austin_dern (austin_dern) wrote,
austin_dern
austin_dern

Moving out in a new way

My computer's taken to slightly more urgent pleas for retirement, I think. The most obvious is that the responsiveness of various keys has been failing. Since some of those keys include the left shift this has the side effect of making me look stupid when I ramble on typing things and don't notice the problems before I send something out to the world. Well, it makes me look like the average typist, but I like to be above average if I'm able, thank you. I can say with reasonable confidence it's the keyboard and not the typist failing me, since I do dramatically better on the computer at work with the new keyboard, and also on the Bluetooth keyboard I bought to go with my iPad but which I've actually used more for my laptop.

The other symptom is in the power cable. The rubber guarding it in the part just outside the plug wore out and retreated, leaving visible a couple of wires that I assume are carrying electricity from the power brick in. It reached the point that I could get power only when the cable was at certain angles, which was the signal for the cats to decide the greatest thing in the world is their rubbing my computer's power cable. You can always count on cats that way.

Fortunately I have a stopgap, the sort of thing that lets me delay useful action forever. I can plug in the power brick and cord from my old iBook, which doesn't get called into action so much now. But it is all pointing to the question of when am I going to actually buy a successor computer already?

Trivia: In summer 1958 Dr Edward Teller travelled to Alaska to unveil ``Project Chariot'', a plan to use a pair of one-megaton nuclear bombs and a quartet of 100-kiloton bombs to carve a large harbor on the northwestern coast of Alaska. The harbor would be icebound most of the year; little fishing in the area would be aided by such a harbor; and Alaskan coal which might be transported by sea from the port would need be brought to the port via a railroad projected to cost $100 million to build. Source: Sun In A Bottle: The Strange History Of Fusion And The Science Of Wishful Thinking, Charles Seife.

Currently Reading: Monster, A Lee Martinez. The book opens with a convenience store clerk noticing that back by the freezers there's a yeti eating all the ice cream. This makes me wonder: how is it this wasn't an Ursula Vernon drawing? (The book's full of wonderful scenes like that, too.)

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