elanya

I had a really good morning at work and then a really meh afternoon - I just ran out of steam Plus I'm sorta supposed to be looking into cloud networking and storage and I have no idea what our needs are, really, and also I don't really understand the services offered. All I know is we need to have our stuff stored in Canada, for various reasons.

We have two server stacks but we don't have anyone who can take care of them, and apparently this will be cheaper (I'm not actually convinced - we have fairly specific needs, and a fair amount of data already and the potential to generate a *lot* more). I think the director is thinking only in terms of cost for storage but we need more than that. So, we;ll see. Ennnnnh. This is one of the less fun/neat things about the job :p

However I think I'm go for first aid training next month! I haven't been certified since, like.... highschool. dang.

I went to knitting tonight, and we a goddamned hilarious bitches. It was great. And I finished the socks I was working on (barring end weaving). So now I need a new portable project! But I think I'll work on trying to finish the book I was reading first. It's been a while since I read much of anything other than DW and tumblr and articles linked on facebook.

I am excited for Space Swap to open next week, that will be good :3

Today has been A Day. On the one hand -I have been offered the museum job!!!!

On the other hand my 'exchange' laptop wound up being way more expensive than I'd planned/expected/hoped.

The new job will certainly help but it is annoying in the short term.

On the upside, it is just annoying and not financially devastating.

More when I'm not on my phone!

So I was organized enough to take my computer in this morning, more or less. It turns out Best Buy doesn't open until 10, though, so I spent about 20 minutes waiting outside. There wasn't really anywhere to go that was good to kill time that wasn't also a food place, and I wasn't hungry. If I had known it wasn't opened, I could have gone to the mall - if anything was open there yet, I could have gotten Bubby's birthday present. I do still have some time for that, at least, and some ideas.

Anyway - it was not a simple fix that they could do instore, which is what I suspected. So I bought a new external hard drive and backed up everything that was important that I could remember and reasonably grab. That was not everything, of course - I missed some fortunately easily re-creatable tax stuff (just calculations for exchange rates), some music, and maybe a cover letter or two? I think I have everything else *somewhere*. But it will be a few weeks. Fool that I am, I forgot to sign out of all the things, so, uh, I hope you're trustworthy, best buy people! This is what happens when I only commit to something at like 12:30 at night and then have to follow through with only an hour to do all the morning things. Of course, if I'd known BB wouldn't be open yet I could have done better :V Now I'm back on my old laptop, which works okay but has some quirks, like the fact that it is missing it's left arrow key and is, mysteriously, slow as hell. Still, it's like an old friend.

Things went well at the museum today - I finally managed to get a good 3d print of the scissors I scanned without them falling apart. We have a powder-and-binder printer so that we can print in colour (it's basically an inkjet with glue ;p), so pretty different from the plastic/metal extruding types people are maybe more familiar with. The way the scissors were oriented in the print bed meant that the handles were really really delicate, and they kept breaking before I could even put them in the glue bath. I'd also been having colour issues, but the structural integrity was way more problematic! I got that resolved - there is a bit of a trade off because of how the layers work, in that the surface is more clearly striated, but for the particular purpose I think it will be fine.

When I came home, I basically slept until dinner. Then Nugsy was a total wreck (overtired and still sick) and being a complete jerk about it, screaming and doing anything he could for any kind of attention, good or bad. And, of course, insisting that he was NOT tired (he was tired). His dad did eventually get him settled, demonstrating incredible patience, and I think he fell asleep pretty fast (shock!) I haven't heard him coughing tonight, though, so that's a good sign.

I did a little knitting, but this part of the pattern is pretty complicated and it was slow going. Watched some cooking shows and that's about it. I'll have to re-locate those job ads tomorrow to apply for them, since all my tabs were open on another computer and I don't have my chrome integrated enough to bring them up here.

I meant to, while I was doing other things, back up a bunch of stuff on this computer onto my external hard drive so that I could take it in to Best Buy tomorrow. That....didn't happen. I might take it anyway and take my chances. I don't have much on the go for writing atm.

Today is International Women's day. I wore a red shirt, and I baked cookies (chocolate with mini reeces pieces). I talked to a friend on gchat and was prompted to look at jobs, and there are a few I will try and apply for - one in Ottawa and one in Nova Scotia (Lunenberg). A project for tomorrow/Friday I guess!

It is windy AF out there. And I am stupid tired. I really hope I am not getting sick, as I was meant to be volunteering this weekend and I feel like that would be irresponsible, if I do have a cold. Which super sucks! But Nugsy is pretty sick right now, and probably I have been giving him too many hugs. I gave him a cuddle while we were trying to convince him to take his antibiotics, and just - you could tell he was not well. Too warm, among other things. And I'm pretty much out of the inhaler I need to keep my lungs from succumbing to terribleness. So I'll cross my fingers, and go to bed.

So I did wind up buying a new laptop after the old one gave me two hard-drive related BSODs in one night and then rebooted weirdly... I managed to recover files.... ad then I gave up and bought a new computer. I now have a 17" Lenovo G70 with Windows 10. I'm okay with Win10 - it is a million times better than 8. I am liking it pretty well but I am always slow to customize things. I put on a background (though I'm disappointed that I can't change the colour of the background the picture is on, bah), I ported over music and other important files. I installed mIRC and Chrome. I bought Word (don't judge me, I use t for a lot f things and prefer it still to alternatives I have tried :p)... I realized I need VLC and irfanview and a better music player... Suggestions? I'd had winamp on the old one but it wasn't my favourite. Not iTunes either, as I despise it. I guess I can give media player a shot ... *dubious* I'm also getting used t the new track pad, which behaves a bit differently than my old one , especially for scrolling. It doesn't seem to have an option for edge scrolling, only two-finger, and I keep accidentally zooming the screen in Chrome -_-

And what I came on to ask is - is semagic still the best client for crossposting between LJ nd DW? I figured someone out here might know....

But I'll accept other input on things I might want to install!

In other news, today I embark with naryrising and longpig on a road trip down to Texas, whee!

In other other news, I have an IMZY now - I haven't done much with it but if I can figure out a good way to crosspost *there* I probably will.

Well, after my last post, I got an email asking me to come for bilingualism testing for a job I applied for back in March. This is basically a weeding phase, but I'm confident I can pass it. Then maybe a real interview, eventually. The job is pretty much exactly what I was telling morbane that I wanted, but it is in Ottawa so I'd have to move. I already have tons of friends who live there, though, so that's cool.

The other thing that happened after my last post is that my laptop's issues came to more if a head. It can't find my desktop and some of its other important files... I have backed up all the things not previously backed up, I think, and am running more off a flash drive. None of the installed files are working, whee! I have a new machine coming on Friday. Thanks back to school sales!

And finally today I began my first forays into natural dyeing, and have some plain unbleached cotton sitting in a pot of tanniny water pre-alum mordanting, and I have a bunch of jars of dyestuffs to test out! I'm thinking of making a pillow or something. From my test scraps :)

I have three USB ports on my laptop, which is really not enough to start with. Especially considering that I am using a wireless headset to which one of those ports is dedicated. This foolishness is the main reason I haven't bothered to buy another usb-powered cooling pad once the fans in mine died. It still provides a lot of good airflow and I've not(yet) had any trouble with overheating.

I currently have one functioning USB port. This is a problem!

Does anyone out there have any ideas/suggestions on what I can do about this? I think I have a hub somewhere, but I'm not sure if the wireless toggle will work great with it, and it is dangly to begin with which is not a great feature for a laptop that spends so much of its time on a lap :|

Is there some technical thing I can try? The device manager seems to think they are all working fine, but this is patently untrue. The two on the right are not reading anything, and the sole port on the left is fine.

Anyone anyone? I bought the computer in December 2011, and it is a Toshiba Satelite of some variety.

Unrelated to computer woes, I had a really great day yesterday! Awesome sessions of both the Sunday games I'm in, plus I managed to fully process three loads of laundry, tidy my room and vacuum and duct in there as well. the only flaw is that I managed these two in the less optimum order, especially considering I decided on a whim to dust my ceiling fan blades and then basically couldn't breathe all night. I really should have worn a mask for that one. I also made turkey enchiladas and vaguely experimental coconut craisin cookies.

So, yesterday I placed an order through Toshiba Direct for a shiny new pre-made laptop. I used my Canadian credit card, because the money I was planning to use is in one of my Canadian accounts and it seemed to make more sense that way.

Yesterday evening I got a call from them, saying that they couldn't process my order because I'd used a foreign credit card. Now, my billing address and delivery address are both America. I have no idea why their system can't handle this, or why it shoudl matter. I can go to any actual store in the US and use that card. I have never had a problem using it anywhere else online, for that matter. I was pretty pissed when I talked to the person who called me (hah they just called again and left a voice mail - but I'm at work and not available to take it, so screw them for the moment), but they couldn't tell my why their system was so exceedingly absurd. They could only make suggestions (like 'get one of your friends to buy you the $600 laptop and pay them back! Or just use paypal!').

Now I am wondering if there is any logical reason for this? It makes me so cranky that I am considering cancelling the order. Am I overreacting to awful customer service? It isn't like I can't find another way to pay them, I'm just not sure I want to :p I'm also paranoid that it may be the same case even if I decide to order form somewhere else :p Maybe I should see how it goes when I call them back, but I am totally willing to take suggestions and opinions on the matter :V

Oh goddamnit - I was so busy today that I forgot to call the computer place until now, and they are closed.

Of *course* they never called me like they were supposed to :p

Dickbags.

Right, I'm off for the night - I need to run errands for Renfaire and such, and I probably won't be home from that in any decent time to make it worth coming back out here after.

I talked to the ordering lady at the store (who left me a voice mail.... probably either right before or right after I called, I'm not sure? I hope before), and we had a discussion about how they have a Partnership with Eastmark (I think) and how that does not do me any good as a customer when they are charging $50 more for a screen than most other places. Seriously, I could even get a screen by Monday using Amazon Prime for $109, with free shipping! Bah. Of course I called from home, and didn't have that info in front of me at the time. The best price I've found, though, is still $85+ $9 shipping, but I don't know how long that would take. Anyway, she told me she would look around and get back to me tomorrow.

The tech never emailed, of course, but at least when I did call back, she had the info I had asked her for.

So, that's like progress... At this point I wouldn't be able to pick it up before Monday anyway, unless it were ready by tomorrow, and that's not gonna happen anyway. Friday I am off to renfaire for the weekend. I'm back on Sunday, but they aren't open, so.... yeah, Monday.

Meh....