My new computer is fried. Happened last night, in the early hours of the morning, just before I went to sleep. Shortly after my last post, actually. I wandered off to go to the bathroom, came back and it was turned off, there was the faint smell of burned computer components in the air, and it wouldn't turn back on.
I'm hoping it's the RAM, but suspecting it's either the vidcard or the processor. Or both.
I'm praying it isn't the hard disk, because I have all my stuff on there, and not backed up anywhere - not recent backups, anyway. Mp3s it took me years to collect and rip off my extensive collection of CDs. Drawings and photos. Bookmarks of sites I know I won't find again. Essays for university. The only copy of my NaNoWriMo story (if any of the people I sent it to is reading this, can you send the copy you have - if you still have it - to sailoreagle@hotmail.com? So in case it's the HD which is fried and it can't be recovered, I'll still have the story... I'll have lost all my notes, and a lot of other bits and pieces of other stories, but at least not that...). Three redesigns and two new sites I was working on.
So now I can't do anything I'd planned on doing this morning - no website making, because all my half-done layouts and all the files I'd need for that website are on the dead computer. No writing, because all my stories are on the dead computer and I - silly me - have no backup copy and no printout to work from. No listening to the music that's currently stuck in my head, because the CD is stuck in the drive of the dead computer.
I won't be on ICQ/AIM/MSN until the dead computer is brought back to life, because Trillian's installed only there and I don't have my contact lists etc. backed up. So don't try to contact me that way.
I'll be on IRC, though, as mIRC is still installed on my laptop, which is the computer I'm using at the moment - dunno how much, though, as mom needs to use a computer for work and normally she'd use this laptop... so I don't know how much I'll be around in the following days, until I get the computer fixed. If you want to get a hold of me, your best bet is IRC or email.
The good news is that the computer components should still be under warranty, considering how new that computer was. The bad news is that if it burned because the guys who put it together did a botched job it could potentially void the warranty. And maybe I'm being pessimistic, but how much do you want to bet that my father will shout at me when he gets home?
I slept all of four hours last night, got up and wandered downstairs to see if the computer was really dead, then wandered back upstairs and promptly fell asleep again. On my left arm, which, when I woke up, was entirely numb, and it took a while to get the circulation started again.
I'm typing this on a laptop with the font sizes a bit fucked up, with brightness/contrast settings which make my eyes hurt and I have to squint at the screen to read and I've forgotten how to change them, on a keyboard I'm not used to which makes my hands hurt, with the headphones' cord in my way when I type, with a stupid headache (again) and with the knowledge I'll get shouted at by my mother for not going shopping for groceries because when I woke up again it was too late and by my dad for frying the computer (even though I did absolutely nothing).
I can't even play a game, which usually is my distraction of choice, because this laptop sucks for gaming. I can't even play ADOM, which has been my distraction of choice recently, because my savegame is on the dead computer, and fucked if I restart playing from scratch when I have a character it took me a month to build up.
To be the day after my birthday, it sure is turning out to be remarkably shitty.