That's, uh, entertainment?
So, it all started innocuously enough.
Actually, let me back up and give some background information. The house we're renting has an in-law apartment appended to the back, in which someone's lived for, oh, the past fifteen years or so. He just moved out, so the landlord's been doing a lot of work. It's an old house, quite likely not up to code, with that apartment plus half the house on one finicky, aged electrical circuit. Our laundry room shares a wall with the apartment's bathroom, where we suspect they've been doing work this week. They have already knocked out the gas for our dryer, which the landlord has yet to repair. Thus I have set the scene for one of the things that happened last night.
To return to the main thread of my narrative, I came home from work and booted up my laptop while preparing lunch, as you do. I opened up Thunderbird and Firefox, both of which were a little slow in loading. I then lost connectivity. This happens, because the router is on the aforementioned finicky, aged electrical circuit, and also my laptop has a quirk where occasionally I have to manually reset the physical wireless switch. So I turn off the switch, let it sit, turn it on, don't connect, know it's the router, turn the switch back off, unplug the router, let it sit, plug everything back in and turn on. Sometimes, I have to reboot the laptop, which I ended up doing. Got connectivity, hopped back on, then lost it again five minutes later. Repeat twice more, quite annoyed that the landlord does not seem particularly invested in making sure his current tenants can live without disruption while he works on the other place in hopes of new tenants.
At last, maintain connectivity, but programs continue to run slowly, mouse continues to stutter across the screen and, when I open iTunes to listen to music while paying bills, music stutters and iTunes glitches. Now, I'm beginning to suspect the problem may be less the connection and more that my laptop is nearing its term of planned obsolescence. I had just done a backup of everything on Sunday, except my music file, because it is so ginormous that I like to start it backing up just before I go to run errands for a few hours. Typical. So I hook up the external and start a backup of the music file while texting Spouse about the issue.
Shortly, Spouse arrives home, and we consult about getting me a new laptop. We had been planning to do so, now that Windows 7 is out and we have credit on the Best Buy card, but had intended to wait until after the holidays, because setting up a new computer the way I both need and like it is time-consuming and resource-consuming and I just plain didn't want to do it yet. Sadly, Dot (the old laptop) seemed determined to remove the choice from my hands, so off we went to the nearest Best Buy to go laptop-shopping. I should note at this juncture that Spouse usually makes the forays to Best Buy alone, because it's not a store that is migraine-freindly, to put it in the most diplomatic terms possible. When it comes to my computing needs, however, it's necessary that I come along.
Because we are savvy consumers intimately familiar with what's available in laptops and what my needs are, we made a beeline for the smallest of the Sony Vaio models available. A bit of poking confirmed this was the one I wanted. Naturally, they didn't have any but the floor model. Next closest store didn't have any, either. Store in Chula Vista listed four, so they reserved us one, and off we went. To Chula Vista. From Mission Valley. During rush hour. I can see those of you who know the area wincing already. At least it wasn't the 5?
We did manage to make it in just over half an hour, despite rush hour insanity. The Chula Vista store, for the record, is even less migraine-friendly than the Mission Valley store. We pretty much grabbed the laptop and ran, though at that point it was too late to save me. I gave in and downed a Relpax, and we headed back north, which was significantly less congested.
Home we got, where the music file backup was still in progress. This did not bode well, but I let it continue to run while I got the new laptop turned on and connected to the wireless, then got various programs uninstalled and others installed. There's still a bit of cleanup to do, but I hit the point where I needed to transfer some files and preferences over, so I checked Dot's progress. Over two hours, still not finished moving music. Not good. I cancelled the music transfer, plugged the external to the new laptop, dubbed Trinity ("Dodge this"), and pulled across the vital files and preferences. At this point, the Relpax had taken enough effect I could eat a little something, so I grabbed a protein bar as relatively inoffensive.
Now, for about a half hour prior to this, we had been hearing some rather odd gurgling noises, which turned out to be originating in the toilets. Checking said toilets showed the water levels lowering, which is not unusual. See: old house, possibly not up to code, landlord doing work on connected apartment. Annoyed, we discussed contacting the landlord about that, though the chances he'd show up to fix it in a timely fashion were pretty much nil. We decided to keep an ear open and check the bathrooms periodically, since the gurgling was very infrequent and nothing seemed to be happening but the toilet water level going down. The sinks still worked, the bathtub and shower were fine, flushing proved unproblematic. Funny how fast things can change, but those of you who've had these sorts of plumbing issues already know that.
After eating my protein bar, I checked the master bathroom to find the shower drain had overflowed and there was water puddling on the floor. The sink was still fine, the toilet still low in water level, but Spouse checked the hall bathroom to find the tub slowly filling with water. We put in a call to the landlord, which of course went to voicemail, and cleared everything from the floor of the master bath, but at that point the flood reversed, tub and shower draining. Spouse mopped the master bathroom floor, double-checked that the hall tub was draining fine, and we continued to keep a wary eye out. We didn't hear back from the landlord.
I went back to transferring files from one system to the other, saving the big stuff for today. I then went to get ready for bed, starting with my nightly saline rinse. I might have mentioned part of the latest bout of sinus ick has been nosebleeds, so I've been very careful when doing the rinse, but I don't have the option of foregoing it. Last night, apparently, I wasn't careful enough. My nose started bleeding while doing the rinse, so I stopped, tried to control the flow as much as possible, then swabbed with vaseline so I could continue to get ready for bed, since it was getting late. The bleed broke through the vaseline. I got horizontal with a cold washcloth and had a mini-meltdown. Spouse consoled me, then helped me re-swab. I managed to get most of the way through the rest of getting ready for bed, when the bleed broke through again, even more severe. I got horizontal for even longer, and probably would have just gone to sleep, except I kinda can't do that while trying to control a nosebleed. Anyway, the flow finally slowed, and I swabbed once more. This time, I was able to finish getting ready for bed.
I closed down all the computers for the night, checked the bathroom one last time, then lay there in bed, waiting for my nose to start bleeding again, waiting for the bathroom to overflow into the bedroom and short out my new laptop, waiting for the roof to cave in. None of those things happened, but it definitely wasn't a restful night. And this morning, the toilets were making suspicious noises again, and my sinuses and nasal passages are supremely Unhappy. Trinity's running smoothly, though. I put her up on the bed before coming into work, so that if the bathroom floods, she will be fine. That's about all the cope I have.
Actually, let me back up and give some background information. The house we're renting has an in-law apartment appended to the back, in which someone's lived for, oh, the past fifteen years or so. He just moved out, so the landlord's been doing a lot of work. It's an old house, quite likely not up to code, with that apartment plus half the house on one finicky, aged electrical circuit. Our laundry room shares a wall with the apartment's bathroom, where we suspect they've been doing work this week. They have already knocked out the gas for our dryer, which the landlord has yet to repair. Thus I have set the scene for one of the things that happened last night.
To return to the main thread of my narrative, I came home from work and booted up my laptop while preparing lunch, as you do. I opened up Thunderbird and Firefox, both of which were a little slow in loading. I then lost connectivity. This happens, because the router is on the aforementioned finicky, aged electrical circuit, and also my laptop has a quirk where occasionally I have to manually reset the physical wireless switch. So I turn off the switch, let it sit, turn it on, don't connect, know it's the router, turn the switch back off, unplug the router, let it sit, plug everything back in and turn on. Sometimes, I have to reboot the laptop, which I ended up doing. Got connectivity, hopped back on, then lost it again five minutes later. Repeat twice more, quite annoyed that the landlord does not seem particularly invested in making sure his current tenants can live without disruption while he works on the other place in hopes of new tenants.
At last, maintain connectivity, but programs continue to run slowly, mouse continues to stutter across the screen and, when I open iTunes to listen to music while paying bills, music stutters and iTunes glitches. Now, I'm beginning to suspect the problem may be less the connection and more that my laptop is nearing its term of planned obsolescence. I had just done a backup of everything on Sunday, except my music file, because it is so ginormous that I like to start it backing up just before I go to run errands for a few hours. Typical. So I hook up the external and start a backup of the music file while texting Spouse about the issue.
Shortly, Spouse arrives home, and we consult about getting me a new laptop. We had been planning to do so, now that Windows 7 is out and we have credit on the Best Buy card, but had intended to wait until after the holidays, because setting up a new computer the way I both need and like it is time-consuming and resource-consuming and I just plain didn't want to do it yet. Sadly, Dot (the old laptop) seemed determined to remove the choice from my hands, so off we went to the nearest Best Buy to go laptop-shopping. I should note at this juncture that Spouse usually makes the forays to Best Buy alone, because it's not a store that is migraine-freindly, to put it in the most diplomatic terms possible. When it comes to my computing needs, however, it's necessary that I come along.
Because we are savvy consumers intimately familiar with what's available in laptops and what my needs are, we made a beeline for the smallest of the Sony Vaio models available. A bit of poking confirmed this was the one I wanted. Naturally, they didn't have any but the floor model. Next closest store didn't have any, either. Store in Chula Vista listed four, so they reserved us one, and off we went. To Chula Vista. From Mission Valley. During rush hour. I can see those of you who know the area wincing already. At least it wasn't the 5?
We did manage to make it in just over half an hour, despite rush hour insanity. The Chula Vista store, for the record, is even less migraine-friendly than the Mission Valley store. We pretty much grabbed the laptop and ran, though at that point it was too late to save me. I gave in and downed a Relpax, and we headed back north, which was significantly less congested.
Home we got, where the music file backup was still in progress. This did not bode well, but I let it continue to run while I got the new laptop turned on and connected to the wireless, then got various programs uninstalled and others installed. There's still a bit of cleanup to do, but I hit the point where I needed to transfer some files and preferences over, so I checked Dot's progress. Over two hours, still not finished moving music. Not good. I cancelled the music transfer, plugged the external to the new laptop, dubbed Trinity ("Dodge this"), and pulled across the vital files and preferences. At this point, the Relpax had taken enough effect I could eat a little something, so I grabbed a protein bar as relatively inoffensive.
Now, for about a half hour prior to this, we had been hearing some rather odd gurgling noises, which turned out to be originating in the toilets. Checking said toilets showed the water levels lowering, which is not unusual. See: old house, possibly not up to code, landlord doing work on connected apartment. Annoyed, we discussed contacting the landlord about that, though the chances he'd show up to fix it in a timely fashion were pretty much nil. We decided to keep an ear open and check the bathrooms periodically, since the gurgling was very infrequent and nothing seemed to be happening but the toilet water level going down. The sinks still worked, the bathtub and shower were fine, flushing proved unproblematic. Funny how fast things can change, but those of you who've had these sorts of plumbing issues already know that.
After eating my protein bar, I checked the master bathroom to find the shower drain had overflowed and there was water puddling on the floor. The sink was still fine, the toilet still low in water level, but Spouse checked the hall bathroom to find the tub slowly filling with water. We put in a call to the landlord, which of course went to voicemail, and cleared everything from the floor of the master bath, but at that point the flood reversed, tub and shower draining. Spouse mopped the master bathroom floor, double-checked that the hall tub was draining fine, and we continued to keep a wary eye out. We didn't hear back from the landlord.
I went back to transferring files from one system to the other, saving the big stuff for today. I then went to get ready for bed, starting with my nightly saline rinse. I might have mentioned part of the latest bout of sinus ick has been nosebleeds, so I've been very careful when doing the rinse, but I don't have the option of foregoing it. Last night, apparently, I wasn't careful enough. My nose started bleeding while doing the rinse, so I stopped, tried to control the flow as much as possible, then swabbed with vaseline so I could continue to get ready for bed, since it was getting late. The bleed broke through the vaseline. I got horizontal with a cold washcloth and had a mini-meltdown. Spouse consoled me, then helped me re-swab. I managed to get most of the way through the rest of getting ready for bed, when the bleed broke through again, even more severe. I got horizontal for even longer, and probably would have just gone to sleep, except I kinda can't do that while trying to control a nosebleed. Anyway, the flow finally slowed, and I swabbed once more. This time, I was able to finish getting ready for bed.
I closed down all the computers for the night, checked the bathroom one last time, then lay there in bed, waiting for my nose to start bleeding again, waiting for the bathroom to overflow into the bedroom and short out my new laptop, waiting for the roof to cave in. None of those things happened, but it definitely wasn't a restful night. And this morning, the toilets were making suspicious noises again, and my sinuses and nasal passages are supremely Unhappy. Trinity's running smoothly, though. I put her up on the bed before coming into work, so that if the bathroom floods, she will be fine. That's about all the cope I have.