mourning my beloved laptop and the day...

i'm so sad to say that my trusty old laptop finally went to laptop heaven today... :( oh how sad i am... 4+ years of "life" on that baby...gone...

i did a little troubleshooting with my "pal" Beverly from Dell...and after i did some fancy technical things at her prompting, she let me know that she felt i probably needed a new motherboard... fast forward for another 20 minutes on hold with parts...and the cost of a new motherboard is $600... so...yah...not going to happen... i didn't think i'd really get a new motherboard, but i was just curious to hear how much it would set us back if we did...

i'm really sad because i am an IDIOT...i have had this beautiful new laptop sitting in my living room for 3 months...but i NEVER sat down to transfer anything... i got all caught up in getting stuff situated for my online class...and it just never seemed important or something i should have made a priority... of course, hindsight is 20/20 and, well, i'm seeing the err of my ways... :(

thankfully, ry has the same work laptop as our own personal laptop, so i think i can take the hard drive out of my recently departed laptop, take his out, install mine into Ry's computer, and then pull off what i need... i have a ton of my files already on my portable hard drive...but i know there are things that i have updated since i dumped the files... i think i might have to do that this weekend...but i do have some things i need for the week - like stuff for my online class...of course...
*sigh*

and i hate the mouse on the newbie laptop...and the keys are all in different places... i seem to suffer from a pretty hard learning curve....

have i done enough whining yet? oh sorry...

yes, i heard a lot of whining here today from my sweet child... she managed to sleep 12 hours last night, but i just think she was all out of sorts from the travels... i would be, too... house hopping between the grandparents - 2 nights here...2 nights there...lots of time in the van... but anyway, we spent over an hour outside this afternoon so that we could "wash that grumpy" right out of her soul.... thankfully, it worked... even though her little hands were like ice cubes by the time we came in...
i was thinking that we were about a half-inch away from her head spinning around in the living room because she couldn't get her kite puzzle piece to fit properly before we headed out, so the chilly hands were worth it...

oh...back to the laptop saga... i called Apple to ask about how to transfer the hundreds of dollars worth of music on my iTunes account... and i spent lots of time on hold, AGAIN... the silly (i'm using nice words) automated person on the other end kept asking me for a serial number...and i didn't feel like going to find the iPod with the serial number... FINALLY i get to talk to a human...she tells me that she needs my serial number (of COURSE!).... so i get my iPod (which is borderline ancient, to Apple standards)... and i read her my serial number and she tells me it's INVALID...
so she asks if i have my box....and i do (of course, b/c we never throw anything away) and i KNEW where it was in about 3 seconds... i read her the serial number on the box, and, by golly gee, it's the SAME number on the back of my iPod... *go figure* the chick is pretty much insinuating that i probably have a "bought on a street corner in Philly" iPod in my hand...of course, i don't... it's from a big box electronics store...i've had it for 4 years... and well, the stupid store is now out of business... gee, i wonder why - probably b/c they were selling these $300+ iPods with faulty serial numbers...
so i ask this apple girl how i can prove that my equipment is not bootleg from Vinny in Philly...and she keeps telling me she's sorry but the serial number isn't valid (and she wasn't from India)... i'm like, "I KNOW...FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! LISTEN TO THE WORDS THAT ARE COMING OUT OF MY MOUTH...." (then i had "Meet the Fockers" flashbacks)...
she tells me i can go to an Apple store and they can verify if my iPod is legit... yah, b/c i live in the middle of the "almost" total country and we have Apple stores in every direction...
then she tells me they can help me get my music transferred if i pay around $30 for person to help me...
haven't i already given Apple enough of my money... iPods...music...for real... so i'm annoyed and tell her that i'm not paying for that service right now until i can see if i can do it myself... and i hang up...
i was not a sweet "customer"
i was so annoyed....................
especially because i really needed to mash the potatoes so we could eat dinner before 10 PM...

and since i spent so much time on hold with Dell and then the remarkably intelligent Apple representative...i didn't get to go to the grocery store until 8:30 tonight... the bonus is that the place is deserted at 8:30... i had my pick of parking spaces... :) and it was OK that i was wearing my sleep nursing bra because no one was there... i had a fleece on but...let's just say that the nursing bra doesn't lend for much as far as "perking" up "the girls" *boy i'm really letting it all out, aren't i?* but no one cared and i could peruse the aisles of the store in total undergarment comfort :)

i liked driving the mile or so to the store and seeing the Christmas lights decorating houses in the neighborhoods... kinda neat... :) i admit, i do miss the cow and baby Jesus that used to decorate the "got junk" house on one corner... it was such a touching Nativity scene... those tenants are long gone... then i started to wonder why people put lights on their houses...i like the whole idea, but...what's the meaning or background of this tradition?

so when i got home, before i gave K her bath, i decided to get out her little 4 ft. tall pre-lit tree that we got a few weekends ago for a pretty good deal... she LOVES "Triss----missss teees" so i knew it would be a big hit... :) i folded down the cheap little branches on her little tree...it's cute... :) i put it in her room in front of her window... her face was so daggone cute when she walked into her room to get ready for her bath... :) of course, she wanted to touch the "trissss------missss teee" a million times...and nicely pointed out the same blue light a few times...
and, aside from making Little Lady's night with her pretty little tree, i realized that i can kind of participate in the "lighting" of the outside of my house "no reason" tradition, albeit from inside, by turning on her little tree to illuminate the window area in the evenings...

we would probably decorate the house with fancy lights if we had an electrical outlet in the front of our house...yah, someone forgot to do that when they built this box of a house in the 80s... some one's leg warmers were probably too tight...or maybe Guns and Roses was playing too loud on the boom box on that day and the construction guys were dancing around in the yard singing "welcome to the jungle" and playing their electric air guitars like Slash...........

i digress...

i'm glad the day is over... :) i feel like i didn't get a lot done... :) gee, i wonder why... :) but, everything is fine...it will be better in the morning when i wake up because the "big things" now will not be that big after a little time has passed...
:)

hope you had a good monday... :)