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January 30th, 2004 13:01
I will never, NEVER ridicule a floppy drive again.
Squelch’s Windows XP Pro install become discontent at the massive change in motherboard and processor, and wouldn’t start up anymore.
It took me a ridiculously long amount of time and no small amount of computer gymnastics and sneakiness but I have finally put things right. I couldn’t have done it, though, without the floppy which saved my ass during the recovery install and resulting activation process…
I owe serious allegiance to my old Sony USB floppy and some anonymous guy.
January 30th, 2004 4:11
January 30th, 2004 1:17
So to remedy my error yesterday (that is the unheard-of destroying two semi-ancient motherboards), I involuntarily crossed two things off my wishlist. I went out and bought Squelch a P4 and associated motherboard so that I could give my current stuff to Andy in apology. And then, to my chagrin, I found it necessary to buy new RAM as well.
I didn’t want to spend a lot of money so I went very middle-line: very standard motherboard, P4 2.6 GHz, two 256 MB DDR RAM. Even so this is a lot better than my old P3 1Ghz, DDR RAM, 4x AGP and old USB. I am in the process of setting up Squelch’s old innards for Andy — I guess some good came out of this, because now he’ll have a much better computer than he would have had, and I got some items off my wishlist (even though now is not the greatest time for me to be buying fun stuff!).
Alas, my Windows install doesn’t work anymore after upgrading this hardware. Blech. If I can’t repair it, I’m going to have to go through that rigamarole of installing and cracking Windows yet again…
For some reason MIT has decided to pay me for January even though I wasn’t working. That is, I have received direct deposit for about 1/3 of my standard paycheck, and for no good reason, since there wasn’t a single day in January that I was still working for MIT.
Oh well, if they want to give me money, I don’t mind!
January 29th, 2004 0:20
Make that two.
This NEVER happens to me.
January 28th, 2004 21:47
Mike’s mother knitted me some wrist-warmers. I’m using them to keep myself warm when I practice piano.
It’s so nice to start referring to people by their real names now that I am friendifying my posts. I could never remember which alternate name I was using for which person!
Today I fried a motherboard. More specifically, it shocked me nastily before terminating itself. Ah, well. There are more where that came from.
Of late, I have become obsessed with dates. I’ve been eating boxes and boxes of them. They have sort of a disgusting texture – that sticky soft inside with the slightly crunchy skin on the outside — that to me is very reminiscent of bugs. I feel like I’m eating a big, plump, crunchy bug with a toasted exoskeleton when I eat dates… but they taste so good!!
And why is it that you never, EVER see a fresh date? Any other fruit that is often dried — raisins, prunes, figs — is easy to get in fresh form too, but I have never seen a fresh date. Do they exist? What do they look like?
January 27th, 2004 13:04
Well!
The guy actually did leave me a check! Now I am $1000 richer and ashamed for doubting him. I told one of the girls that works there that I am leaving the ball in his court — she said she’d pass on the message.
I just found out that given my MIT 401K had a measly $1700 in it, I am required to take it out. Fine with me — I don’t mind having an extra $1300 in my pocket and I can deal with the 10% penalty tax later. I never wanted the damn 401K anyway — they signed me up for it against my will and it took me lots of trouble to end the monthly debiting.
I have arranged another interview for myself, at BU. Well, more specifically, my old boss put me in contact with a person she knows there and they liked my resume.
I love my old boss. She retired last June, and yet she is still vigilantly helping me find jobs and giving me her extensive contacts. That Wellesley interview I had last week was obtained through her contacts. (Houghton Mifflin was all me, though.) She is the best boss in the world! If ever I am in a boss situation, I will try to emulate her. What would I be doing right now without her?!
January 27th, 2004 11:23
So I have tried, yet again, to set up an appointment to go to my sort-of-part-time sysadmin job to finish up some things and get paid for work I did last NOVEMBER, and once again the guy doesn’t deign to write me until I am about to leave and then says “no… I’m not going to be around… come later…”.
I have been trying to get this guy to pay me forever. He hardly ever responds to my emails (about either payment or work), won’t cooperate with me making times for me to come in and do work. He assigned me to do a task with another woman who works for him and she isn’t cooperating with me either. Honestly, I’ve hardly ever seen such bad communications.
Anyway, I’m going to go in today and try to get my check even though he isn’t there. He told me a week and a half ago he would leave the check for me — I don’t believe him, but we shall see! I should give him the benefit of the doubt.
If I can get the check, I think I will stop communicating with him and just leave the ball in his court. Let him tell me when he wants to cooperate so that I can actually get something done. I don’t’ like having my chain jerked. But if he doesn’t….
Well, I am keeping my fingers crossed.
January 26th, 2004 17:35
See, with me it’s always been a waiting game.
When I was a little kid, I was waiting to grow up so I could do whatever the heck I wanted. When I was in grammar school, I was dying to get to high school. In high school, I wanted to run away to college (and indeed did, after Junior year). In college, I was endlessly waiting to be certain ages – 18, 21, 25…
And now I’m 25 and not really where I want to be.
The problem is, I have no tolerance for waiting. Things just don’t happen fast enough so I try to rush them along. I wail and moan and complain and throw fits because I can’t have what I want the moment I want it, but even when I achieve the proper age, or situation, or location, or item, or person, or whatever it may be, it isn’t good enough, because then I am desperately trying to rush along to the next thing.
I’ve been running away — not running away, I suppose, but running towards — things for my entire life. It’s exhausting. But I don’t know how to stop.
How does one learn to sit and be patient and calm and stop the adrenaline rush of impatience? How does one learn to enjoy the moment and make the most of the waiting?
Right now there are so many things – tiny things, not-so-tiny things – that are just eating away at me. Waiting for a job, the right job. Waiting to hear from Houghton Mifflin. Waiting for February to come so January will be over, waiting for spring, waiting for the end of this mind-numbing cold. Waiting for a nice apartment in a nice place that is warm enough and clean enough. Waiting to move away from this rotten city. Waiting to be out of debt, to get skinny,
There are so many things I want; selfish things, frivolous things. I want a nice job, that I can actually enjoy instead of feeling that stomach-dropping dread feeling I used to get every time Monday morning came around. I want a decent apartment, with good heat and hot water, sturdy doors and windows, a clean interior, maybe a washing machine. I want to be able to go grocery shopping without looking at the prices. I want to live in Charleston. I want a dog, or, better yet, Kettricken back again. I want some new clothes, so I can get out of tight jeans and saggy sweatpants and T-shirts, I want more pairs of underwear and a facial and a new motherboard and CPU and video card for squelch. I want one of those cool little PalmPilots that has a built-in camera. I want to become slender enough that I can stop feeling depressed every time I catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror. I want a better haircut, I want to get rid of Verizon Wireless, I want an indoor parking garage for Subi. I WANT TO BE OUT OF DEBT.
I want Bryant to never, never, even remotely touch my life again.
Too many things, and I can’t feel good about wanting most of them. There are so many more important things to dedicate my time to! And yet — I am ever swamped with my own small discomforts and desires. I become snappish and disconsolate and restless and, occasionally, distraught (thought that is mainly as I watch my dwindling bank account) and then I hate myself for it. Because, really, I have no reason nor right to complain.
January 26th, 2004 16:48
I’ve spent most of today trying to formulate a plan as to how to optimize this terrible laptop that I must optimize tomorrow at the place where I have been (well, not for the past two months) acting as temporary sysadmin.
I’ve been applying my plan to my own depressed laptop that is as defunct as they come. Just to make things more difficult, livejournal client keeps crashing itself and my machine, grrr. Musicmatch too.
I’ve also done useful things like wash a lot of dishes, cook nice food, have fights on the phone with my car insurance lady and with MBNA, the latter which agreed to lower my APR and refund me some hundreds of dollars provided I pay this month’s bill at a much higher APR, bah. I am happy that they are refunding me *something* even though they have yet again copped out on lowering an APR they promised to lower two months ago.
People’s incompetence really gets me down. Then again, a lot of things are getting me down lately, not the least of which is my lingering unemployment, fast decreasing checking account, and the fact that it has been between -3 and 10 degrees F for 95% of the past month.
For the record, I hate the cold. I really, really, really, hate the cold. And to add insult to injury, my apartment doesn’t have heating installed and rarely gets above 60 degrees (at nights it’s in the 40s)… but then, I have complained about this before.
I swear, if MusicMatch plays me any more The Guess Who I will uninstall it — again.
January 24th, 2004 10:49
After giving it some thought, I have decided (albeit with regret), that I am going to start protecting my entries much more heavily. Everything but the most non-informative entries will be limited to friends-only.
If you non-LJ folks that read my journal want to keep up with me, email me at kirilisa@livejournal.com and I’ll send you a code – I have them coming out of my ears!
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