HELLO EVERYONE!!!
I am back! For reals!! My brand new gigantic laptop has arrived, and I've started its setup process. I've been without a computer for so long, I've forgotten most of my shortcuts and settings and stuff. This thing is HUGE. My old Dell was one that had been previously beaten up by the ex before being handed down to me. Pretty much as soon as I got it, the DVD-R died. I've been without a CD drive for years now. This one has that new nifty kind that prints the label on the top while writing the CD/DVD on the bottom. My old one had an 11" diagonal (I think) screen. This one is a 15" high def one. The old one was small enough to have a slightly shrunken keyboard. This one is wide enough to have a full-size keyboard and 10-key numeric keypad, too. I've been borrowing Mom's tiny netbook on very rare occasions, so this feels like something I've borrowed from a giant. I've never owned a laptop this big before. This is the most up-to-date version Dell makes. (Yes, I know it's a Dell, but it was available through QVC and thus Mom could get this $600 laptop for 5 payments, instead of one lump sum.)
Fair warning, I might be marveling at the amazingness of this thing for a little while. All day yesterday all I could say was, "MY COMPUTER'S COMING TOMORROW!! TOMORROW!! WOOO!!!"
Once I get more stuff set up, I'm going to try and get some of the kitten pictures uploaded. I caught outrageously cute ones of the cream-colored girl we're calling Brie (like the cheese she shares a color with), and Lili (the silly runt we're keeping for ourselves). They're playing with toy mice and rolling jingly balls now. And, if anyone argues that cats are messy, I can prove now that using a litter box is genetically encoded, because we've watched them instinctively use one this past week. Every day they become a little bit more cat-like than before. So amazing.
Mom took a test yesterday that was a certification in Psychiatric Nursing. She'd been nervous as all hell for the last 2 months since she scheduled the test (and all hell broke loose here at home), and Saturday she was just about to explode. Sis and I, and all of her friends and coworkers, believed that it'd be easy for her and she'd pass with no problem. She just didn't believe it. So when she got her score at the end of the exam yesterday and passed by a significant margin, she breathed a giant sigh of relief.
I'm hoping that her passing that test is the first step in life starting to go back into an upswing. As Sis would say, that the shit tsunami would finally start to really recede. I know I'm already feeling better being connected to the internet again after being disconnected for so long.
Oh! If anyone has any programs they recommend, or tips/tricks for using Windows 7 (I was still using XP), please let me know!
I hope all is well with you guys. I promise part of this evening will be spent catching up on the month-long backlog of your entries.
Fair warning, I might be marveling at the amazingness of this thing for a little while. All day yesterday all I could say was, "MY COMPUTER'S COMING TOMORROW!! TOMORROW!! WOOO!!!"
Once I get more stuff set up, I'm going to try and get some of the kitten pictures uploaded. I caught outrageously cute ones of the cream-colored girl we're calling Brie (like the cheese she shares a color with), and Lili (the silly runt we're keeping for ourselves). They're playing with toy mice and rolling jingly balls now. And, if anyone argues that cats are messy, I can prove now that using a litter box is genetically encoded, because we've watched them instinctively use one this past week. Every day they become a little bit more cat-like than before. So amazing.
Mom took a test yesterday that was a certification in Psychiatric Nursing. She'd been nervous as all hell for the last 2 months since she scheduled the test (and all hell broke loose here at home), and Saturday she was just about to explode. Sis and I, and all of her friends and coworkers, believed that it'd be easy for her and she'd pass with no problem. She just didn't believe it. So when she got her score at the end of the exam yesterday and passed by a significant margin, she breathed a giant sigh of relief.
I'm hoping that her passing that test is the first step in life starting to go back into an upswing. As Sis would say, that the shit tsunami would finally start to really recede. I know I'm already feeling better being connected to the internet again after being disconnected for so long.
Oh! If anyone has any programs they recommend, or tips/tricks for using Windows 7 (I was still using XP), please let me know!
I hope all is well with you guys. I promise part of this evening will be spent catching up on the month-long backlog of your entries.