laurel's online journal

If I disappear for any length of time, it's because of my computer. It has been behaving strangely lately and I may have to take it in to the computer geeks to remove a very tenacious virus. I know there's some sort of virus on my computer because I've been seeing and hearing random ads for no good reason. I tried installing AVG to get rid of it, but it didn't work. I keep getting the blue screen of death and I'm afraid that soon, the computer won't boot up at all.

I've also been having a lot of pain in my right shoulder, something that happened to me before in 2010. I've got to get a computer desk again so I have a more ergonomic setup while I use my computer. That and maybe a back massager.

See ya when I see ya! :)

Wanted to see if anyone knew what was going on with this thing my computer does and how to make it stop. The other day, I downloaded some picture tubes for Paint Shop Pro. They were enclosed in an .exe file. I installed them. Turns out a few of the actual tubes were repeats of tubes I already have, so I'd like to delete them. The original tube, for instance, is "snowflake," so I named the repeat "snowflake2." But when I open the directory the tubes are in, the new ones won't show up. (I can see snowflake but not snowflake2.) When I go to open them in Paint Shop Pro (just to make sure they're really there), I can see them, but their icons have a little lock over them. I went in and made sure that my computer was configured to show hidden files, and it is. So why can't I see these files?

I'm on Windows 7, if that helps at all.

...coming to you from beautiful downtown DeskintheLivingRoom! Yaaaaaaaay!

My old computer setup wasn't the least bit ergonomic. I had my monitor on the bottom shelf of a tv cart and my mouse and keyboard on the floor, and I'd lie on the floor and work/play, sometimes sitting up indian style and working/playing. It was comfortable for over a year, but recently, not so much. So, after my shoulder felt better, I went back to this setup to see if it really was the problem, and unfortunately, it was. My shoulder started to painfully tense up once more last night. Damn. :( I was hoping I could get rid of my desk and have less furniture whenever I move to my new apartment, but no such luck. I dragged the desk in here last night, and after a bad arrangement that had me peering at the tv around the monitor, finally settled on putting the desk next to the tv. It looks nice. :) Took ages to get the tv moved over a couple feet (until I remembered I have little discs you can slide under the corners of the tv stand that make it easier to push across the floor), but it's done.

Getting older is no fun in this way. You can't lounge around on the floor in weird positions without hurting something. Now my keyboard and mouse are on a sliding shelf at waist level, which doesn't hurt much at all. My index finger is still puffy and a little numb, though, but I've noticed less numbness since last night. Which of course means "yes Laurel, you're exactly right, it was your weirdo computer setup that was causing ALL your pain."

But, now my butt falls asleep if I sit in this chair too long. Note: Put "comfy desk chair" on the list of things I'd like to buy when I have lots of extra cash... *smacks own butt to wake it up*

Aren't you guys glad you know that?! My life is so exciting! I'm sure the neighbors downstairs just looooved me last night, moving furniture at 4AM... I tried to be quiet, I really did, but I butterfingered a couple things, and then all my folders slid off the arm of the couch... ^_^;;

Guess which computer I'm using? ^_^ That's right, the one in my bedroom. I reinstalled aol, and I'm now online, but my computer probs are far from over.

First, I installed aol 9.0. The comp froze up three times while trying to sign on. Okay, let's try 8.0 instead. Fine, that works alright. But the comp still has problems booting up. It froze up a little while ago, I rebooted, and it took me 5 tries to get it to load the desktop! I'm going to look for a solution since I pretty much have to if I don't want to use that slow muthafucka in the living room. In the meantime, I'll save for a whole brand new computer, because that would be NICE.

I'm also going to ask Nancy what she did with her old computer; she just bought a new one and she said something about needing to do something with the old one when we went out to dinner a few weeks ago.

I had McDonald's today. And you ain't got none, and you ain't got none... mmmm love the McFlurrys. Weird thing, though. I ate the Happy Meal first, then my McFlurry. It sat there for a good five to ten minutes waiting to be eaten and it didn't melt at all. What kind of mutant alien ice cream is this? (Yummy, that's what!)

And now, time for pimping! The fairly final version of my latest fanfic is ready for reading. Ready, header?

Title: Fate is an Engineer
Rating: Adult17+ (NC-17) for graphic male/male sex and bad language (including multiple uses of the F word)
Summary: After being hypnotized and finding out he was attacked by a supernatural being, Paul Callan is balancing on the edge. A twist of fate crosses his path with a fellow investigator of the weird and strange, Dean Winchester, who is looking for his missing brother, Sam. But as they will soon find out, that twist of fate was engineered for reasons they could never imagine. A Miracles/Supernatural cross-over, which slashes Dean Winchester/Paul Callan.
Timeline: This story was finished at least a month before the season finale; the small parallels between it and the finale are a coincidence. (No spoilers, just a couple of small things.) Happens after the Supernatural episode "The Benders" and before "Shadow," which moves the Miracles timeline up to 2006.
Warning: Contains spoilers for all of Miracles and Supernatural up to "The Benders."

Beta Thanks: Special thanks to kaijawest and meredevachon for the wonderful, thorough beta treatment they gave this story.
Author's Notes: ...are multiple and long-winded and so can be read along with the story.

Fate is an Engineer

Will be cross-posted all over hell and damnation.

A couple other new stories were also added to the Adult section of the site, which can be found linked from here: Only After Dark

Note: The computer froze up before I could post this entry. I was so freakin' annoyed with losing it and having to retype it. Then, when I went to try again, LJ asked me, "Restore from saved draft?" And I did. And the whole post came back, just like that. WOW, that's a wonderful, handy little thing there. *hugs it* But man, this computer is bugging out.

I'm currently stuck using my old computer, which is in the living room, because my regular one did some funky thing tonight and won't sign online now. I'm hoping a nice long rest will fix it, but if not, I'll try reinstalling aol and see if that does it. If not still, I'll consider buying a new hard drive/tower/whatever. I'll have to save up for it, but at least I have this one until then.

Okay computer experts, tell me what happened. That computer has been locking up A LOT over the last few months. When it does, all I can do is reboot, which is what I did this time. Except it wouldn't reboot. I finally got it to boot up somewhat, and it said something to the effect of that there was an "error in the system registry" and that it would repair it on reboot. Rebooted. System registry seemed to be repaired. But after, it just kept refusing to get online. Won't even dial now, just opens that window, sits there, then says there was an error in connecting to aol. It doesn't say it can't detect the modem or anything of that nature; it just won't even try to dial in (still on dial-up, just fyi). So, is there something I can do to fix this?

I'm just glad I was able to get the computer to reboot at all. At first, it would reach a certain point, then refuse to go any further. I was freaking out there for a couple hours wrestling with that thing, thinking I might've lost everything on it. And I had just finished the final edit of "Fate is an Engineer"! Def wasn't looking forward to having to redo that, which would take hours and hours, AGAIN. I had no backup anywhere. Eeeeee, tense moment there, until I got it to reboot.

Whatsmore, do I need to buy a whole new tower, or just a new hard drive? I don't know a lot about the hardware of a computer. I can't afford to take this in to a computer repair shop. Honestly, it's not worth it, when a new tower would only be a few hundred dollars. I've been quite sick of this one locking/freezing up so much all the time anyway. Don't see the point of having it fixed when it's not all that special anyway. It has served me well, but it might be time to retire it. I'd still appreciate any advice you guys would have.

Visited le doctor today. He said I have an excess of ear wax in my right ear which is making that ear retain water, which breeds bacteria and then infection. They squirted stuff in there to melt and drain the wax. Also gave me some ear drops. SO EXCITING. At least it got me a couple days off. (My whole job revolves around listening to people yap all day with headphones in my ears; when your ear and neck feel like they are going to explode, that job becomes incredibly irritating and uncomfortable.)

I got my scanner card properly installed!! YAAAAAAAAAY!!! I took the cover off and took it out, then tried putting it in again, but nothing seemed different. So, I removed the video capture card so I could see what I was doing better. That really helped! I got on my knees, put as many fingers as I could get along the edge of the card, and leaned all my weight down on it. It felt like it went into the slot more, and I heard this quiet "fft" sound. But it was very subtle, so I wasn't sure if I got it in or not. I hooked the computer all back up and gave it a try. Scanner Test Successful!!! ::happy dance!!!::

Oh yeah, I also put the video cap card back in and it still works fine. That card just slides right in; a baby could put it in. The scanner card could take some lessons from that one.