What a day. What a nightmare.

My beloved laptop computer died yesterday. I can't say I wasn't warned - it had been acting sick for about 2 weeks, and became critical last Sunday. Its screen would start to pixelate, then funny stripes would appear, then the whole thing would just freeze up. I was in a state of denial, and also panic, because my life was stored in there!

I own an external drive, and had backed it up about 6 months ago, and while I still didn't want to believe I was going to lose the computer, I decided drastic measures were necessary. I learned if I performed enough CPR on it, I could ultimately achieve a working state on it, so I got it up and running, and started to back everything up. I also went online with Dell, and ordered a replacement laptop. (Ouch!)

I decided to leave the computer on all week, since starting it up seemed to be the issue. But on Thursday, critical programs were refusing to function (like my photoshop program), so I had to reboot - and couldn't. Tried again on Friday, and nothing. Dead, dead, dead.

Unbelievably enough, the new Dell computer had arrived on Thursday, despite Dell telling me it wouldn't even be shipped until 4/16. I guess my old one knew it was safe to give up!

So on Saturday, I began the painful process of getting my new computer in acceptable condition - you guys know what I mean - getting all my old files migrated over, and reloading all my favorite software (games, too!), and getting the wallpaper and screensaver set up, etc. I started at 7:30 PM, and finally quit at 6:45 AM - I knew I had dreaded doing this, but I really underestimated how long it would take. Lots of the software required a restart after each install, and I had to search on the web for some drivers and other stuff. Plus just migrating all the backed-up files took over 2 hours.

So I wasn't done at 6:45, but was exhausted - fell asleep around 8AM - realizing I was hungry because I had missed dinner AND breakfast, and woke up at 12, ready to finish. And now, at 6:30 PM, everything is done except for a few games, which can wait. And I still haven't eaten.

What a nightmare this set-up was. But I love my new computer - it is so bright and shiny and super fast! But I miss the old one, and I keep opening migrated files where only half the text came over - Weird.

I'll try to resuscitate my old computer one more time (not today) and see if I can wrangle up the incomplete Word files. I have way too many to open them all to check for content, but I'll check the most important ones.

I feel for anyone else facing this situation.

Something nice happened while all this was going on - I logged on to Etsy at one point, and discovered that one of my favorite necklaces had sold! Very nice customer, too - so I will be getting this packed up tonight for her!