I took my PC in to work Wednesday, but Dean didn't have time to get to it. So, I brought it in again yesterday. What a pain in the ass. I had to wait for the rain to ease up a little bit. Then I had to figure out how I was going to carry the umbrella and PC, open the car door and hold the passenger seat up to get the PC on the rear floor board. Since our driveway is slightly uphill, the car door and seat didn't want to stay where I put them. I also had to put a garbage bag over the PC. Add all this to driving in the rain to work and getting there too late to get a parking space near the door, and I was highly irritated.

We installed the RAM and ethernet card in less than 5 minutes. He then reformatted the hard drive and installed the XP Pro. This took about an hour, most of it waiting for the PC to do the work. We then tested the ethernet, and got the updates on XP. We then installed the antivirus and firewall, and set them up and got updates. And we even configured my router.

At home, I installed Work and Excel. I re-loaded my MP3s and pictures. After that, I'd had an assful of working on the computer that day. I received the DSL modem yesterday. It will be activated sometime today, but they won't be out to switch the jack to the main number until Monday. I can still manually dial up to my old ISP, though. I just have to figure out how. I'm waiting until the DSL is completely installed and working before I disconnect the other phone line and cancel the dialup.

Something's up with my speakers. I either need a driver or to change a setting or something. I'll ask Dean about it today. So far, that's the only snag. I have to get a new surge protector that's DSL approved. I think mine's okay, but Dean said you should replace them every 2-3 years. Mine came with my PC over 4 years ago. Eh, couldn't hurt.

So, with the stress of the upgrade, replacing our stove, painting the bedroom and being in disarray because of it, work pressure and stress, and being on call this month, I'm a bit tense. Good thing I have a massage scheduled for this afternoon.

2/1

Well, I had a mini breakdown or panic attack or something last night. I got the printer successfully hooked up and XP miraculously had a driver. I say miraculously because the XP website had no driver for it, it's over 4 years old, and the Gateway system analysis tool I did before the reformat said it was obsolete. Fuck you, it works just fine. Anyway, I then tried to install the scanner software. Everything was fine until I re-booted. I then got my first Blue Screen of Death in XP. Apparently a driver was funky (duh), and the message said something about not booting up to prevent damage to the hard drive. Shit. I knew I'd screw something up. I had my, um, episode, tried to reboot several times, logged on in safe mode, deleted the offending file, and quit for the night. I'll have to wait for DSL to download the driver from HP's site. Why does this shit stress me out so much? I guess I'm afraid of royally fucking it up and not knowing how to fix it or who to call without annoying the hell out of them.

I don't think Dean is annoyed with me. He and I and another woman from work were in my office yesterday shooting the shit and being our normal sarcastic selves. He even found some spare speakers for me to take home to test. At least he didn't run away screaming after helping my anal-retentive self upgrade my PC.

So, yeah, my shitty speakers went out again. This was the replacement that Gateway sent me after the first set went out for good. They'd go out, and I'd call tech support. They'd have me do various things to restore them - unplug, let sit, re-plug; change settings, retrieve drivers from restoration disk... Well, none of that worked, so I bought new ones. Mothership Connection and Nothin' But a G Thang hit pretty hard with this big ass subwoofer. Fo' shizzle.