity ever. I feel all manly!

Now I am aware that video cards are among the simplest pieces of computer hardware to replace and that a child could probably do it. But this time I'M the child, and it is a child's right to be proud of their achievements.

Really the things are almost too simple to install and remove once you know what you're looking at. It made me thankful that car manufacturers do not make personal computers. If they did, then the graphics card would require eight hours to replace and cost $800 in labor.
uberreiniger: (donnie darko drew fuck (iconomania))
All day I was wondering why nobody loved me enough to comment on anything I had said on LJ in the past day because, like, that has never happened before. Then on my way to work tonight I find a voicemail from Adam on my phone informing me that my email doesn't work! Son of a bitch, it turned out he was right. Because apparently those vicious bastards at SBC Yahoo decided to kill my primary email account since I quit using their crappy dial-up service. I thought my email account was in no way connected to my dial-up account since the primary email for that was a completely different email which I never use. Boy I guess I was wrong. Anyway, it's fixed now and I have a working email address again. If anyone needs it, just let me know. Also, I've pretty much missed all my LJ notifications in the last 24 hours so if you said something you desperately needed me to know you said, please point me to where it was. Thanks.

T-baggers. (Not you all. Yahoo.)

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