Computer Fixes and Quarantines — A Diary Game Post... of Sorts

in hive-185836 •  4 years ago 

It feels like it has been one of those days, today.

The day started altogether too early because Mrs. Denmarkguy had an online meeting with the board of directors of a non-profit organization she works with... they are on the US east coast, so three hours later than we are. So when they have an 11:00am meeting, that's 8:00am here.

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Of course, neither of us had slept too well to begin with because it has been windy as heck and driving rain for several days now, with wind gusts to 40 miles an hour (65km/h) on a regular basis... meaning that there were branches sometimes beating against the side of the house and loose bits landing on the roof. This worries our dog Daisy... who'd periodically wake is us with her growling and barking.

I suppose the people at the ski resorts are happy... the nearby Interstate Highway pass over the Cascade mountains has had 64 inches (160cm+) of snow in the past week!

Or maybe they are not so happy, because...

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The Latest Lockdown Rules

...were just announced by our state governor, and essentially shuts pretty much everything down, right down to the fact that you cannot even have your neighbor over for coffee as long as we remain under "Phase One" lockdown... and there's just a whole string of requirements attached to being able to move to "Phase Two" which I just don't expect us to see until sometime in March.

As I drove into town today, I once again noticed the many boarded up and closed storefronts... and thought about the irony of a set of rules that essentially is handing "economic success" to corporate giants like Amazon and WalMart and Federal Express, while almost certainly consigning small home grown businesses to failure because they are not allowed to stay open for their local customers.

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But at Least I Have a Computer!

As I wrote a while back, my primary desktop computer that I use for work started to shut itself down rather often at the beginning of December... so I ended up taking it in to be fixed at our local computer repair shop.

So I've been using some combination of my laptop and my phone to do my work since then, and that has been woefully inadequate, although I have stuck to it.

The reason it's been five weeks is that we simply didn't have the money for a $340 fix, consisting of a new solid-state drive, new fan, reinstall of the operating system and data recovery to get back to working condition.

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$340 might not seem like a lot of money... but we're among the estimated 60+% of American households that simply cannot fund a $500 unexpected bill on short notice. No mileage left on our charge cards and no savings meant working extra long hours over the holidays and being extra frugal in order to set the money aside. I chose to not power down my meager Steem holdings... so as to at least have something available, in case another disaster strikes.

It seems a little ironic that we allegedly live in the "richest country in the world" and yet we often have to choose between food and telephone service, or paying the insurance bill or the electric bill. Meanwhile, the economy is "doing really well" and the stock market is near new highs... makes me wonder just whose economy that is... because it sure isn't ours or any of our neighbors'!

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Well, I guess I'd better end this little rant here... at least I am writing this on a "real" computer again, so there is a silver lining to this story!

Thanks for reading, and have a great remainder of your week!

How about YOU? How are the lockdowns (if any) where you are? Does there seem to be an end in sight? Or is it as bad as ever? As always, comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!

(All text and images by the author, unless otherwise credited. This is ORIGINAL CONTENT, created expressly for this platform — NOT A CROSSPOST!!!)
Created at 20210106 00:37 PST
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Denmarkguy just wanted to say hi! It's been a while. Hope everything will work out alright, luckily being part of the crypto community seems to be a good place to be these confusing times..
Ronni

Hej @ronni, og godt nytår!

Yes, these are very strange times we are having. Crazy election, lockdowns and no summerholiday in Denmark this year... and it doesn't look like this year, either but we will see.

Going to take this year to mostly make our life simpler and easier to manage. We expanded our kitchengarden by 3x in 2020, and that was a very enjoyable distraction from outside life, PLUS we now eat much of our own food.

Hope you and your family are well, "over there!"

Good idea with the garden, we have been looking into a "kolonihavehus" (summer house of sorts) lately to get out of the city and enjoy nature.

The lockdown has cleared most appointments in our calendar which is kind of nice though. It has slowed down time and given us more time together as a family. So it is not all bad :)

I'll make sure Denmark is still around whenever you are able to travel again ;)

Ronni

Ah yes, I remember when I was little my moster Karen had a kolonihavehus somewhere near Skovlunde and we'd go help her sometimes.

If there is a positive in all this, it is perhaps that people have a chance to remember that family is very important, and need to appreciate the time we spend together.

Hope to make it to Denmark in 2022!

The life is complicated by the fact of lock down and isolation. I believe the number of cases of Covid raised now after Holidays. Hopefully it will calm down later by the end of the month or February.

I can imagine, to the situation nowadays we can just say "every cent counts", people think twice before buying something and so I believe with your computer. At least now it is fixed and you can use it again. I can't imagine how some people prefer only their smart phones. That would drive me crazy :)

If all I had to work with was my phone, it would drive me nuts! It was bad enough to only have a compact laptop for five weeks... but I made do. I am very glad my computer is now working again... and it's so QUIET! I never realized just how much noise a "spinning" hard drive makes... now I have have one of those new SSD drives (like a huge camera memory stick) instead.

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Great post!

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