Sweet Catastrophe

I think I’m experiencing my quarter-life crisis at the moment. I find myself questioning everything– mainly school and my job, and I just don’t know what I’m doing or what I want to be doing. I know something has to change, but I have no clue what, so I’m just looking at options all over the place, trying to find something that speaks to me, something that feels right. I’ve started looking into online degree programs to see if that’s a route I might like to take. Of course there’s a lot of them to weed through and you really have to dig to find the ones that are genuinely worth it.

I was recently pointed toward Western Governor’s University (WGU) which is a non-profit online university– this means tuition is low, and is a sure sign that it’s about the education and not about getting your money. So far I’m thinking it’s a perfect example of what I’m looking for.

WGU was founded by the governors of 19 U.S. States who sought to make an education available that was cost effective, easily accessible, and competency-based– meaning you’re earning a degree based on skills, knowledge and experience, not how much time you spent sitting in a classroom. This also means you can potentially finish a degree more quickly because you can take assessments as soon as you’re ready– similar to CLEP which is taking a test to earn credit for a course when you already know the material. And WGU is nationally, regionally, and NCATE accredited– the only exclusively online university that can make that claim.

Tuition is a flat rate per 6-month term, at rates easily comparable to the school I’m already attending, and much lower than most. And WGU is approved by the U.S. Department of Education to offer federal financial aid– which means Pell Grants, loans scholarships are available.

WGU believes in fitting an education into your life, not the other way around, so not only do you have the flexibility any online course would offer, but WGU 6-month terms can be started any month you choose.

I’m seriously looking at their College of Information Technology, but again, I’ve got to figure out what it is I, realistically, want to do….

In an attempt to cut costs, we’re shutting off our cable. We’re both okay with that but would really like to get something that would enable us to stream Netflix to our television in the bedroom. The thing is, I’d really like something that can do that, and stream files from my computer. Xbox 360 has the capability, but I don’t want to go buy another 360 to put upstairs, or any other gaming system for that matter. I’ve looked through the suggestions Netflix offers, but I can’t seem to find anything that would let me know if any of those devices support this streaming feature (it works through using your Windows Media Player library). Anyone have any suggestions?

I’m not above spending a little money, especially if it ends up being a device I can use for more than just the streaming– like a blu-ray/dvd player or something like that.

If we can’t figure that out, you may find me holding rabbit ears and trying to route signals through Orange NJ dental implants to the television, kind of like Mom on Pete and Pete with her metal plate.

Meet my new laptop. Okay, well, it’s not my laptop yet, but this is it, it’s the one! Ryan really came through on this one. We talked, at length, about what I wanted– must-haves, extras I’d like, things I absolutely didn’t want, and price range. We talked about brands and I decided I’d like an HP or an Asus. Asus won! Wow did Asus ever win…

16″ display. 4GB RAM. DVD±RW/CD-RW drive. 500GB hard drive (yum!). Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 4500M. Windows 7 64-bit. The reviews are glowing– apparently the battery life is fantastic and there’s a lot of talk about how long it takes for it to even feel like it’s heating up.

And how much? $529! And that’s not even a sale price.

I’ve even taken it for a test-drive and I love it. The color is great, not a lot of worry about fingerprints. It’s a great weight and it’s the perfect size for me. 4 usb ports so I don’t have to worry about that. I’m definitely excited. We’ve been fans of Asus and their motherboards for quite a while, it’s great to see they seem to have the same quality and price in their laptops.

I’ve got to wait a little while to actually get it, but hey, it can only really go down in price, right?

I realized last week that it’s almost time to upgrade my iPod. I’m just a few gigs short of reaching capacity so it’s about time. Hopefully, mine will just crap out within the next year and my warranty will cover getting a new one, ya know?

I want a 64GB iPod Touch. I want to have access to apps and I like all the features–mostly the things that I dislike about my current iPod are things that have been changed for the Touch like making it easier to navigate to specific songs or artists.

I was talking to Ryan about it, telling him about the voice features and such and he said his Sony VAIO does all of that, he should just give me that. I said sure, but I still want a Touch ’cause I can’t carry his laptop in my pocket :-P

So that’s what I’m aiming for. I guess I should start really working my iPod, get it to keel over before my warranty runs out next summer, heh.

We’re officially getting a new television soon.

Right now, you can’t really watch something unless you’ve already seen it before because you can’t see faces when the camera is pulled all the way back. I’d say it’s probably about the top 1/4 of the screen that’s just worthless. It’s getting way, way too annoying.

We’ve looked at a few just to get some ideas on prices and what size we’re looking for. I think we’ve officially decided that we don’t want to go under 30″. I think anything smaller just won’t look right in the space we have. Yeah, we could go smaller and not be picky, but the price differences aren’t really enough to be worth giving up on the size we want.

I wish, oh how I wish, we could go for something as sexy as this Samsung 40″ HD TV. I’m loving the red tint in the frame. It boasts twice the resolution of normal HD TVs!

I’m selfish and would want this gorgeous beast in the bedroom, but it would make more sense to put such an incredible television downstairs where it could be used to its full potential with the gaming consoles. I’m certain Ryan would enjoy sniping with a 4ms response time! And it already comes equipped with 3 HDMI slots so we could lose the bulky splitter we’re currently using.

Yeah, I’ll just dream a little dream then. It’s certainly a fantastic sale, but still out of our price range. I’ll have to keep my finger crossed for that lottery win, or the death of some rich relative I never knew who picked my name out of a hat to leave all of their wealth to…

Finally! Just finished paying to replace my monitor =) I’m happy. I finally found my monitor on ebay so I snatched it up. I got an okay deal on it; I probably could’ve done better if I’d been patient and kept shopping around, but I finally got to the point where I’m really annoyed with not having my second monitor.

I’ve started watching Chuck this week (all of season 1 is up right now) but it’s been slow-going since I’ve had to choose between web surfing and watching Chuck. It’s really hard for me to just sit and watch a show like that for long. I have to be doing something else!!

Anywho, when it gets here, Ryan may actually be able to use my dead monitor to switch out screens on this one with the dead pixel, so it’d sort of be like getting two new monitors instead of just one.

*sigh* Now to work on saving for and replacing my tv…. this whole being an adult thing is annoying. It really sucks when you get to the point in life where you’re replacing major things that you bought. It’s so much different than having to replace something you never paid for in the first place.

Well Ryan has taken my monitor apart and found, what he thinks to be, the problem. After some extensive searching, we were able to locate the part to replace it. Unfortunately it’s on backorder, so it’ll probably be about a month before we get it and find out if it’s even going to be the solution. *impatient sigh* In the meantime, I’m now having a fit because after looking around for 17″ monitors at decent prices, Buy.com had to go and put one on sale at a ridiculously amazing price.

It’s a Samsung 18.5″ Widescreen LCD monitor, which, I know I’ve been looking for 17″ to match my current monitor, but this would be a small enough size difference that I could be more than okay with it. It’s a gorgeous monitor but it’s the price tag that has me drooling over it. It’s $107!!!! I haven’t even been able to find a decent monitor for under $200! I’m kicking myself a little for my Victoria’s Secret purchase now because if I hadn’t done that, I’d very seriously consider canceling the part I ordered and just buy this monitor. I’m still not so sure I won’t cancel the part and the undies order and buy this instead…. I’m gonna have Ryan look at it when he gets home and see what he thinks.

Or ya know, if anyone just wants to loan me $100 until the 19th, I’m good with that too! </ wishful thinking >

Welp, my monitor is officially dead. MY monitor. My preferred and default monitor of the two. The one that doesn’t have an annoying dead pixel in the middle of the screen *deep sigh*

I’m going with just a single monitor right now, but it’s proving to be annoying. Dual monitors is very much just a convenience, but gah, when you get used to something it’s so annoying to put up with less. I’m a serious multitasker so I generally have a video playing on my monitor off to the right and I just go about things in my default monitor. I’ve grown very accustomed to this! iTunes is getting a real workout right now since I can’t really watch anything and I can’t seem to just do one thing at a time.

Ryan is almost positive that the transformer is blown in the monitor and supposedly we should be able to find a replacement for like $30. That would be ideal, but otherwise, I’m going to have to shop around for a good one on sale. I need a good 17″ monitor to put next to this one. I just don’t know if I could handle them being different sizes. That’d look too awkward to me.

Of course I could handle getting a whole new dual monitor setup like this one in any size. It’d be nice to get rid of this monitor with the dead pixel altogether! I could kick Ryan for not just exchanging it. He said it didn’t bother him, but dammit, here we are and now it’s MY monitor and it does bother me :-P

Could be worse though, I guess. The power supply to my computer could’ve been blown altogether. I think that’s probably the only thing I dislike about this rain– the potential it has to cause harm to my electronic sources of entertainment.

That and trying to drive in that hunk of metal I’m still borrowing…

We got a message a few days ago letting us know there’d be a big Alltel update in our area on the 7th with instructions on how to update our phones on that day if we experienced and interruption.

I just realized it’s the 7th so I tried to update my phone and it said it couldn’t be updated using the automated system, call customer service from a landline phone.

No big deal until I realized I can’t send or receive any calls or messages now! I have no idea if I’ll get all the calls and messages I’ve missed after the phone is updated…

And wouldn’t you know it, not a single other person is home in this complex for me to borrow a phone to call and get mine updated!

I’m sure Ryan doesn’t remember this update was coming either and of course I can’t get in touch with him.

And now over half our cable channels are out and I have no clue why, nor can I call and find out what’s up.

Technology is biting me in the ass today.

Oy! Hopefully, I’m done with computer problems for the year! My poor baby has been having startup troubles and flashing the BSOD for a little while and it finally kicked it. I had been assuming it was due to a problem with one of the new hard drives. Well, one of my hard drives did have a bad segment, which is fixed now, but my motherboard was fried. Apparently it’s a common eMachine problem, so it was nothing I did.

Luck was on my side though, turns out, based on the registry times, I had some nasty adware, a virus, and a friggin key logger activate right before my motherboard crashed! It seems to have been latent, possibly even something stuck from that virus I had last time. Who knows? Either way, I now basically have a brand new computer. I’m not even in my old case anymore. I’m in an awesome silver and blue Alienware case! I’ve got new ram, the new hard drives, new everything! The only thing I have left from my old computer is my original 200GB drive. I’m still drooling over my new custom computer. I’m happy to know I’ll never have a factory-built piece of crap again.

I need to help Earl out with his advertising here in town for Datacorp. I mean, he doesn’t run things like a snooty store–you walk in and there are just computer parts all over the place, but he treats you right and gives you a good deal and he eats and breathes fixing your computer. I’m gonna set him up with some business cards and stuff, and probably see if I can convince him to do some t shirts as well. I’ll wear ‘em around campus and everywhere else.

Anyway, I’m back. All that’s left is to get Mediacom to fix our damn connection and I’m good to go—yeah that’s right, they still haven’t come. And yes, I’m angry.