Yesterday was my birthday. It was an OK day - nothing too exciting or out of the ordinary - though I got some nice messages on the phone by friends and family singing Happy Birthday. Thank you Uncle Art and Aunt Judy and thank you Mike and Mandy for that.
We went to the Bonefish Grill for dinner and as always, it was a really pleasant night with some really good Sangria.
It is strange sitting here now... to know how old I am and where my life has gone. I am determined to do things this year to start the next phase of my life and to make it something more. I have so much more in me than this! I can't lose my determination and dreams.
It is also difficult to sit here and think about those I have lost this year. A few days ago, another of my Aunts passed away. That will be three Aunts and an Uncle I have lost in one year, not counting the cousins of which I believe there were 2 or 3. All of them were from my Father's side of the family. He now only has one brother alive and that one is not in good health. This is the difficulty of being the youngest in a large family. And I know one day I may have to deal with this as well, being the youngest in my family. It is strange to know, that when I go overseas again, I will not see the faces I have always seen... the smiles I knew, feel the hugs or kisses that I once did. I try not to think about it too much because it would get overwhelming I think. Its just strange and sad.
With the new year, I know there will be other losses, but I know there will be new things... New challenges, opportunities and chances. I guess while I always resented having my birthday at the end of the year (it usually gets lost amid Chanukah, Christmas, New Years), this year I don't feel that way. It sort of wraps up 2008 for me in a good way and sets me up for 2009 and what is to come. Its been a rough couple of years and I'm ready for good things.
So... Happy New Year everyone. May 2009 be one of health, love, prosperity and creativity for all of us.
Monday, December 29, 2008
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Leopard ate my Tiger!
Yeah, as usual, it has been forever since I posted. Sorry. Life eats me and then spits me out. I don't mean to let these things wither. I am going to try and be better about it as I once again get my life together.
As Pooka asked for my Leopard disc for Mac, I figured I better actual install it on my iMac before I mailed it out. As a precaution for this whole event, I got an external hard drive to load my files on to (horror stories of crashed systems also encouraged me as I didn't want to be one of those people with good intention... that were a day late). Before installing, I did a last check of files and things and put those onto my external drive... My friend Dave randomly came over in a fit of serendipity right before I started. I disconnected the external drive from the iMac.
I put in the disc and started installing.... all was good. We were going to archive and update. Things went fine till the system was going to the desktop. The beachball of doom wouldn't go away... 15 minutes... We disconnected all periferals thinking that was causing problems and restarted. Still no go.. beachball of doom remained. We tried to re-install and just upgrade... No use. After a few attempts at circumventing said beachball.... we were left with one last option. Overwriting everything. Meaning, losing EVERYTHING on the iMac and restarting from scratch... At this point, I didn't have a choice.
So... we did it. I died a little inside but was thankful I had saved important files (like artwork!!!!) on my external drive. I did lose all my bookmarks and a few random 'loose' files no in folders.... but it worked. Then it was hours of trying to reload in all my software and reconnecting periferals again. Some applications wouldn't load and we had to make repeated attempts. I don't know if it was the computer or the discs. Still don't know.. But everything seemed to have finally loaded and updated, upgraded and finished.
I'm EXTREMELY unhappy about how Leopard humped my iMac like that... For what I got (Time Machine and 'Stacks') I could have done without it. I just assumed (mistake) that it was the right thing to do... You know... get an upgrade and load it to make things better... I could have stuck it out with Tiger. It worked fine. But what's done is done. What I lost from the old system is gone and it was nothing too important I think. I don't know - I didn't keep track.
There is an upside to all of this. That is the fact that I have essentially a clean slate on my computer. I had tons of things on it that didn't need to be there. Icons all over my desktop and clutter clutter clutter. That's gone and I think its a good thing because I need to unclutter and better organise my life. I tend to be a horder (nothing to with WoW mind you) and keep things because maybe I might use it later or maybe its important. I have to let things go.
So in that theme, my computer is now... clean and organized. Now for the rest of me and my life.
As Pooka asked for my Leopard disc for Mac, I figured I better actual install it on my iMac before I mailed it out. As a precaution for this whole event, I got an external hard drive to load my files on to (horror stories of crashed systems also encouraged me as I didn't want to be one of those people with good intention... that were a day late). Before installing, I did a last check of files and things and put those onto my external drive... My friend Dave randomly came over in a fit of serendipity right before I started. I disconnected the external drive from the iMac.
I put in the disc and started installing.... all was good. We were going to archive and update. Things went fine till the system was going to the desktop. The beachball of doom wouldn't go away... 15 minutes... We disconnected all periferals thinking that was causing problems and restarted. Still no go.. beachball of doom remained. We tried to re-install and just upgrade... No use. After a few attempts at circumventing said beachball.... we were left with one last option. Overwriting everything. Meaning, losing EVERYTHING on the iMac and restarting from scratch... At this point, I didn't have a choice.
So... we did it. I died a little inside but was thankful I had saved important files (like artwork!!!!) on my external drive. I did lose all my bookmarks and a few random 'loose' files no in folders.... but it worked. Then it was hours of trying to reload in all my software and reconnecting periferals again. Some applications wouldn't load and we had to make repeated attempts. I don't know if it was the computer or the discs. Still don't know.. But everything seemed to have finally loaded and updated, upgraded and finished.
I'm EXTREMELY unhappy about how Leopard humped my iMac like that... For what I got (Time Machine and 'Stacks') I could have done without it. I just assumed (mistake) that it was the right thing to do... You know... get an upgrade and load it to make things better... I could have stuck it out with Tiger. It worked fine. But what's done is done. What I lost from the old system is gone and it was nothing too important I think. I don't know - I didn't keep track.
There is an upside to all of this. That is the fact that I have essentially a clean slate on my computer. I had tons of things on it that didn't need to be there. Icons all over my desktop and clutter clutter clutter. That's gone and I think its a good thing because I need to unclutter and better organise my life. I tend to be a horder (nothing to with WoW mind you) and keep things because maybe I might use it later or maybe its important. I have to let things go.
So in that theme, my computer is now... clean and organized. Now for the rest of me and my life.
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