Ramblings of a Crowe

Still Broken

My computer took a trip back to the Geek Squad on Tuesday. It's still not home(I'm stealing the parents while they sleep), nor have I heard a word from them. I'm a little concerned. I called them on Thursday and was told it was still being daignosed--which I think means "Since we screwed up and you probably won't have to pay for this, we aren't working on it" or "We screwed up and are thinking up a way that this will make it seem like your fault and not ours."

Or perhaps I'm just being impatient. At any rate, I will call them (despite their insistance of "We'll call you") back on Wednesday morning and start getting snippy with them.

Christ, all I want is a friggen computer that works. I have learned a valuable lesson though. The next time my computer breaks, just buy a new one instead--in the end, it costs about the same.

*sigh*

STOP: BSoD

Deadly, especially if you're busily working on something and haven't had a chance to save (like this blog). One minute you're happily typing away, and an instant later you're staring at this eye blinding blue screen with white text that says Windows has died...again.

Until having my new hard drive installed, I'd never heard of a BSoD. Apparently, I'm not alone in my suffering. Pages and pages of Google revealed to me the problem my computer suffers from:

Since the only fix for this malady is to buy a Mac, I could only nod and smile and wish I had the money. More digging uncovered other information I really didn't understand. A bunch of long numbers with letters mixed in. I really don't get why computer messages can't flash a screen that says: Hey, dumbass! Your NIC card is F#@$ed up! Fix it!

But no. Instead we get things like, "DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL", which is followed by a code (or five--thousand) that looks like some sort of code from the spy era of the Cold War. "Yeah, Jim. We got a ZERO DELTA NINER ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO X ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZERO ZEROTHECHAIRISAGAINSTTHEWALL NINER X."

Obviously, the President wants a cup of coffee. God forbid he ask for a latte.

I digress. Microsoft, of course, offers their help with these STOP codes and their harbinger of doom, the BSoD. See, look at how helpful they are: their answer to my problem

Thanks Microsoft!

Sadly, my error wasn't special enough to warrant giving up the bad driver name in my BSoD message. At none that I could read. Which is fine and good, I suppose, because there probably isn't much I can do about it anyway. I have a sneaking suspicion that my computer's trouble stems from the new hard drive. Tomorrow I'll call the people who fixed it, laugh about it, then get mad when they try to charge me another 70 bucks to fix it. Part of me thinks the BSoD and I can learn to live with each other, sort of like Lucy and Ricky.

In closing, I leave you with my system error code:

Error code 100000d1, parameter1 f8009c60, parameter2 00000002, parameter3 00000000, parameter4 f7fb4a80.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Christ on a Cracker

I'm back. A week ago the hard-drive on my computer up and died. It was a fiasco getting everything put back together and I'm still working on it as I type this. I lost a lot of my files, all my music, some of my writings, movies, pretty much everything. It sucked. Thankfully I had a lot of it backed up.

Hooking the computer back up the internet was an even more daunting task. If it wasn't for my savior, the masterful and very patient J, I probably would've thrown myself in front of a bus by now. It took us a few hours and three trips to Best Buy, but so far it seems to be going OK. I even got the IME bar back up and going. It still disappears when I drop it into the tool bar, but at least I've figured out how to make it show up again.

The new router is pretty amazing. I can't believe how fast my downloads are now. Well, most of them anyway. I'm still working on replacing a bunch of them, but I've got plenty of time (not going back to work until the middle of January). So I've got time to fight with the computer and get it back up to speed. I doubt it will be 'good as new' ever again, but I'll take what I can get for now. After seeing J's laptop, I'm seriously considering buying it from him. *laughs* That thing is pretty sweet. Unfortunatly after this computer mess, I'm pretty broke. I imagine most of my income tax return will go to paying off my credit card. *sigh*

That being said, I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season. Thanks J for all your help, I'm so relieved you bail me out all the time with this stuff. *laughs*

You Disagreed With My Stance on Global Warming--

...so in my next novel you're going to be a pedophile! Take that!

What is it with famous authors acting like toddlers?

Mistral's Kiss by Laurell K Hamilton

My first impression of this newest installment of the Meredith Gentry series: short.

Only a mere 200 and some pages. The first six chapters were nothing but tedious and boring sex. That added up to about 72 pages, if I recall correctly. Where exactly is this story going?

Where was all the fun magical discovery? The witty characters? The wickedness and backstabbing? Most of the popular characters were hardly present in this book. And where was the plot? I don't think there was one, just a bunch of people running around screwing and cutting each other up. WTF is that?

Needless to say, I was left confused and disappointed. I kick myself for being surprised, considering Ms. Hamilton's work as of late has been less than stellar. I'm not sure if she needs to fire her editor or just take a long vacation.

I will say that the scenes with Sholto were interesting. I was glad for him and it tied up a few loose ends rather well. The ending was decent too, but most of the book lagged and bordered on boring. I was left feeling like I'd been robbed of a story that could've been so much more.

I keep reading Ms. Hamilton's books, hoping that they will return to their former format and style: interesting, well thought out, and fun to read. Each time I'm let down, and each time I have to ask myself why I waste money on these new books.

Please, Ms. Hamilton, I know from one of your several public meltdowns that you know your fans are unhappy with the turn your writing has taken. Would it hurt so bad to step back and listen? Without your readers, your stories are nothing. Or perhaps this isn't about telling a good story anymore, maybe it's just about pumping out as many crappy books as you possibly can to make some cash. If that's so, shame on you.

EDIT:

Seems I'm not the only one complaining. Here's an excuse, because I'll be damned to call it a reason, from the admin over at LKH's Forum.

Partially it was the deadline. Partially it was the next bit would have made that book 3-4 times as long. Laurell would rather not leave it with a cliff hanger if possible or something half done.

Also, if books exceed a certain size, it requires special binding. No one wants to go to that expense.

The entire post is laughable. LKH's writing for the last two plus years has gone down the crapper. All authors have deadlines and I can count quite a few who turn out amazing books. Some of them even while working on another project.

But it's the special binding explanation that really gets me. 212 pages is half a novel. Last year, Danse Macrabe was over 400 pages. Before that, most of the other books have pushed the 400 mark or more. So this was just a load of bull.

LKH is cashing in, plain and simple. Her fans have stated again and again they'd wait a few more months for a meatier, well written story. I suppose it's time to cut my losses and not "go through the expense" of buying anymore of her books.

Icons!

Tis the Season of...SCAMS

So I got this e-mail today:

Dear Friend,

Warm Regards from Blessed Mother

So, some stranger wants to give me 9 million dollars in the name of God? I knew religion was good for something!

Seriously though, you know there are people who are going to fall for this shit. Particularly the old and the brainwashed who think that because the G word is stamped all over the place it can't be bad.

Dear Cable Company

Your service sucks.

If there was any other provider in my area, I would drop you like the hot sack of poobar you are. I'm not sure what's worse, listening to that damn automated woman who sounds like she belongs on a sex-line or talking to your barely English speaking Pakistani several thousand miles away who has no friggen clue what the hell your company even does, let alone how it works, and can't string together six coherant words of English. I will say you made me laugh when said employee told me it would take three days to get a technician out to fix both my TV and Internet service. I'm glad to see you took my advice and got it fixed more promptly. However, I still hate you and the wood-brained gnomes who run your company.

Please go die in a fire.

I just wanted to say...

Yes! December is finally here!