I had something different to post this morning, but I think I'll wait until I'm feeling less depressed.
My father called the computer place, and they got the computer, and here's a list of what got fried: PSU, motherboard, videocard, hard disk. Must have been a power surge or something like that, of course. Goddamned electrical company and their newfangled "digital" electricity meters, ever since they've been installed it's been powercut, power surge, power cut, power surge, and on and on...
Sigh. So. I have recovered my Trillian contact list from my old computer with a filerecover proggie. Everything else is still lost.
But.
For the broken parts to be replaced, since the computer was still under warranty, they have to be sent back to the manufacturer. Of course, if they do that with the HD, I lose any hope of recovering the data on it. Apparently it's just one part of the HD that got fried - the little engine thingy that makes the HD go whirr (bear with me, I can't be bothered going for the dictionary). So the data on the HD could still be recoverable... so dad is buying a new HD rather than getting the one under warranty, and he's asked the techs at the computer store to see if they can replace the thingy or find some other way to recover the data off the HD. If they can't manage, he's asked that they send the b0rked HD back with the fixed computer, so he can get it to a data recovery company or somesuch. So maybe not all is lost.

In other news, I've been trying out Opera7 decently now that it's out of beta and actually released. It's great, pity that blogger is entirely b0rked in it... eh. Maybe it'll be an incentive to switch to Greymatter, or Moveable Type, or whatever.

The Two Towers. Now with incest, interracial proposals, Hobbit slashiness, toasted masochist dwarves, and much more. (At least in the bootleg DVD captions.)

Sono riuscita a recuperare Witch 22... Beh, cosa dire.... invece che chiamarlo "il cuore spezzato", avrebbero potuto intitolarlo tranquillamente qualcosa come "the power of luuuuuuuuurve" :P Non che mi dispiaccia un numero con protagonista Cornelia, ma la soluzione che hanno usato per far svegliare le guardiane è quanto di più scontato ci sia... insieme alla cattiva che, una volta che il suo piano è fallito, molto tranquillamente spiega alle guardiane cosa aveva cercato di fare invece di incavolarsi. :P
I disegni sono abbastanza belli, ci sono degli splendidi disegni di Cornelia che devo riuscire a usare in qualche modo... poi c'è anche una chibiWill in terza di copertina (sul preview), carinissima XD E anche il solito regalino questa volta non era abbastanza male, un ciondolo con il simbolo di un elemento... sono stata fortunata e ho trovato quello della terra (ebbene sì, la mia Witch preferita è Cornelia, se non si era capito... :P), dico fortunata perché ho trovato UNA copia del numero su TRE edicole che ho controllato, quindi non è che avessi molta scelta.

(PS. Ma kandrakar.it è defunto? Uffa...)

Computer update (again): we sent it back to the place we got it from, via UPS. It should get there in a couple of days, hopefully get repaired quickly and sent back to us quickly so I can have it for the end of the week. *crosses fingers*

Computer update: we took it to a computer shop this morning and it's apparently the PSU and the motherboard that went. Processor's fine, vidcard is fine, HD is hopefully fine. Since it's still under warranty, we are sending it back to the place we got it from, and they'll replace the fried components and then send it back. I managed to get my CD out of the drive - thank [insert deity of your choice here] for safety holes and long paperclips - but not to get my data off the HD. The drive is so large and our other computers so old that the BIOS won't recognize such a large HD, even if it's hooked up to it. (Yes, we tried.) So the computer is getting sent back with a large sheet of paper reading "please don't format this HD, important data on it" taped to it. If they format it anyway, I'm gonna murder them one by one. :P
Got my NaNoWriMo story back though, thanks to those who sent it to me. At least now I know I haven't lost everything. :)

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.

o.O
(Yes, that's all I could find to say. Look at the link and you'll see why.)

If you lived in Middle Earth, where would you live? Drop me a message on this Middle Earth guestmap and tell me. *grin* (Idea shamelessly stolen from Hikaru, though mine probably isn't going to be permanent.)

And happy birthday to me, since it's the 23rd already. Woo, 21.

Back from my second viewing of TTT. Yay.

Upsides: the cinema was almost empty this time, no morons sitting on the left of me whispering (loudly) "who's that? why did that happen? what happened? how can they do that?" like last time.
We got to sit on the row of seats in front of the corridor, so we had even more room to stretch our legs.
I got a poster with Legolas, Aragorn and Gimli on it (to go with the Aragorn poster I got last year). ^^v
Downsides: I was supposed to go see it in English, but when we got to the cinema I found a little sign that said "due to circumstances beyond our control, "Lord of the Rings: the Two Towers" in English will only be shown tomorrow". So I had to settle for seeing it again in Italian. Grrrmble.
One of my brother's friends was also there (with his sister). He squealed, fairly loudly, throughout Helm's Deep. ><

A few thoughts...
On Legolas: damn, he kicked ass. Especially when he jumped on that horse, and when he went down the stairs on that shield at Helm's Deep.
On Faramir: I dunno which I like better, book Faramir or movie Faramir. But movie Faramir, albeit different from book Faramir, was not ill-fitting (even though he made me want to throttle him - but then, so did book Faramir). It was a bit odd seeing his character changed so much from the book, but it fit with the movie, and I honestly can't understand all the whining of "they ruined Faramir!" that I've heard.
On Gollum: best. CG. character. EVER. He seriously did not look CG, and this second time I was actually LOOKING to see if there were any points in which he looked blatantly fake, but nope. His facial expressions were great, and that dialogue with himself steals the "best split personality scene" award that originally went to the Norman Osborne/Goblin scene in Spiderman. I felt genuinely sorry for the poor thing.
On Grima Wormtongue: perfect. Genuinely viscid and fucking scary.
On Eowyn: great. Not the prettiest girl around, and thank fuck because I honestly can't stand "pretty girls" (die, Arwen, die), and she kicks ass.
On Ents: yay. I don't remember how they were described in the books, but I like how they were shown here. I loved seeing the Ent council and each Ent looked different based on which kind of tree they were, and suchlike. Also loved how they walked, how they rooted themselves in the ground when they flooded Isengard, etc.
On Legolas and Gimli: seeing their developing friendship was nice. I LOVED the scene where Eomer threatened Gimli and Legolas immediately defended him. Not to mention their "let's see who kills more orcs" thing at Helm's Deep (pity we didn't get to see how it ended), and their (friendly) teasing just before the battle.
On Gimli: HE WAS NOT COMIC RELIEF, FOR FUCK'S SAKE. QUIT YOUR WHINING, PEOPLE. He's just somebody who's out of his depth, knows it, and chooses to lighten the mood with it. Dwarves are short, stocky, and made for digging and axe-fighting, not for running and horseback riding/fighting.
He falls off his horse? Big deal. How do you know he actually didn't do it on purpose as he says? He strikes me as the sort of character who would do that. He was telling a funny story about dwarven women a few seconds previously, to make Eowyn laugh. How do you know he didn't fall off the horse on purpose, again to make Eowyn laugh? And, even if he didn't fall off on purpose, how do you know he didn't choose to exaggerate it ("It's okay, it's okay, I did it on purpose!") to keep making Eowyn laugh rather than be grumpy and take his fall badly? There's a whole column of people leaving their city, can you blame Gimli for seeing he's out of his depth and capitalizing on it to lighten the mood a bit? As for the second fall (on the battlefield), he's a dwarf, he's not made for horseback fighting.
As for when he's standing on the battlements and he's too short to see over the wall, and Legolas teases him... well, that strikes me as teasing between friends, to lighten the mood before a battle that's looking hopeless. Same with the previous scene with the too-large chainmail.
The dwarf-tossing scene? Well, he couldn't get past that gap on his own, so he asks Aragorn for help. The "don't tell the elf" afterthought, well, there's two of them and they're about to take on a horde of Uruk-hai to protect the gate on their own. Things are looking pretty hopeless, even if they do manage to protect the gate. I saw the comment as Gimli trying to show hope in any situation... "we will survive, so don't tell the elf about this".
I've also heard people whine about the "Legolas! Two already!" "Two? I already killed seventeen" exchange. IT'S IN THE BOOK, PEOPLE. It's not made up, ffs. It's PART OF THE CHARACTER.
Seriously, Gimli kicked ass when it was needed of him, and used his being out of place in a world of men and elves to the advantage of everybody to lighten the mood when he wasn't needed. What's the problem in that?
On little details: this time I managed to catch both cameos, Peter Jackson's and Alan Lee. I also tried to follow a few minor characters during Helm's Deep (such as the boy who rides with his sister to Edoras, and the young man Aragorn talks to just before the battle, his name escapes me at the moment), and I think they both survived the battle. Or at least, I didn't see them die. The young man Aragorn talks to was on the same tower as the old man who shoots the first arrow of the battle (and kills the first Orc), but after a bit I just lost sight of him. Other random little details I noticed... the rats on the sewer/water discharge/whatever at Helm's Deep, Grima Wormtongue's tear, the burning ent extinguishing himself in the flood water.
On moving moments: I cried (again) when Gandalf, Eomer and the Rohirrim arrived to save the day at Helm's Deep. The Smeagol/Gollum scene also got me, as did the scene where Elrond predicts Arwen's eternal widowhood.

More when I'm a bit more coherent, probably.

[EDIT] Oh yeah. Haldir. In FotR he was just this ugly haughty elf, but damn, he kicked ass in TTT. I was sorry to see him die.

[EDIT #2] This happened when I first went to see TTT, but I forgot to mention it then, so I'm mentioning it here. I wandered into the cinema store before the film started (had to get there half an hour before the start to be able to get seats), to see if they had some TTT stuff. They did, and I got a nifty keychain (leather and pewter, with the Hand of Saruman on one side and the horses of Rohan on the other), and while I was waiting in line to pay, I got treated to an amusing display. A whiny brat of a kid saw the One Ring replicas and promptly went to his father and threw a fit: "I WANT IT! I WANT IT! I WANT THE ONE RING!" Disturbingly amusing. XD

Added a subscription service to the left column. Basically, if you want to be notified when I update this blog, you subscribe, and you'll get an email each time I update. Though I have no idea why anybody would want to do that, but meh. It's there if anybody wants to use it.

1. If people feel the need to jump in and defend somebody who can fully well defend herself, just because she has perfected the "little girl lost" routine and uses it daily, I will learn to laugh at them, because they're morons.

2. If people feel the need to drag up year-old shit they know nothing about in an unrelated argument, I will learn to laugh at them, because they're morons who have either nothing better to do than try and hurt people or feel they have to resort to cheap shots to win an argument they wouldn't have gotten out of otherwise.

3. If people feel the need to jump in on something that doesn't concern them, just to insult somebody they have a grudge against, I will learn to laugh at them, because they're morons.

4. If people feel the need to use arrogance, uncalled-for insults and in-your-face I-look-down-my-nose-at-you in a debate, I will learn to laugh at them, because they're morons, and I will gleefully wait for the day when somebody short-tempered will punch them in the face and knock out a few teeth.

5. If people feel the need to use juvenile, uncalled-for insults in a discussion, while at the same time accusing the person they are arguing with of using juvenile, uncalled-for insults and being immature and not knowing how to argue, I will learn to laugh at them, because they're morons.

6. If people feel the need to, and insist on, heading down the same slippery slope that another person who is apparently one of their heroes did, I will jump off while I can and watch them slide to certain ruin. I will learn to laugh at them this time, because they're morons, and not get caught in the hole they dig up for themselves.

Finally went to see The Two Towers.

...

That was so fucking great.

More when I'm over my gibbering fangirl state and/or I've seen it again. (Going to see it in English on Wednesday, then probably once more in Italian the following week.) Legolas 0wned, Aragorn 0wned, Gimli 0wned ("simple comic relief"? pah, were you watching the same movie I've seen?), Eowyn was great, Gollum was bloody PERFECT, Grima Wormtongue was scary as fuck.
And I still hold that Theoden is the world's lousiest tactician.

And the last of the packages I was expecting arrived, this one was from Cafepress (the TTLG store) to be specific. *huggles the bear* Damn it's cute.

(Yes, I like cute things. Problem?)

And in other news, I'm finally going to see "The Two Towers" tomorrow. About bloody time.

My amazon.com order arrived. :D A whole stack of Tolkien books, plus a couple others. I am a happy bookworm. :D

XD This I have to post...

* IVANGOTOY has joined #thief
<IVANGOTOY> hellou
<Tumbleweed> hlo
<IVANGOTOY> how r u?
<Tumbleweed> typing in full english words, you?

It's been a year now since my cat disappeared. It was last January, just a few weeks before my birthday, that we let her out in the evening as usual but she didn't come back in the morning, and we never saw her again.
It's been a year already, and I still miss her terribly.
I remember her, from when she was a stray kitten we'd found one night who would always try to run away, so we took her with us to the seaside because we knew if we left her home, when we'd come back after a week she would've been gone. So we took her to the seaside with us, and I remember one stormy cold afternoon I just curled up with her on the sofa and we both slept there.
I remember that she used to always sleep on my bed, whenever she could, and my mother would get angry at her for being on my bed and at me for letting her stay. And one morning I left my bed undone and went to do something else, and when I came back she was sleeping in the bed, under the blanket with her head on the pillow. I ran to get the camera, of course... when the film got developed and mom saw the photo, she could not get angry, but instead just laughed.
I remember that she always used to know when I was sad, and come find me, no matter where I was, and curl up next to me and not leave my side until she was certain I was feeling better. And when I cried she'd lick the tears off my face... sounds silly, but it's true.
I remember that she always did her best to be as close to me as possible, going as far as getting up from a warm comfortable place she was sleeping on (ie. my bed, among the pillows) to go sleep on a less-comfortable place (ie. the kitchen table, while I was doing my homework). I remember that, when I was away from home, on holiday for instance, she always disappeared, only to come back when I came back.
I remember that she always waited for me on the doorstep, sometimes even at the beginning of the street that leads to my house, when I came back from school.
I remember that she let me carry her on my shoulder, draped across my shoulder and completely relaxed, not even trying to cling to my shirt or anything. I remember her weight on my shoulder. I remember how she felt under my hands, nice and soft and warm.
I remember how much I cried when she didn't come back home after leaving that night.
I still remember, and it doesn't matter if people say "come on, she was just a cat", because she wasn't. I still see her out of the corner of my eye sometimes, and it still hurts when I turn to check and she isn't there.
If there is a heaven somewhere, some sort of afterlife, I am certain she will be there to wait for me when I come, as she always used to wait for me when I came home.
She is not forgotten.

Snowing again. Really small snowflakes this time, but I'm hoping they'll get bigger and that by tomorrow the landscape around here will be all white.
Of course, this time, the cats are staying inside, looking distrustfully at the snow outside. Hehe.

Over the past few days I got some of the packages I was expecting, such as the CDs from Bird (many thanks - I'll watch the episodes / listen to the songs next week, when I'm not trying to muster up the will to study for an exam I never wanted to do in the first place =_= and when I stop having the new CD I just got yesterday on repeat ^^;).
I also got Laura Pausini's CD "From the inside" (which is the CD I mentioned that's been on repeat for a while). I've been a fan of Laura Pausini since she debuted in 1993 at the Sanremo festival here in Italy, and I have all her albums (most on cassette, though, it's only recently that I managed to get a CDplayer for my room). I even managed to go to one of her concerts last year.
This new CD of hers comes out here in Italy on the 17th of this month, but of course I had to get the import... couldn't wait. Hehe. I'm not disappointed, it's a great CD... some songs are English covers of songs she'd already sung in Italian, but most are new, and great (IMHO). I especially like "Surrender", "You are" and "Every little thing you do" (especially the piano/vocal only version). It's very worth buying. Poke me on IRC or something if you want a few samples.

Holy shit, it's snowing here. That I wasn't expecting to wake up to.

Of course it won't hold... still, it's nice. Large snowflakes, too. Pretty.

Woke up this morning with a cat sleeping curled up at the foot of my bed, and a large sock filled with candy on a pillow.
:D w00t. Candy.

In other news, I have a stupid cold again, I didn't sleep any last night because I kept waking up coughing, I have two ugly-looking purple bruises on my left hip because yesterday I slipped and fell on some ice, my whole left leg hurts as a result of that same fall, my lower back also hurts, and I wish I was a cat so I could sleep all day.

But tomorrow is Epifania and I'm getting candy, and I have cats to hug and I have people who love me, and that makes it all okay.

You know you're easily amused when, playing nethack...
- you play a few games as a female samurai named Nana, just because a samurai's pet dog is automatically named Hachi.
- you actually try to get hallucinated sometimes, then spend the next five minutes giggling at the silly messages you get when hallucinating
- the fact that, when you're a barbarian, your dog is automatically named Idefix makes you giggle

Hee.

Icon's Story. Hee.

No singing lesson this afternoon, because my teacher's mom is sick (bad cold) and she's gotta take care of her. Hmpf. First no singing lesson for two weeks because I had a cold, then no singing lesson because my teacher had a cold, then this... I do hope that after this the stupid cold stops going around. ¬¬

Referer Risk, because I'm bored.

(via Metafilter)

Happy new year. It's all cloudy this year, so fireworks don't show very well. That doesn't stop the cats from being terrified (and refusing to get out of the house) because of all the bangs and stuff.

So yeah. Happy new year, and stuff. Enjoy it as much as possible.