Circles · and · Circles · and · Circles · again

Ok, this is incredible news! I'm so excited! Wish I didn't have to wait two years for it though :-(

Book #54 -- Kelley Armstrong, Living With the Dead, 372 pages.

Well, after finishing Personal Demon on Saturday I couldn't resist moving right on to this one while at work yesterday. There was a lot new in this one, which was interesting. The frequently shifting perspectives was something Armstrong rarely does, although it worked in this book. More surprising was the introduction of several new major characters and a new group of supernaturals in the same book. The comparison I kept returning to was the 'introduction' episode of a TV series that's about to spawn a spin-off. You have the framework of original series, with the familiar characters, but you've got a whole set of new, clearly well-developed characters and a plot that seems to leave quite a bit of room for development later. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised (or disappointed, in fact) to see more of Robyn and Finn later.

Progress toward goals: 180/365 = 49.3%

Books: 54/100 = 54.0%

Pages: 13712/30000 = 45.7%

2009 Book List

cross-posted to 15000pages, 50bookchallenge, and gwynraven

Book #53 -- Kelley Armstrong, Personal Demon, 371 pages.

Kelley Armstrong has this gift for creating side characters I find annoying, and then turning them into central characters I find I like. I really shouldn't be surprised by this any more. First it was Paige, then Jaime, and now Hope Adams, all of whom annoyed the hell out of me when they first showed up, and have since grown on me. Elena was really the only one I liked right off the bat. And I was surprised how much I grew to like Karl in this book, predisposed as I was to hate him based on the first novel. And of course, I actually do really like Benicio, so it was nice to see more of him, and his awkward but ultimately loving relationship with Lucas. So yeah, now I've got another character to care about and it looks like the next book features Hope as well.

And if you are totally lost and don't know what I'm talking about, you should go read Bitten, which is the first in the series, and keep at it from there :)

Progress toward goals: 179/365 = 49.0%

Books: 53/100 = 53.0%

Pages: 13340/30000 = 44.5%

2009 Book List

cross-posted to 15000pages, 50bookchallenge, and gwynraven

Got a call from the Dell technician today, who seemed to think I was being unreasonable because I refused to *take time off work* to meet him so he could install the *fifth piece* of replacement hardware on my computer. Dell has also been sending me annoying automated phone calls reminding me to return the old parts that were replaced, something I don't intend to do until I have a functioning computer. They can have their pieces back when I'm sure that they won't be needed again.

I am so sick of this. Last time I talked to someone at their technical support I asked to be transferred to a supervisor and my call was promptly dropped. I don't know for sure that was intentional, but I wouldn't be surprised. They've really screwed themselves with this. I've been buying Dell computers for years, and I honestly believe that the problems I've been having with this computer are the exception rather than the norm. Since I never had to have prolonged contact with their technical support before this, I would actually have recommended them. Their computers are usually pretty good. Now I know, however, that their customer service sucks donkey's ass, and I intend to tell everyone I know to avoid them like the plague.

I'll be telling them this too - *after* my computer is finally functional and if I ever manage to get myself transferred to a supervisor.

cachinnation: (n) Loud or immoderate laughter.



foie gras: (n) Short for pâté de foie gras, a pasty made of fat goose-livers, imported principally from Strasburg in little stone pots. Properly the contents should be taken out and served in a crust of pastry, but the name is usually given to the original importation.



sabaton: (n) A broad-toed armed foot-covering worn by warriors in armour.



scrinium: (n) A box for books and papers, writing-desk.



gestatio: (n) An avenue set apart for exercise either on horseback on in a horse-drawn vehicle.



hippodrome: (n) 1. In Greek and Roman Antiquity: A course or circus for horse-races and chariot-races. Sometimes used as a high-sounding name for a modern circus.
2. A fraudulent race, or other athletic contest, in which it is arranged beforehand which of the contestants shall win.
3. A theatre used for various stage entertainments.



dado: (n) 1. The block or cube, with plane faces, forming the body of a pedestal, between the base mouldings and the cornice; the die.
2. The finishing of wood running along the lower part of the walls of a room, made to represent a continuous pedestal; strictly applied only to the flat surface between the plinth and the capping.
3. Any lining, painting, or papering of the lower part of an interior wall, of a different material or colour from that of the upper part.



quotidian: (adj) 1. In Medicine: Recurring or occurring every day, specifically at twenty-four-hour intervals; (of a disease, esp. malaria) characterized by paroxysms recurring at this interval.
2. Of a Plasmodium species: causing quotidian malaria.
3. Of or occurring every day; daily.
4. Of an everyday character; commonplace, mundane, ordinary.
5. Of a person: that performs a particular action, or displays a specified characteristic, on a daily basis.



quatrefoil: (n) 1. A set of four leaves.
2. A compound leaf or flower consisting of four leaflets or petals radiating from a common centre. Also: a representation or stylized depiction of this, originally especially as a charge in heraldry.
3. In Architecture: An ornamental feature, as a boss, opening, etc., taking this shape.



brochette: (n) 1. A small broach, spit, or pointed stick.
2. In Cookery: A particular manner of frying and stewing chickens, etc.
3. A pin or bar used to fasten medals, orders, etc., to the coat or uniform of the wearer.



berm: (n) 1. A narrow space or ledge; especially in Fortification: a space of ground, from 3 to 8 feet wide, sometimes left between the ditch and the base of the parapet.
2. In Geology: Those terraces which originate from the interruption of an erosion cycle with rejuvenation of a stream in the mature stage of its development.
3. The bank of a canal opposite the towing-path.
4. A ledge or flat of land bordering either bank of the Nile and inundated when the river overflows.



gamboge:(n) 1. A gum-resin obtained from various trees of the genus Garcinia, natives of Cambodia, Thailand, etc. It is largely used as a pigment, giving a bright yellow colour, and also as a drastic purgative in medicine.
2. The plant from which gamboge is obtained.



stochastic: (adj) 1. Pertaining to conjecture.
2. Randomly determined; that follows some random probability distribution or pattern, so that its behaviour may be analysed statistically but not predicted precisely; stochastic process = random process.
3. In Music: Applied (originally by Yannis Xenakis (b. 1922), Romanian-born Greek composer) to music in which the overall sound structure is determined, but internal details are left to chance or are established mathematically by composer or computer (by the laws of probability or otherwise).

Book #52 -- Kim Harrison, Lynsay Sands, Kelley Armstrong, and Lori Handeland, Dates From Hell, 404 pages.

This is a collection of four novellas focusing on, as the title suggests, paranormal relationships. I bought it originally for the Kelley Armstrong novella, which gives some of the backstory of one of the characters in her Women of the Otherworld series, but I found I liked the other stories quite a bit as well, with the possible exception of the Kim Harrison story, which seemed too far entrenched in her very complex fictional world to be fully understood by someone who hasn't read her other work. Come to think of it, the Armstrong novella might suffer from the same problem for those not familiar with her series, since there were a lot of references to things that happened in other books, but being a fan of the series myself that didn't bother me at all. The Sands and Handeland novellas appeared to be mostly standalone, and quite good.

Progress toward goals: 175/365 = 47.9%

Books: 52/100 = 52.0%

Pages: 12969/30000 = 43.2%

2009 Book List

cross-posted to 15000pages, 50bookchallenge, and gwynraven

I always find it rather interesting when I run into a friend or someone at work and they refer to something I've posted on LJ or on Facebook. It's like a single conversation that spans both internet and real life communications without pause or interruption. Kinda cool.

So, last night, I finally got to sleep somewhere around 1:30am, woke up around 3:15, got back to sleep around 3:45, woke up around 4:30, got back to sleep around 5:45, and finally woke up again when the alarm went off at 6:30. I have no idea how I'm functioning today. (scratch that, I do know - I'm *not* functioning today)

Also, I am at the heights of frustration because iTunes keeps crashing when I try to re-sync my iPod, which lost all its songs when I was trying to fix the volume control by restoring the factory settings. That solution did not, in fact, fix the volume control, and now I can't transfer more than about 200 songs at a time (and with almost 9000 songs in my Library, that's taking a long time). In addition, whenever a sync does fail, it somehow erases part or sometimes all of the songs on the iPod itself (I'll start out with 800 songs on the iPod, try to add another 200, have the sync fail, and end up with 650 songs on the iPod). I'm actually pretty sure by now that the problem is my iPod going bad, and not actually iTunes itself. Unfortunately, since I can't afford a new iPod, I have to deal with what I've got. Which is frustrating, to say the least.

Ok, so the Dell technician came back with the new motherboard on Monday. Everything now *seems* to work, but I won't really relax until I make it a week or two with no problems. I'm still in the process of reinstalling all my programs and restoring my backed up files, a process which is taking longer than it might otherwise due to my general frustration and lack of motivation to have anything to do with the computer for awhile. I have not torn a strip off Dell yet, but I will in a day or two, after I'm reasonably sure there won't be more problems.

Book #51 -- Heidi Julavits, The Uses of Enchantment, 288 pages.

No, this is not the famous book on the psychology of fairy tales by Bruno Bettelheim, although it certainly does draw from Freud. This is a very complex novel - hard to describe. In November of 1985, sixteen-year-old Mary Veal vanished after field hockey practice. She reappeared just as suddenly a few weeks later - physically unharmed, but no longer a virgin, and claiming to remember little of her absence. Mary's story becomes a bestseller for her ambitious therapist, who is convinced Mary made the whole thing up, a view endorsed by Mary's puritan mother, who would rather her daughter be a liar than a rape victim. Now, years later, Mary returns to attend her mother's funeral, and finds evidence that brings the whole episode to the forefront again as what really happened in 1985 is slowly revealed from alternating past and present viewpoints.

Progress toward goals: 161/365 = 44.1%

Books: 51/100 = 51.0%

Pages: 12565/30000 = 41.8%

2009 Book List

cross-posted to 15000pages, 50bookchallenge, and gwynraven

It took quite a bit. I've had good experiences with them in the past. My Dell computers have been by and large stable, and lasted quite a while. In fact, my nearly 10-year-old Dell desktop still works, it's just so obsolete as to be nearly worthless. And previous to this instance, I've been happy with their customer service as well. But now I'm not so enthralled.

First of all, they categorically refused to allow me to simply return the tower and let them figure it out. The guy I talked to has worked for Dell for eight years and in that time they have *never* returned a desktop tower. It just isn't done. They also insist that the problem is with the harddrive, based, apparently, on the x0000007B error code I've been getting, and are sending me *yet another* harddrive.

Let's recap, shall we? My primary harddrive didn't work. When the primary harddrive was replaced with the secondary harddrive, that one didn't work. While unlikely, I can see how it's possible that some environmental factor (a power surge that somehow got past my surge protector? something else?) damaged both harddrives simultaneously. But then the *brand new* harddrive they sent me that arrived yesterday didn't work either.

Now they're sending me a *fourth* harddrive, and somehow that's magically going to fix the problem. Ah, but this time they're sending a technician to install it for me (the unspoken but clearly implied explanation being that I installed the new harddrive incorrectly [I didn't install the new harddrive incorrectly]).

I was assured that no matter what other knowledgeable people of my acquaintance (including my brother, who now works for Microsoft) might have suggested, the problem could not possibly lay with either the motherboard or the power supply. I just have had the most horrible luck to have had three harddrives fail (one of them brand new). After all, that's much more likely than a single, underlying problem somewhere else. This new harddrive will work because, obviously, fourth time's the charm.

I was promised, after I politely but firmly expressed my skepticism that yet another harddrive would solve the problem and relayed my frustration over the sheer amount of time I've had to spend on this (not to mention time without my computer), that the technician would not leave until everything was up and working.

This sounds to me vaguely ominous. I'm having visions of having to kick the technician out at 1am because of course, this latest harddrive won't work either.

I feel very sorry for the technician they're sending. Because, while I'm sure that none of this is his fault, he will be there in person, and when the new harddrive doesn't work (which it won't) he won't be leaving without taking the tower with him. I don't really care what happens to it after that. In fact, if returning the tower is really truly that impossible, I can just dump the whole thing in the trash and they can send me a brand new one. I'm liking that option more and more. After all, I know they *ship* towers.

Aarrgh!!

Ok, first you need to know some background. There is a country song called "26 cents." When I was in college, I heard this song on the radio and sent a copy to my mother, and it kind of became a thing for us. It tells the story of a girl leaving home for the first time and being given an envelope by her mother. She opens the envelope on the the bus to find it contains a note and 26 cents. The refrain (which is the text of the note) goes like this:

When you get lonely, call me
Anytime at all and I'll be there with you, always
Anywhere at all
There's nothing I've got that I wouldn't give
And money is never enough
Here's a penny for your thoughts
A quarter for the call
And all of your momma's love

This'll be important later, I promise.

It's been a crappy month for me. I've been sick with a miserable cold that won't let up. My computer is a broken mess, and I've spent way too much time on the phone with Dell trying to get it to work.

Today in particular has been bad for several reasons. When I went out yesterday, I apparently didn't close the door to my bedroom all the way, which means a cat got in and decided to express their annoyance at me not being around to pay attention to them by peeing on my comforter. Which meant that I had to sleep last night with just a sheet, as the comforter was in the wash. So I was cold all night and didn't sleep well. Today was boring and I was tired and couldn't seem to concentrate on getting any work done. Then I come out to my car after work to find that somebody left an advertisement flier on my car windshield *covering* my parking registration tag. As a result, I got a $30 ticket that I now have to take time off work tomorrow to go contest, since the parking office closed the same time I left work.

So all in all, I was in a pretty foul mood before I ever came home.

Then I came home, checked the mail, and found a card from my mother. It was an "I'm thinking of you" type card, and inside was simply taped a quarter and a penny.

So now I'm still having a bad day, only now I'm emotionally conflicted because I feel both warm and fuzzy from the card and also guilty because I haven't called her in almost a month which why she had to send the card in the first place.

I think I'm going to go take a nap. (yes, I've already called my mother)

*sigh*

Ok, so I spent about five hours on the phone with Dell last night, and the computer is still messed up. The first technician I talked to, who, happily, didn't treat me like I was an idiot, said that the fact that the computer was freezing when in Safe Mode indicated to her that it wasn't a malware or driver problem, since those things are disabled in Safe Mode. She thought my copy of Windows was corrupted, so she had me back up my important files and reinstall Windows.

Windows reinstalls in two stages - the first where it loads certain files, and then launches and begins setup. As soon as the files had completed loading and the computer went to launch Windows, I got a blue screen of death. This began hours of changing BIOS settings, unplugging and replugging in the hard drive, testing the memory chips, etc. Nothing worked. Finally, I tentatively drew the technician's (now a new person) attention to the fact that my computer came with two harddrives. We had been trying to install Windows on my primary harddrive. Might it be possible to switch the harddrives and see if the secondary harddrive worked? He agreed this was a good idea, and so it was done.

The files loaded, Windows launched, and began setup. I cheered. The technician said clearly my primary harddrive was bad, and that he'd have a replacement sent out. My secondary harddrive would be my new primary harddrive and the replacement for the original primary would become my new secondary. Fine with me. We got off the phone, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Windows was still loading, and would be for about the next half hour.

Twenty minutes later, I got another blue screen of death. It was now almost 11pm. So I had to call Dell back and tell them that the problem was *not* fixed, but that we'd have to continue this later, as I was completely exhausted and near tears with frustration.

So, either both of my harddrives are damaged, or it's something else completely. Personally, I'm ready to ship the whole damn tower back to Dell and let them figure it out, but they seem to want to do it piecemeal. So I guess I know what I'll be doing again tonight. *sigh*