Karma

Okay, that bitchy last entry was a little lesson in karma, baby.  Not ten minutes after I got done bitching about my friends, I also finished downloading an update to Windows ME which, in the middle of installing, crashed and wiped out my Windows software.  I kept getting the message that certain files were missing and I'd have to reinstall Windows.  So after fucking around with it in a lame attempt to avoid having reinstall the operating system, I finally gave up and purchased an Upgrade Version to Windows XP - one that required, as I did, that you have a certain early version of Windows.  So, guess what?  When I went to install it, it was looking, apparently, for the very Windows files that were missing as a verification of an early version!  The upgrade wouldn't work!  Unable to return the open software, I was forced to go out and spend money on the full version of the XP operating system. Whoo hoo!

Long story short:  I've managed, after a week of fucking around, to install the new operating system and get most of my old programs working with it.  I had to reinstall a lot of them.  Luckily, the Adobe Page Mill version that I use only needed a little jiggering to work, 'cuz I have NO idea where the disks for this program are, and would have had to resort to composing my web pages in Microsoft FrontPage.  We all know how I'd feel about that, right?

Anyway, all's hunky dory now, so I'm not complaining. And I'm offering a big ol' heartfelt apology to my friends, so the damn karma gods will leave me alone!


So the past two weeks haven't been the greatest.  Lots of anguish over the whole computer mess, and, of course, there's a war on.

I'm having a great deal of trouble with the war, and I'm getting a little sick and tired of being told that because I'm against the war, somehow that means I don't support the troops who're fighting it.  On the contrary, I think that the United States armed forces are some of the most professional, noble, skilled and brave people in the whole world.

But I also happen to think that the people who are giving them their orders (i.e., THE POLITICIANS) are complete and unmitigated jackasses who haven't the tiniest clue of the repercussions of their actions.  I think Mr. Bush and his little cabal of hawks are not just fucking up our relationships with three-quarters of the rest of the world in the service of an illegal war that can't possibly meet it's public relations objective of making the United States safer, but their my-dick-is-bigger-than-your-dick bullshit policy is going to stir up a hornets nest of hatred and anger for the US in the middle east.  And if through the grace of God we manage to stop any future large-scale terrorist attacks on US soil, it's only going to be through the dedication of our law enforcement professionals, not because we bombed some third world nation into the fifth world.

So now I mourn for the losses on both sides, and pray that as many Americans, Brits, and Iraqis as is humanly possible get to go home to their families soon.

And goddamnit, I'm going to do my best to make sure our president is NOT elected to a second term.

Thank you for letting me have my say.

So now that my computer's up and running, I've managed to download the pictures that have been stuck on my camera, like the one of Truckstop to the left.  What's really cool, though, is that in the process of downloading all the pictures that had stacked up in my camera, and sorting through the stuff on my hard drive to make sure that it had survived the crash, I came across some pictures of Truck that I'd completely forgotten about.  There are a couple that are really cute and really show how much he's grown since we got him.  I feel kinda like a parent, looking at my teenager and thinking, "Why the hell couldn't he stay a cute little baby?!?"

I've become increasingly convinced that Matt's not putting any effort into placing Truck in a home, or that maybe he wants to keep Truck for himself, so he tells he's looking for a home for the kitty, but really isn't.  There are a couple people at work who are interested in having him, but the plain fact of the matter is that I've fallen for the little shit, and if Matt doesn't plan on taking him back to Alaska when he goes in May, I'll probably keep him.  And I'm here to tell you, I never thought the day would come when I would have a cat for a pet.  Ask Amy Hartman sometime about my reaction to her cat Ariel when we all lived in North Oakland.

The picture on the right side over there is one of the ones from when he was a kitten that I'd forgotten I had.  Matt had borrowed my camera one morning while I was at work and snapped a couple of the kitty and Max together, and this was one he shot of Truckstop alone.  I think it's hilarious how, it looks like it's two different cats, but if you look at his face you can really see that it's simply a more mature version of the second photo.  Like looking at a picture of your friend when he was a kid and seeing your friend in there.  Weird.  And holy crow, wasn't he just impossibly tiny?!?

You know who I'm really gonna miss when Matt goes back to Alaska (in addition, of course, to Matt himself, who's a relatively good roommate once you set aside his love for smoking in the apartment)?  It's Max.  That big ol' creature has really grown on me as well.  He's just such a gentle soul.  He's so patient with the cat, and even with Matt, who's always locking him up in wrestling moves and picking him up and spinning him around.  And he just sits there and takes it, with this "oh, look - he's picking me up again for chrissakes" look on his face.  It's absolutely hilarious.

Boy... May is coming waaaay faster than I could ever have imagined it would.