January 13, 1999.
Well, I finally did it.
"Did what, Rob?" you wonder.
What I did was, well, I finally bought a new computer. After years and years of holding out and modifying my sweet old jalopy of a 386-40 (carrying a whopping 8 megabytes of RAM, a gigabyte of hard drive space, a sound card, and many other parts that weren't originally part of my very first computer) as far as I could, I broke under the combined pressure of taking a Java course and wanting to do some at-home contract work (as well as having the resources to rework my entire website using Photoshop) and used this sudden need for processing power as the justification to surrender so, so very much money over to my local computer store in exchange for a brand new system. Now, mind you, I am a poor starving student, and even though I nearly broke the bank purchasing a new computer, by no means is it the sweetest system you ever did see. Oh no. But I think it will do for my purposes. I bought:
A Pentium-II 333 mhz on an AGP motherboard with a 100mhz bus, featuring:
Of course, after putting down $250 as a deposit for the system (which shall be ready, to my eager anticipation, on Saturday), I learned this morning from my friend, and new roommate, Mike, that I could have purchased the same system from his school for the same price, with a 17-inch monitor. Oh well. He's taking a networking specialist course at one of those wonderful fly-by-night business colleges this winter (hey, it's paid for by the government -- wouldn't you go?), and they get all their equipment wholesale, selling to their students at the same price. So that aside, anyway (because I'm stuck using my 14-inch monitor until I decide I really want to cough up two or three hundred smackarooneys for a larger one), I'm excited and happy and only moderately uncertain about how to go about transferring absolutely everything I have onto my new computer. I was thinking about yanking out my larger hard drive and installing it in this new system, but I'm giving my old computer, pretty much intact, to Broken, so I don't really want to cannibalize it.
J a n u a r y 15 |
On Friday I gave the following invitation to someone special:
You are cordially invited....to a day of exquisite
quality time with your
own personal Rob
starting Friday afternoonBring only yourself to a
day spent at the gallery,
featuring hours and hours
of relaxation,
conversation, a yummy
dinner, and the greatest
massage you've ever had.
Movies may be watched.
And today we spent the relaxing and talking and laughing and exploring, smiley and euphoric with the simple pleasure of each other's company. We cuddled, we ate the most delightful dinner, we watched cheesy television programs and dealt with cheeseheads in some internet chat rooms. It was all too briefly over, and didn't turn out in precisely the way detailed in all of my arrangements and schemings, but I'd do it all over again exactly the same way, even including the miserable half-hour walk to and from her house in the blowing snow at -20 celsius temperatures just so I could see her safely home.
Tomorrow I'm picking up my brand new computer, which is really exciting, but if you think even a few minutes of lying on a bed before braving the cold while someone looks down at you, smiling, and playing with your hair is overshadowed in any way by even a delicious delight like a shiny new Pentium-II 333 -- well, you need to get outside more.
Oh, and a glorious happy birthday wish to my friend Vera, whose birthday I most ignorantly went unaware of, but wish to celebrate all the same. I've never met her, and probably never will, but formerly she belonged to one of the souls I now own, and has been more than a sweet, sympathetic ear quite quite often, and I'm hoping she got many presents and even more love. Well, anyway, here's even more love for you.
J a n u a r y 16 |
Brought to you by Jolt Cola, with
the buzzing and mild irritation of
caffeine induced paranoia.
