I need to meet more people.
I was sitting at my computer, like I seem to be doing for the majority of my time these days, mindlessly searching. “Searching for what?” you might ask. Well, my answer is a pretty simple one.
“People.”
For a blogger, I think I’m both insulated and divided. I’m insulated because, well, I don’t “talk” (read: comment) to many other people, and other people don’t talk back. And I’m divided because I hang in three main groups, in three different places. I follow authors on my livejournal, book bloggers via On The Nightstand, and everyone else here at Catherine-Haines.com.
It’s an odd feeling, as sometimes I feel like I am at least two different people, if not three. And that all of them are very lonely. I/We all sit around and lurk on various places. I/We want to comment, but it’s hard to find something that I/we have something to say about.
And I know everyone hates really simple one-liners, those “love the layout!” comments that don’t match the entry. So it’s back to lurking once more.
That’s why I am writing this post. I know you have to give a little to get a little. What I want to get is communication, blogs to read and blogs to comment on, and I suppose communication is what I can offer to give back. But what I would like from you is a starting point.
Who do you follow, who do you read? Those who do know me, who do you think I should follow, that I might like?
It seems all I am blogging about here is computer trouble, and neglecting it for everything else. I have been posting somewhat regularly at On The Nightstand though.
This is not me apologising for not blogging, as this post has an actual point to it.
My laptop has used up another life, and it’s choking and gasping and, well, not doing anything, really. And after all of the problems I have had with it, I have finally had enough. Actually I had had enough long before now; it’s just taken me this long to save up enough for the parts to build my own PC. (We have decided to call it Torchwood)
So now I’m looking at Linux installs, since I don’t want to spend 150-200NZD on Windows (XP or Vista) with Windows 7 coming out in October. More specifically I am looking at Ubuntu and its many derivatives. Does anyone have any suggestions versions that would be good for someone who has used Windows most of her life, or ways to make the changeover easier?
Expect a lot of blog posts about my venture into Linux and building a PC in future. But don’t worry – there’s some more writing ones hidden up my sleeve. Especially now that I am working on Lionheart…
You know how I have been having a bit of computer trouble lately? And by “a bit” I mean “my computer is an utter zombie, except not nearly as awesome”?
You get three guesses, and the first two don’t count.
Yeah, it’s being a pain in the rear again. This time my user profile is corrupt and I have had to set a new admin profile up. All my files are safe; this is just annoying, having to reset all the little things I had: Firefox addons, Thunderbird settings, bookmarks… all the little things like that.
It’s nothing too major in the grand scheme of things, but it’s still annoying. Only a smilie can properly show my feelings.
Well, it’s finally happened. After about five years of slave-labour loyal service (and one year on top of that as a showroom display), my laptop seems to have finally given up the ghost. It’s been a long time coming – the CD/DVD drive somehow became just a DVD drive sometime early last year, the original power pack exploded (with a bang!) earlier this year, and it would scream in protest if I try to open filezilla while already having firefox and photoshop open already – so now the whole thing seems to have finally died.
I am writing this from the family’s desktop, which only reminds me of how much I miss having a computer in my room, with all my programs and files and everything. I miss my firefox install, with its bookmarks and addons and British-English spellcheck.
Don’t worry if the laptop takes my novels with it: the most recent versions of Blood Bound are with my wonderful beta, and the beginning fragments of Bones and The Superhero Diaries can be pieced together from stuff I have in various emails/from my notebook. I will have to do some extra typing and re-do a few things, but it could have been far, far worse.
In a way, this is a good thing, as I have been wanting a new laptop for some time now. The bad side, on the other hand, is that I cannot afford a new laptop right now, and it will take me about a month until I have saved enough money for the replacement I have got my eye on. So I am trying to look on the bright side in the meantime: being online less will mean less online distractions, so I can write my novels by hand in my notebook; I have noticed that when I type things up online from handwritten notes things get expanded, and my word count increases. So hooray for that.
So don’t worry about me if I am not online as much as usual. I’m still around, still writing… and looking for things that I need to get rid of anyway, and figure how much they’d be worth on TradeMe. It seems that not only am I trying to trim the fat on my body, but everywhere else now, too.
