I am now the proud owner of...

an HP laptop!

Although far from my dream machine (I would have loved a faster processor), it will have to do. Hopefully once I get online and see how fast it is, I'll be pleasantly surprised. Although from what everyone told me, I should have held out for the faster processor.

Unfortunately I got a $1000 bill for propane for the lake house. The lake house we've kept at 45 degrees since October. The lakehouse we spent two or three days at since then, days when we ran the heat up to a whopping 65 degrees until it went off when the woodburning stove or the room heater heated up enough to shut the heater off.

That $1000 was NOT expected; I was sort of thinking $700 or $800, so there goes the extra $200 or $300 for the upgraded laptop...

It does have the memory I was looking for (4GB/500GB) and I bought a wireless router - useless, by the way, until we get internet back. Internet, TV, and phone have been out since Saturday night, thanks to Mother Nature's hurricane-without-a-name! (That's what the weather stations are calling the storm - 75mph gusts = F1 hurricane!!!) I did call the house and the machine answered so I'm hoping that's a good sign, that all things cable-related are back up and running. We were lucky enough not to lose our electricity; neighbors on the street behind us have been without electricity since 6pm on Saturday night, and they have children and lots'o'food in their refrigerator and freezers.

I wonder, all you techy readers, if I can upgrade a processor later on... or is it simply cheaper to get a new laptop in a few years...

Well, gotta run - am posting this during working hours so I don't want to spend too much time on it...

Later, dudes!

Laptop Update

Well, Krysss (one of my readers! Yay, I have another!), I haven't gotten my laptop yet.

I sort of decided one day to just buy one of the HPs in Costco and narrowed it down to one of the three they had there. Then I paid for it, and then it was out of stock and then they credited me for it. And that sucked.

Then I started asking the IT guys at work. We have quite a large IT department and apparently it's like your favorite flavor of ice cream: every one of the guys I talked to had a different opinion!

So now, desperate as I am to get one I'm going to do a little digging on the Dell site and finally make a decision. My problem is that I always assume "as is" isn't good enough and I start upgrading and my custom laptop goes from a base price of $849 (which is within my budget) to oh, I don't know, $1200, $2300... and then I get discouraged and I stop and another week goes by without a laptop!

An internet friend just got a Sony Vaio and said her hubby got if for her after a lot of research. So I ask Tony at work about it and he doesn't like them, they last 2 years and then they have to be replaced. No way, Jose! I'm not buying another one in 2 years! When I get this it has to last at least 5 before I can even begin to think of going through this again!!!

Anyone of my 12 readers have an opinion about what laptop I should buy? Here's some of what I'm looking for: 4GB/500GB, a pretty good processor (I'm not a gamer but I will be adding Photoshop and I don't want to wait minutes for my photos to open!), a screen somewhere around 15"-17" (I'd LOVE the bigger screen but don't want to spend that money and then I have to worry about a case; apparently it's not so easy to find a laptop case for the 18"+ screens...), reliable, Windows 7 (64-bit), and Office Professional (2010 if timing allows).

Suggestions?

Sales Conference

No, I'm not dead.

I'm starting Sales Conference.

I will be in meetings from 9am to 4:30pm, today, tomorrow and Thursday.

Tonight I have dinner at Anthony David's in Hoboken.

Tomorrow I have dinner at Court Street in Hoboken (yummm!!!).

Thursday I have a manicure appointment at 6:30pm.

Friday Jack and I have dinner at Frank's Waterside in North Bergen.

I have sporadic access to voice mail and email, and unless I stay up really late and fall asleep during the meetings, virtually no access to the Internet and this blog.

Until the weekend. When it turns C.O.L.D. When double digits would feel like summer (or at least spring). When I have a three day weekend. When I take Mom's laptop to the lake and hack into my neighbor's wireless.

OH. BIG NEWS! You all know how much I miss my mom (she's in AZ visiting my sister P - who, by the way, I also miss, bigtime!).

I GOT TO SEE MY MOM THE OTHER NIGHT!!! P got herself a webcam and with Mom's laptop we were able to video chat. Okay, I can handle Mom visiting P if we can do this once in a while. Just for the record. (Although I'd still like her home, she can stay by you for a while longer, P!)

This has pretty much decided it for me. It's time for me to get either a webcam for my desktop, which will most likely be the route we go, or a laptop (which I'm resisting simply 'cause I hate their keyboards and the darn non-mouse-pad). And Mom, you'll just HAVE to leave your house once a week or so to come over to mine and you can video chat with P, a NICE change from "just" a daily phone call (or three!).

It has begun. Computer trouble.

Whilst I LOVE playing on them and with them, I HATE them. I.Am.Not.a.Programmer.

But I have some brains. Sometimes they're a bit mushy, but I do have some. And when the cable-guys came in and installed my online modem doodad, I asked them: "What about my current dial-up ISP?" And.They.Said.They.Fixed.It.

They.Didn't.

They did supposedly click where they were supposed to click to tell the computer to ignore the three-lettered ISP that begins with M and ends with N.

And it did. For an evening.

Then last night I went online to show DH how to get online and look stuff up and sell stuff on Craig's list (his newest obsession and get-rich-quick-idea). I clicked on a link in a message, in order to reply to that poster, and I got an error.

So after talking to a friend, I uninstalled M-N Dial Up, apparently successfully, until the very end where it said it would reboot and it didn't. So I tried to shut down and start up again, so that the uninstall would take effect, and my computer wouldn't shut down.

So I called the cable-guys. And their tech support suggested he take control of my computer and designate Microsoft Outlook as my email manager since I didn't want a cable email address. (Oh, I almost forgot - I didn't get any manuals or instructions with the new computer/phone/TV thingee like my friend did who had the same thing installed two days ago. Cable-guys suggested I go to Paterson to pick them up at the store. Paterson??? NJ??? Are you kidding me???)

And it didn't work. I still have a rundll32.exe error. I know it's serious. And I know it has something to do with "panes of glass" and the operating system, but I don't know how to fix it. So cable-guy told me to call the computer manufacturer.

I did. And I HATE them, too! This is the 5th piece of equipment from a company that starts with H and ends with P and I don't like them any more than I did the first time I had trouble. Do not ask me why we keep buying them. I'm not paying for these items so I just say thank you and open the box and keep my fingers crossed.

Here were my two options:
1) Pay $99.95 for an extended warranty that includes virus protection for a year. (My response: No thanks. I just paid for Norton Anti-Virus for two years last night so I don't need that.)
2) Pay $49.95 for the "event."

Fifty freakin' dollars for them to read off a piece of paper how to fix my problem????? No way. No how. Not a chance.

I slammed the phone down on them.

DH gets REALLY stressed when I go ballistic over computer problems 'cause he can't help me fix it. He's clueless when it comes to computers, and actually, so am I. I just use them. And drop the f-bomb a few hundred times while I'm doing it.

I emailed my friend to see if her brother had an idea about fixing it. She's very computer savvy, too, and suggested reinstalling Windows. She said she'd come over next week and help me.

Thank the dear Lord for friends who understand computers.

I'll keep you posted.

Welcome to the 21st century!

I've heard that several times in the past 24 hours.

As of 6pm yesterday, we are the proud owners of an Optimum Triple-Play account. This means that we're on line via our cable, we have 200+ channels on our TV and just for sh-ts and giggles, Optimum will handle all of our land-line phone calls for the reasonable rate of $29.95 per month.

This means, my friends, that I can actually open emails at home.

This means that there is no longer any reason for me to do my personal email reading and writing at work when I arrive there at 7:30 in the godawful morning! (I'm not really, deep down, a morning person!) This means that I can actually spend my hours at work - well - working. Wow. What a concept.

It also means I can read my daily favorite blogs at home 'cause my computer will actually access them in less than 10 minutes. Whatever will I do without dial-up access??? Ah, modern technology!

In a few minutes, I'm actually going to be giving DH his first computer lesson on the new system.

Wish me luck.

So much of my writing recently has been construction-oriented that you'd almost think there was nothing else going on in my life. Wait a minute. Nothing else IS going on in my life! But I'm going to write about non-construction stuff today.

A sad story...

My sister's cat, George, died last week. When I called P to tell her how sorry I was and how much I loved her, she said something so poignant that I haven't been able to get it out of my head (and I'm paraphrasing): "I heard somewhere that although you might have lots of pets in your life, that there's always going to be one who's your soul mate, and George was mine."

I didn't know George well, but I loved him - he was (I think) a Russian Blue and he was absolutely gorgeous. His sister-of-the-heart, Camille (another of P's cats who died several years ago) had stunning markings; she was gorgeous. But George? I loved the way he looked. I'm not a cat person, but I could have truly enjoyed being owned by George. I don't know what it is I liked so much about him - I only "met" him a few times. There was something about him, though, something that I really liked. I feel so bad for P - it's not easy to lose someone you love, especially someone with whom you've spent almost every day of the past 15 years or more...

I asked P to send me a picture or two of George, or of George and Camille. I like what I can create on a scrapbook page, even though I'd never describe myself as artistic, and I offered to make a page for George that I could frame (or she could frame) for her wall.

He will be missed.

On to other topics...

I went to Best Buy yesterday to drop off my camera for repair. The little door that holds the batteries in broke when I dropped the camera. Yes, the damage was my fault. But I paid for an extended warranty and by God, I will try to get it fixed without having to pay for it! I picked up my nephew (he jumped at the chance to go to BB) and we went.

Now I didn't go in cold-turkey. I called first. I sat on hold for 2o minutes, only to hang up, sit on hold for another 10 minutes, then talk to someone not from the Repair Center, and finally got in touch with Customer Service. CS told me that it's okay if I don't have my receipt; I'm registered online so they can look me up with my phone number. She told me to come in and go to the camera department.

So in we went, right to the camera department. She sent me to Customer Service. There was one line, roped off and marked with a sign that read "Returns and Exchanges." There were two other registers marked "In Store Pick Up" and "Customer Service," and there were lines of people in front of each.

So I got on line in front of the Customer Service sign, behind two Spanish guys who had an HP printer in an unopened box. There was a woman talking to the clerk in front of them. CS finished with the woman, then the two men approached the girl. They spoke briefly, then the guys picked up their box and went their merry way.

AND THE WOMAN ON LINE IN THE "RETURNS AND EXCHANGES" LINE CUT IN FRONT OF ME.

Okay. That set me off, I admit. So I walked up behind this woman who made a return and waited my turn there so no one else from the Returns and Exchanges line could cut in front of me.

They sent me to stand on line at the Geek Squad counter, after pulling my extended warranty number up on the computer, asking me if I had any other Canon camera under warranty with them "'cause the numbers don't match." No. And I don't have any other camera under warrantly with them either, thank you very much.

So I stood on line. Four registers opened, people at each, with one guy standing at the counter with no one helping him. Some guy walked in carrying a PC and he proceeded to walk up to the counter in front of me. When the Geek finished helping the person in front of me, he started to wait on this guy instead of asking "Who's next?"

My head exploded.

I threw my hands in the air and started huffing and puffing. "Oh, were you next?"

Duh... Yes.

The guy with the PC apologized and nicely chatted with me while the Geek took his sweet time taking my info. I felt bad and apologized for overreacting, but I was on my 2nd or 3rd line and had been waiting... He was very nice and we talked for a few moments, while the Geek confirmed what, when, where, why and how...

So again, sorry, mister, for being such a bee-atch.