The laptop is dead. Long live the laptop.

So, I got home last night from watching Megaman with coldfireserge and my wife, and booted up my laptop.  I'd taken some pictures of myself wearing (and please don't laugh) but several outfits meant to evoke the stylings of Chris Pine.  The lovely folks over at the jim_and_bones  community decided to have a "Dress like Chris Pine" contest, which I found too funny to resist.  So I assembled four outfits (because overkill is fun), took some pics, and had them ready to submit... and suddenly, my computer screen decided that vertical stripes were slimming. 

Oh yeah.

After a minute of nothing but vertical stripes, I turned off the computer, and was treated to the black screen of death.  That's right, we went right past the blue screen stage, and this bitch was DEAD. 

With the help of the kind and generous coldfireserge , we re-snapped the pictures, uploaded them , and submitted them to the website *just* in time, and then... I got about the business of what to do with the dead laptop.

I called up popefelix , who is known aboard the USS Macchiato as the ship's cyber-psychotherapist (he talks to the computers and makes them happy), but at the end of the night, the declaration was not much more hopeful than a resounding, "It's dead, Jim."  We can get the thing to turn on at this point, but nothing is responsive.  No mouse, no keyboard... even plugging in a separate mouse or keyboard has no effect.

So, it's time for me to face the harsh truth.  Bob isn't quite dead, but he's in a coma, and he's not waking up.  I adopted him back in 2006, so that's pretty good for a laptop, considering how much I've abused the poor thing.  I've dragged it everywhere with me, on planes, in cars, in luggage, to coffee shops, on Army assignments... using it for the valuable endeavors of self improvement and the fine art of motorcycle maintenance writing fanfic.  Time for me to look at my finances (medical bills have been a bitch this year) and buy a new laptop.

Until then... no more fanfic.  *whimpers*  I had so much reading and writing to do!  I'll be online at work, but more work and less play.  Alas... maybe I'll get out of the house and do some stuff.

The real-life story behind Unstoppable...

I saw THIS article linked on CNN.com this morning.  I thought some of you might enjoy the story behind the Hollywood drama. 

Go on, read it.  Take the time acknowledge the real people behind the story, and how the actual event unfolded that day.  I think that's important.

Let's keep this train going...

More "Unstoppable" stuff... CNN's I-report has a brief set of interviews with the cast, including a short segment with Chris Pine talking about the everyday folks behind the story in the movie.  Whenever I hear this guy talk, I get the impression that he really *does* think a lot, that he considers the stuff he says, and that he's not just waxing poetic for the camera.  If he is just playing up the intellectual ethics for the camera, then I'd be disappointed (impressed with his acting, but still disappointed), but I really think this is just the way Pine is.