Ardath Rekha

Good:

So I have my new desktop. It is sitting in its box, just waiting for me to assemble it and boot it up. I am excited. I swore I'd never get another HP, but it seems like they've done a complete turnaround and are making far better machines. At the very least, this was the highest-rated machine on Best Buy's site... 5.0 stars from 34 ratings. 8 gigs ram expandable to 16 gigs -- that should keep me taken care of for a while -- and a 750 gig HD with lots of expansion bays. No BD but I have a bay I can put one in when I get to that stage.

The monitor/TV looks like it's going to be absolutely awesome. It's got a ridiculous number of input choices.

I also have an external DVD-RW for my netbook... so I can load programs into it.

This means that I'm going to have a hardcore workstation on my desk (which will only need a RAID and a BD-R to decimate all), a powerful laptop for on-the-go working (which should be back from the factory in another two weeks, and which I plan to trick out with memory and a bigger HD soon) and then the netbook for lighter usage but still with a lot of flashy capabilities itself.

Good? More like awesome.

Meh:

Currently backing things up off of my old desktop and uninstalling programs prior to its final decommissioning. I'm not particularly bothered by that but it's going to take a while. And until I get it out of my room, I can't assemble the new machine. Meh.

Oh and much room-cleaning left to do. More like organizing all of the stuff that currently has problems fitting in the room, or defining itself well enough for me to know where to put it. But it is annoying. I want to have it done by Monday so an electrician can come in next week and upgrade one of the outlets in my room. But meh.

Bad:

I appear to have gone off Chinese food rather violently. Which possibly means that I'm okay with it as long as I avoid the nearby restaurant... and possibly means I'm just no longer okay with it, period. I'm going to be very frustrated until I know which one it is. :(

Ugly:

One word: Shingles.

I think I'm about to have a flare-up, to be exact. I had one last year... if it had waited two weeks it would have been the first anniversary of my diagnosis. BLARGH! BLARGH, I SAY!

At any rate, my left thigh (apparently the virus's Happy Place) has a tingling, burning feeling a bit like one of those old "indian rope burn" things kids used to do to each others' skin. In another day or so, I will probably see the first blisters appear.

The really shitty part of this is that my primary care provider is the student health center, and they're closed until Monday morning. If this were a life-threatening emergency, I could go to the emergency room, but paying a $175 ER copay just for an Acyclovir prescription seems a bit steep. So I just have to hope that I can get them to phone in a prescription first thing Monday morning so I can pick it up and take the first dose prior to classes. Or that the virus decides that flaring right now would be boring, and doesn't do any worse than just itch-and-tingle at me. (That's happened before; I had no idea that it was shingles back then because it never blistered.)

So ugh ugh ugh. I will try to focus on thinking happy thoughts about new high-tech equipment.