By: T F Stern
T F Stern’s Rantings
Have you ever noticed how similar wallets and computers are? If you’ve been carrying around a wallet for any time, it becomes part of you. You know how it feels and where everything is located without having to think about it. The same holds true for computers; they become familiar to a certain extent.
Our desk top computer “blew its brains out” the other day; a violent image stolen from the fellow who diagnosed its failure to function. I’d have preferred something like, “It passed away in its sleep,” or “It ran away from the insane asylum.” Closer to the truth than discharging a loaded weapon in my office.
Fortunately we’d purchased Carbonite a year ago to back up all our files for just such an event. It might take a couple of days to recover all those “ones and zeroes,” but thank goodness for a little planning in advance. I have almost everything on CDs or memory sticks and could probably figure out where they all go; but this way all our files should look pretty much like they did before.
I can’t imagine having to reload every photograph or having to download all that music manually. I sure hope those files find order out of chaos as they filter across the internet. Imagine what it would sound like if Meatloaf got jumbled up with Chopin; mind boggling isn’t it?
We’d skipped Windows Vista and went from XP straight into Windows 7. Just wanted to sound technical for a few moments. I just checked on Carbonite’s progress; only one percent has been transferred, a little over 3,300 files. At this rate it will take a few days before the new computer will be useful. I only mention this because I know how often our internet connection is interrupted. Keep those fingers crossed, toss a dead chicken over the fence and spit.
If you put that in perspective, Egypt will have gone into total upheaval, oil will have jumped another ten dollars a barrel, Rahm Emanuel will have proclaimed all other candidates in Chicago ineligible, gotten a federal judge to have them removed from the ballot and declared himself Emperor of the Windy City. Nobody would be surprised.
The new computer shut down for an unknown reason, something to do with Windows 7 upgrades not being able to find a System Restore Point. It rebooted and Carbonite acted as if nothing had been accomplished, starting over from the beginning, again. The old computer may have died in its sleep; this brand new one might get shot if it keeps doing that. Are bullet fragments in the hard drive covered under warranty?
This article has been cross-posted to The Moral Liberal, a publication whose banner reads, “Defending The Judeo-Christian Ethic, Limited Government & The American Constitution.”
