Wrapping up that which has been a rather disagreeable week, I came home today (after having left work at around seven in the evening) to find my laptop hard drive has failed. At boot and throughout post, pressing my ear up against the bottom plate which holds the hard drive mounting bracket inside the chassis reveals the classic "whir, click, whir, click" of a drive gone bad.

Needless to say, I was furiously mad on my drive to dinner. The only thing that helped calm me down, besides my rather well-prepared Darden Cajun blackened mahi-mahi fish dinner with rice pilaf, was the knowledge that I had a backup copy of the files I would miss the most. Having just recently formatted my laptop, I conducted the customary LAN dump to a desktop system, but for some reason, did not delete it once I was back up and running on my laptop. And boy, am I glad for that.

I have decided I will attempt one temporary recovery solution I have learned about from several hardware focused sites and forums. The suggestion was to place the hard drive in a freezer for an hour or so, shrinking the metallic components of the drive unit and hopefully loosening-up and stickiness that may be causing the failure. I really have nothing to lose by trying. I do have some data that I would like to recover that was not in existence when my backup to the desktop was made, but nothing so significant to cause me suicide on failed revival.

So now I am left in a difficult situation that I must think about and act upon shortly. The big deal for me is replacement. Hard drives for my older system are expensive, so do I spend the $200 and get one for my computer, built in 1999, or do without a machine for a while and save up to buy a new notebook.

These questions and others will be pondered this weekend, during which I will be seeing the band Train at the House of Blues. With any luck, the place will not burn to the ground whilst I am inside.

…of why I cannot understand how any homosexual could vote for and approve fully of the job President Bush is doing.

As the [US Anglican/Episcopal Church] meeting opened, President Bush, who is a Methodist Christian, suggested that gay people should not be allowed to wed.

"I believe a marriage is between a man and a woman, and I think we ought to codify that one way or the other," he told reporters in Washington.

[...]

Responding to a question from journalists, Mr Bush said it was important to "respect each individual" but that did not mean he needed to "compromise on an issue like marriage."

"I think we ought to codify [marriage between a man and a woman] and we've got lawyers looking at the best way to do that," he said.

The president declined to pass moral judgment on homosexuals but commented that he was "mindful that we're all sinners". Some Christian groups welcomed the president's remarks enthusiastically with the Reverend Pat Robertson calling for a constitutional amendment on the marriage issue.

from Gay showdown for US Church

Looking out the second story office window next to the desk where I have been working until I get a little more of a permanent desk and computer, I can see a most beautiful storm brewing around me. Of course, I am sure I will not be thinking it so beautiful when in thirty minutes I will probably be driving through hell, if hell was a wet, windy highway.

I will be working at our company's secondary office for the next two days to help with Transaction Coordination at that office. It will be nice to work with someone for a few days, while at the same time not really focusing on computers and such.

In other news…
   Friday was fun.
   Saturday was fun.
   Sunday was productive.

Someone I have spoken with briefly online, but have never met told me that he saw me driving out of my neighbourhood over the weekend. Turns out he lives in the same subdivision as I. Small world.

"I was blind, and now I can see!"

After a very frustrating time and the requirement of my having to get an alternate copy of Windows XP Professional, my computer is now well on its way to becoming usable again. As I write this, I am finalizing my customizations, configurations and settings and getting ready to copy back my documents and applications. I will be heading to bed soon, though, so I will have to wait until tomorrow to finish.

In other news, I was forced today to disable hot linking of images on my domains due to people leeching off of my graphics. If any graphic here is something you would like to share with others, please just provide a link to the page on which it appears. And to those who were the offenders: make your own graphics and pay for your own data transfer.

Work was great yesterday. I had written a proposal and some new policies and procedures that were given the thumbs up by the owner today with nary a commentary or alternate suggestion. I was also helping and making people happy left and right. It was a really busy day and I was glad for it to conclude, but looking back it was really refreshing. It is really nice to be in a position of making a difference again.

Tonight I am supposed to attend an art opening for a friend from back in the Yab Yum days and there was also conversation about there being an after-work happy hour run. Come hell or high water, though, my computer will be fully operational by Saturday. Sad as it may be, I am becoming ever more lost without my companion, calendar, message manager and contact book: Outlook. Saturday is Erica's birthday party, but I will be stopping for a very brief hello at another party (Travis at the Waverly). Chris will also be making the trek from Tallahassee to attend Erica's party, so I will get to chat with him and wish him a happy belated birthday.

I would make a pretty graphic to go along with this entry, but Photoshop is not yet installed. Instead, close your eyes now and imagine something that would immediately bring an ear-to-ear smile to your face.

My computer is old and hates me. I can see my car repair fund is quickly turning into a new computer fund. I will not be online for the next few days out of frustration. If you really need me for something, you can e-mail me, since I will be checking it regularly.