Finally!

My laptop came back to me on Thursday. I spent that evening and Friday evening reloading programs onto it since they had reformatted the hard drive to fix the wireless card issue. Well, that's what I did until it finally gave me just a blue screen along with a nice error message. But even before I got that, something just didn't seem right about it.

Turned out that, when they reformatted my hard drive, they installed an earlier version of Windows XP. I don't know if that was what caused the error message, but it sure seems suspect.

At any rate, when I got home from alumni band on Saturday I decided to use my recovery CDs to reformat the hard drive once again in an attempt to save my laptop. I figured it couldn't hurt anything since it was unusable in its current state.

Luckily this worked and I am now cruising along with use of my laptop once again.

What bothers me is that I've always had such positive experiences with Gateway up until now. I bought my desktop from them over five years ago with no problems at all. And, up until this summer, my laptop has been great. Whenever anyone criticized Gateway products, I was the first to speak up about how great mine were. I guess I won't be able to do that anymore. And I don't know what I'll buy the next time I need a new machine.

But in the meantime, I'm so happy to have my toy back!

So Tired... Must Use Bullets

• Yesterday was the first day of school for the kids. I've stayed at school until five o'clock the last two days. Yesterday I was trying to finish some work and today I had to wait around for a TV repairman. Everyone keeps asking me how things are going and I'm not sure how to answer. I tell them they are going well, but it's a little surreal to be at school all day sitting in my office (I have an office!) working on the computer while everyone else has a classroom full of kids. I know that is not the reality of the job though and it will be a little more normal next week when the classes start coming down.
• B. made a point to talk to me on Wednesday last week (work related) and I almost laughed because it was like he was trying so hard to keep the conversation going even though he already knew what I had to say. Then he was the one to come find me the next day when the fifth grade teachers needed me in their meeting. And then later in the day we were both working (alone) in a back room off the library when he mentioned how he had seen my new tattoo in some of my Hawaii pictures that I had posted on MySpace (via his girlfriend's daughter). Ever since then it's been like old times with him... like way back when we were friends before there was ever a hint of something more. It's been kind of nice to have my friend back.
• A teacher at the high school, who I used to be practically best friends with, delivered her twin boys today. A happy occasion, yes, but not as happy as it would have been in another month to six weeks. She was not quite at 30 weeks, but one baby's cord flow was bad and he was not getting what he needed. They have known for a month that the flow could deteriorate to the point that they would have to be delivered at any time. So the boys have arrived, weighing in at 3 lbs. 4 oz. and 1 lb. 13 oz. Please, anyone who is out there reading, please pray for these little guys and their parents, and if you don't believe in prayer, at least send them some positive thoughts.
• Tomorrow I have dinner plans with Drew, who is leaving in five days with his Army Reserve unit. In another month he will be deployed. I refuse to believe anything other than that he will be coming home. Again... more prayers and positive thoughts, please.
• On a brighter note, I finally got an e-mail yesterday saying that my laptop had been shipped back to me. I expected it to arrive today, but it didn't, so I'm hoping for tomorrow. I never realized how much I love that thing until I've had to go the last month without it!

The List--The Daddy-Do Edition

I crossed four nagging little issues off my list this weekend. Or rather, I crossed them off after Dad did the work. Mom and Dad have intended to make the two hour plus trip all summer, but it never worked out until this week. Luckily they were able to come up before school started so I don't have to wait another year before having these items done!

Project #1--The Bedroom Door

Sorry, no before or after pics of this one but it makes no difference as they would look exactly the same! Ever since I had new carpet installed in April of last year, my bedroom door didn't shut anymore. The new carpet was that much plusher and stuck up that much more that it simply couldn't get close enough to latch. I needed Dad to cut a little off the bottom so it would latch again. Mission accomplished.

Project #2--Bathroom Faucet

I bought my new bathroom faucet about two years ago because I had a coupon at Lowe's. Since then it's just been sitting out in the garage waiting for Dad. And, unfortunately, I forgot about taking a before picture until it was too late, so behold the "during" photos.

Note the massive amounts of hair wrapped around the drain stopper. And there was much more in the drain. Gross, I tell you, gross.

But the after scene is a thing of beauty...

Oooooh, shiny.

Project #3 & 4--Kitchen Faucet and Garbage Disposal

Can you believe I've lived in my house for over three years now with no garbage disposal? Not a pressing matter, but inconvenient just the same. And the kitchen faucet has been leaky since day one... kind of annoying. I told Dad the faucet was something I'd like done, but I'd wait to see if he had time to do it during this round. He told me that, if I wanted a new faucet, it needed to happen before he put the disposal in. Good point, Dad. Of course, what I really want is new cabinets and such for my kitchen, but, unless my work pool won the $325 million lottery the other night, I don't see it happening.

So the faucet went in first. Before:

And after:

Once all was sealed with the faucet, it was time for the disposal to be installed and wired in. Before:

And after:

After seeing the deplorable condition under the sink, I decided that new contact paper was sorely needed. Apparently, there was a leaking problem that was allowed to sit at some point in the past. Add metal cabinets to this situation and that means a whole lot of rust.

Mom and Dad had driven up on Thursday afternoon and Dad was done with the door before I even got home from work! Then we made our shopping list and went out to dinner to celebrate Mom's birthday. After dinner Lowe's was our destination as I had another 10% off coupon. Dad spent a little time looking at John Deere lawnmowers as he is in the market for a new one. Then it was home to relax and eventually to bed.

We got up Friday morning and went to McDonalds for breakfast, then back to the house to start working. Dad and I made our first trip to the local hardware store about 10:00 a.m. The guy working there was very helpful and Dad had to share that he had everything we needed at home, but he was working 100 miles away. Once we told him what our projects were he told us we'd make at least three trips to the store that day. And he was right!

Mom and Dad had originally planned on heading home Friday, but when dinner time came and things were still not done, I hoped I'd be able to talk them into staying another night. My dad isn't as young as he once was and I knew he would be exhausted. Luckily, Dad had made up his mind by about 7:00 that they should stay another night. It was a good thing because it was about 9:00 p.m. before the last of the wiring for the disposal was done.

Though school is starting, I still have a few more items left on the list that I hope I will accomplish before winter arrives. I know that not everything will get done, but at least I've made a bigger dent this year than last... which was... none.