Operation New Computer is a Go!

I am finally back with a new computer! It only took 2 weeks... I think. So did I miss anything?

While my computer was borked, I managed to borrow my mom's laptop for a few minutes each day. I think I got one daily done in that time... good thing it had already been written the week before. haha Between starting a new job (where my sleep schedule has completely changed) and using a borrowed laptop that is shared between everyone else in the house, I didn't get more than 20 minutes at a time on the computer. Frustrating but couldn't be helped.

Plus, her laptop is old as the hills, slow, and very annoying to try to use with any proficiency. Nothing is set up how I like it to be used. It basically makes me hate using the computer when I can't use mine.


So, I have a new computer now. My bookmarks are probably lost, as I'm not sure if I can find my code for FireFox Sync. And I'm not even sure it updates as I add new bookmarks or if I was supposed to do that manually. I'll give it a try if I find my list of computer stuff. It is around here somewhere. I'm still crossing my fingers hoping that all my files are still intact on the desktop hard drive. I haven't gotten it to my computer guy yet for him to look. It will SUCK if the hard drive is gone. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

So the new computer is nice. I'm happy with it even though it cost more than I planned to shell out at the moment. It is a Toshiba Satellite P755D laptop. 6GB of RAM and 640GB hard drive. Apparently the processor is decent but I don't know squat about computers. I just know that my desk top was a 3.2 on the Windows Experience Index with fairly consistent scores from 3.2 to 3.6. This new one is a 5.9. If you know what the numbers mean, lucky you. I just know that higher numbers is supposedly better. This new computer got a 5.9 for the graphics and primary hard disk. It has a 6.5 for gaming graphics, a 6.8 processor, and a 7.3 for RAM. Good yes?

I'm working on naming the new computer. I don't know why... someone told me during my first NaNo that all electronics should have a name. I think that is where I got it. Anyways, so I had to come up with names. The name of my desktop and my netbook change frequently though. The netbook has been Pipsqueak, Thumbalina, and Purple Polly. The last name it held was Peaches... not because it is orange-ish but because of the baby from Ice Age. It is my favorite movie series after all. The desktop was named Grumpy for the longest time as it had some issues. It was 8 years old, so it fit. Lately, I had been calling it Gramps though... might be why it decided to give up the ghost finally. So for this new one, Harvey is jumping out at me. On the bottom right of the screen edge, the words harmon/kardon is printed and I immediately thought "Har-don" for a name. Of course, I can't use that. So Harvey is probably going to be it for a while at least.

So, now that Harvey has been introduced, on to other business. My daily posts are going to be limited now that I am working, especially since I am still working on the transcription of my final Immo1 edit. Even more so if my file is gone. Let's hope not but I'll let you know about Immo1 when I find out. So as for daily posts, they aren't going away 100%. I'm going to keep a few of them, namely Tuesday Treat, Thursday Thought, and Friday Five. I'll add more in as I figured out a good schedule that optimizes my free time. I hate that I have to cut out over half of my dailies but I love having a job and I love having time for sleep... something has to be limited until I find a balance. Other posts will continue as they come along... one good thing about limiting the dailies is that I will be able to write more writing posts. Since this is a writing blog after all. :)

So stay tuned for Immo1 updates, new semi-daily posts, and actual writing stuff. I'm very glad to be back online!

My Computer is Borked!

No idea what I did to my computer but it is broken. *sigh* The monitor will not come on after a restart. It says immediately that it is going to sleep. So my pc isn't booting from hibernation. I think it is a video card issue but I'm not sure. I'm not a computer person by any account. It isn't the monitor so I'm hoping it is a video card. Until I can get on a computer that isn't the size of a shoe (this netbook), I'm suspending my daily stuff. I'll keep you updated and will hopefully be back to regular posting by tomorrow evening or within a few day.

Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS

Daily Posts to Resume

I really enjoyed the past couple months writing a daily post on a specific subject. It allowed me to share some of my interests without talking about myself. Over the past few months, until NaNo took over my life (and blog), I managed to share some of my favorite fairy tales, thrift shopping locales, and books. I also shared some personal stories and helpful information. It is my hope that readers have enjoyed these posts as much as I have.

I know that as a writer, I should be pushing my writing. But the fact of the matter is that I don't like to do that. Yeah, yeah. I'm supposed to be branding myself for the interwebs. Meh. I enjoy writing, just as I enjoy a myriad of other things. After a lot of soul searching and debate, I finally decided what I will be writing on from December 1st until I feel inclined to change it up again.

Here is my *new* list of dailies (and a short explanation for each) to look forward to once the madness of NaNo is over:

Monday Machinations: So a machination by definition is [intrigue, plot, or scheme]. On Mondays, I am going to address such things, be it current events, famous historical episodes, television shows/movies/books, whathaveyou. We'll see if I can get really creative when I'm digging around.

Tuesday Treats: It seems like every month has a holiday built around food. Here in the north, we had Sweetest Day on the 3rd Saturday of October. All of us Americans had Halloween on the 31st of October and Thanksgiving on the 4th Thursday of November. Then Christmas rolls around for our Christian Americans soon. Pagans have their own holidays around this time of year: Mabon, Samhain, and Yule (the actual names might be different depending on the particular Pagan flavor). Hanukkah, Yom Kippur, Kwanzaa, and many others join the list. And those are just holidays that have passed recently or are coming up soon! I am going to take the opportunity to post some of my favorite recipes on Tuesdays, possibly with pictures. I highly doubt they will be *my* pictures so I will try to site where I lifted the recipe and the photos whenever possible.

Wednesday Weird: Getting your news from mainstream news outlets is like getting ice cream from a butcher. You might get *something* resembling ice cream, but all bets are on it *not* actually being ice cream. I just made that up. Anyways. Weird news happens all the time. My friends share the strangest stuff in my Facebook newsfeed. Yahoo news has a section of their site dedicated to it. Wednesday is one of those days that we all need some funny in our week. I'm going to find weird news, pictures, videos, etc. to post on Wednesday. I'll be sure to provide commentary on why it struck me as odd. Chances are, it won't be why *you* find it weird. I'm weird like that.

Thursday Thought: I like quotes and inspirational sayings. I tend to share the funniest on my personal Facebook page. I find myself fascinated by idioms and colloquial sayings. Thursdays will be dedicated to such things until I get bored with it. I lived in the South for a long time so I have a lot stored up that I try to avoid using in regular conversation. Maybe I can get the uniquely Southern sayings out of my system.

Friday Five: This seemed to be a pretty simple daily post in the past so I will be continuing my Friday Fives. It shares a little bit of information about myself without going overboard. I think I'm going to try to pick a theme for each month and tailor the lists to the theme. Maybe. We'll see what December has in store.

Saturday Salute: Anyone that knows me understands that I resolutely support our troops. I may not support the government and the status quo, but I always support the troops. I'm going to use Saturdays as a means to talk about different branches of the military (briefly, I promise) and things pertaining to it. I may recognize a particular event, a person, etc. Who knows.

Sunday Scene: I am a bit of a dork. I love John Hughes films from the 80's. There are many other films that I look on very fondly filmed over the past few decades (less so much the current decade). So imagine my thrill when I found that there are several sites that have uploaded the scripts to many popular movies?! I'll be picking some scenes from my favorites to share with you. Don't worry, I will make sure to provide the link to said scripts when I capture them.

So what do you think about those new daily postings? Any qualms? Better suggestions? I'm open to change so long as it is interesting and will keep me entertained. :D

Love is love, no matter the back story. <3 DS

600 views and counting

600 views and counting! Whew! I never thought I'd get this much traffic in such a short amount of time. I'm loving this! To all you visitors, hello! Stick around, comment, and share!

On a side note, I was up uncharacteristically early this morning and found myself looking for something to do when it hit me that NaNoWriMo is officially 100 days away according to the site. I have spent the last 8 hours writing up my own NaNo dailies for October and November. I have yet to determine if I will write the regular dailies during October and November. It is a maybe for October, and a most likely no for November at this point. That is good and bad to me. The bad thing is that I love writing the daily blogs. They make me feel creative and productive, no matter how short or weird they get. The good thing is that a break from the dailies will give me time to come up with new material. Friday Five will probably stick around. Wednesday Wiki too since there is little chance that I'll run out of random Wikipedia pages. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday are all subject to change though. If you have an idea for something I could write about on a specific day, post a comment or shoot me an email.

Are you going to participate in NaNo2011? Check out the website and come back for NaNo dailies starting October 1st! I'll post my NaNo details sometime in August or September. I'm trying to decide if I should stay with my original home group or merge into the current local home group.

A daily "thing"

So I've been reading a lot of blogs and saw that a lot of people do the Friday Five, where they make a list of 5 things. The topic of the list is random, but all the things on the list are related. I suppose it is like Twitter's Follow Friday where users use #FF and list folks they think their followers should follow as well. I've seen variations of themes for different days and I've come up with my own based on my interests.

Monday Moods: We all have them. I like to read about moods and emotions, their causes and effects, and with what those various moods are associated. I'd like to try to associate the topics with either personally relevant moods at the time, pop-culture, and general interest.

Tuesday Tales: I love fairy tales. I especially like reading about the origins of those tales and their adaptations over the years. I will pick a fairy tale and discuss it and its various incarnations in literature, film, and theater when applicable.

Wednesday Wiki: Wikipedia is a wealth of (sometimes reliable) information. When I'm bored, I like to use the "random article" feature and read about something new. I'll find a random link, post it here, and talk about it.

Thursday Thrift: I love thrift stores. It is like Christmas morning in a warehouse. There are tons of stuff all over the net about them so I'll share links to fun articles, talk about the history of specific chains, and just basically be a cheap fangirl.

Friday Five: A random list of five connected things. I can't really describe it beyond that because the topic is really, really random.

Saturday Solicitation: Book reviews! While I will probably do some book reviews throughout each week, I want to make a point of doing at least  one a week and Saturday is that day. Got a book you'd like me to read and review? Contact me to make that happen. I prefer open format ebooks, but if you have an .html or .txt version, I'll take that too.

Sunday Sales: Okay, so this is something like a book review, but not really. On Sunday, I want to plug some books/movies that I am anticipating, authors that I know with books out, and tour happenings.

This is a tentative plan for now, but I hope that it works out well because I love this idea. My posts are random as it is, but at least this is a great way to share some of my interests without going the "me, me, and me" route.