Oldschool Repairs versus Tech Repairs
Jul. 15th, 2021 11:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
captainsblogHaving spent more time in the past few months demolishing tile, scraping glue and slogging around pieces of permanentish equipment, at least you can tell what you need to do and, more or less, when you're done.
The tech stuff, not so much.
As I mentioned last week, Microsoft had to push through a quick and dirty patch on account of an exploitable hole in one of their universal print-related operations. Even if you didn't use a printer, you had to do it. We quickly updated our two Windows 10 laptops, but we have that old beast in the corner, a Frankenputered old Windows 8 tablet/laptop that Eleanor didn't last six months with. I use it for some older applications that don't play well with Ten, and after its last use I remembered to push through the emergency update for it. Windows 8, and its still-supported successor 8.1, were the last versions where you chose when to download and install updates.
I then forgot about it until 3 this morning, when nature called and I saw lights coming from that room. That computer was still on, hours after the update finished. It was nagging me to "finish setting up this computer," and the main feature being pushed was the much better, cooler and highly secure browser that Windows 8.1 recommends…
Internet Explorer.
Before rolling back into the rack, I replied: Go back to sleep, Microsoft. You’re drunk.
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Not that Ten isn't without its own day-drinking issues.
After more-or-less getting back to sleep and then up for feedings and kitchen cleanup, I started working from home; we had an energy audit scheduled for this morning and I wanted to take Pepper with me to work so she wouldn't be too bothersome. I finally left when they were late in arriving and I needed to get things scanned and printed. Which was going to be difficult, because Ten's built-in virus protection had turned itself on for a nice little scan around the block and was slowing everything down to a crawl.
You cannot turn it off. At one point, it was consuming 95 percent of CPU. The only real way out of it is to close out of everything and restart. There are suggested workarounds online, but they generally involve mucking in the registry or disabling the thing altogether, which is also not recommended unless you've got a replacement antivirus program ready to roll. The once innocuous AVG, which still runs on the Windows 8.1 beast, has gotten annoying over the years; I refuse to have anything to do with McAfee, given their history of "optional offer" BS with Adobe and their founder's general kookiness; and Norton has always bothered the shit out of me when it's come preloaded. So I'll just live with the occasional slowdowns, most likely.
----
Once I did get going, I was referred a letter from an attorney I don't recognize from Bankruptcy Court, threatening to file his client in a bankruptcy and describing the potential consequences of that to his opponent. I told the referring attorney, The letter you received is so full of shit, I'm going to need a poop knife to cut through it.
This is a new piece of
Post text was as follows:
My family poops big. Maybe it's genetic, maybe it's our diet, but everyone births giant logs of crap. If anyone has laid a mega-poop, you know that sometimes it won't flush. It lays across the hole in the bottom of the bowl and the vortex of draining water merely gives it a spin as it mocks you. Growing up, this was a common enough occurrence that our family had a poop knife. It was an old rusty kitchen knife that hung on a nail in the laundry room, only to be used for that purpose. It was normal to walk through the hallway and have someone call out "hey, can you get me the poop knife"? I thought it was standard kit. You have your plunger, your toilet brush, and your poop knife. Fast forward to 22. It's been a day or two between poops and I'm over at my friend's house. My friend was the local dealer and always had 'guests' over, because you can't buy weed without sitting on your ass and sampling it for an hour. I excuse myself and lay a gigantic turd. I look down and see that it's a sideways one, so I crack the door and call out for my friend. He arrives and I ask him for his poop knife. "My what?" Your poop knife, I say. I need to use it. Please. "Wtf is a poop knife?" Obviously he has one, but maybe he calls it by a more delicate name. A fecal cleaver? A Dung divider? A guano glaive? I explain what it is I want and why I want it. He starts giggling. Then laughing. Then lots of people start laughing. It turns out, the music stopped and everyone heard my pleas through the door. It also turns out that none of them had poop knives, it was just my fucked up family with their fucked up bowels. FML. I told this to my wife last night, who was amused and horrified at the same time. It turns out that she did not know what a poop knife was and had been using the old rusty knife hanging in the utility closet as a basic utility knife. Thankfully she didn't cook with it, but used it to open Amazon boxes. She will be getting her own utility knife now.
[Edit: Common question - Why was this not in the bathroom instead of the laundry room? Answer. We only had one poop knife, and the laundry room was central to all three bathrooms. I have no idea why we didn't have three poop knives. All I know is that we didn't. We had the one. Possibly because my father was notoriously cheap about the weirdest things. So yes, we shared our poop knife.]
Not falling for that one, LOL
Date: 2021-07-16 11:25 am (UTC)Recommendation: We use Avast on all our machines at work and home and just love it. No bloat! Plus, if you want some humor, they have a sound theme you can enable that sounds like a pirate. :D (Optional.)
Arrrr you sure?
Date: 2021-07-16 12:35 pm (UTC)Re: Arrrr you sure?
Date: 2021-07-16 12:57 pm (UTC)