Catastrophe, Catastrophe

Of many sorts.  Here's the short version (seriously, I'm going to abridge it dramatically), and why I really haven't posted in a bit.

Work: I've been working many hours and many days.  Illness and injuries have abounded, as have holidays.  Most recently, my coworker's husband died (the funeral was today, as a matter of fact).  Karen was on holiday for a week, but instead of heading out of town as planned, her husband had surgery the Monday they were to leave.  She kept the week off, since a week of not being at work is better than a week of being at work.  Sadly though, about 6 days after his surgery, he died; he had had a heart attack (which I presume was brought on by complications from the surgery, but obviously I'm neither a doctor nor the coroner).  Stuart was only 53.  So Karen was out two weeks ago for holiday, last week, this week, and what we presume will be at least two more weeks.  Poor Karen is not doing well, which is unsurprising, but still quite sad.  Additionally, Carmel is going on holiday starting Monday.  That leaves me as the only shop staff for our shop for the next 2.5 weeks.  That means 6 days of work a week for me.  I will be sent help, at least.  But the next person who tells me to think of the money will get a foot in the ass.  I have thought of the money, and it ain't enough.

Computer: To make matters worse, my laptop (Geoff), had a catastrophic failure on Sunday.  I know what caused it, but I don't know why.  For those keeping score, this is the second time in 15 months that I've forced a shut down on Geoff (ie. holding down the power button until it shuts off, something you only do when you have no other options), and the second time in 15 months that it has caused a massive hardware failure.  Last year, it physically broke my hard drive.  Not a "oh, you somehow corrupted the data on the drive" failure, but a "the spindle broke and if you want the data, send it to a data recovery company with a clean room, and pay them about $1500 for it."  This time I'm not getting the "sad Mac" face or folder with a question mark (which means it can't find the boot disc, probably because you corrupted or broke it).  I'm getting nothing but a gray screen (so the monitor isn't toast).  That implies to me that either the logic board is fried, or the processor blew.  If it's the logic board, I'll get a new computer, because replacing it is half the cost of the computer (and they probably replaced my hard drive last year with another faulty one anyway), and I'm betting the same will go for the processor.  If I'm lucky and it's the hard drive though (heh, "luck"), I'll buy one myself and replace it myself.  And I'll get a solid state drive this time, because when there are no moving parts, they cannot break.  Note: I'm not saying solid state drives can't be trashed, just that there are no moving parts to them, meaning spindles cannot break, thereby screwing you out of 9 months of data (how long I'd had the computer before the drive broke.  I now have a nice 1 terabyte external drive on which everything is backed up.  Sadly, Adam's computer cannot access it, stranding me without my videos and music).

So yes.  This is why I haven't posted much.  I've been working loads, not wanting to talk about work for a variety of reasons, and now I'm computerless.  Or to be accurate, using Adam's windows desktop.  And if I end up buying *another* friggin' new computer, it won't be until we're in Oregon in November, so this state of being could last a while.  Plus, Adam's not thrilled, because, despite his complaints about how and when I use my laptop, he also likes it and uses it.  Mine is on whenever I'm home, so it's always easy and quick to look something up, whereas he doesn't like leaving the desktop on, and it's not portable, so it's not as handy to look up porn stuff on IMDb.

Oh well.  I might be getting a MacBook Pro this time (MacBooks don't come with solid state drives, only the Pros do).  I fear I may also waste $300 on an extended warranty, which I hate doing, but it's shown me this time that I need to.

Righto.  I must make tea (supper for those who don't hear it called tea all the time) for tomorrow.  Butternut squash stuffed with lardon, onions, mushrooms, and apples.  And probably some cheddar, since we don't have cream cheese.