It is my own personal opinion that Dell Technical Support couldn�t support a pair of boobs if it were a WonderBra made of cement with three-inch thick, steel-reinforced copper underwire. I say this based on three or so hours of personal experience talking to some guy who had no idea what the hell was going on. To wit:

Me: Okay, it�s giving me an A:> prompt. What should I do now?

Tech Guy: �

Me: Hello?

Tech Guy: Okay, sir? What does it say?

Me: �it�s giving me an A:> prompt.

Tech Guy: Okay, does it say �A�?

Me: Um. Yes. It�s giving me an A:> prompt.

Tech Guy: Okay, so it says �A�?

Me: �decidedly.

Tech Guy: All right, I need you to type in �format c:�.

Me: That didn�t work. It says �bad command or file name�.

Tech Guy: Okay, what does it say now?

Me: �it says �bad command or file name�.

Tech Guy: Sir?

Me: Yes?

Tech Guy: Did you type in �format c:�?

Me: Yes. Twice, in fact.

Tech Guy: And did that work?

Me: What? No! Are you serious with this? It says �bad command or file name�!

Tech Guy: �what does it say now?

Me: Is there an adult I can speak with? Are your parents home?

Tech Guy: Okay�I�m going to have to�verify something�can I put you on hold?

Anyway, after much ado, I finally managed to get my computer up and running. It turns out that there was indeed a virus spreading somewhere within its memory bank, but it was eradicated with I napalmed the hard drive and reinstalled everything. Of course, then I was asked to provide various product codes, which modern programs won�t work without, due to rampant software piracy -- which I�m not necessarily opposed to on an ethical level, except in such cases where those of us who didn�t have the foresight to preserve their product code keys in a safe place for four years on the off-chance their hard drives would melt down at an unspecified future date would thereby be forced to make another hour-long phone call to Satan�s Little Helper at the Technical Support center. End computer piracy! It�s a huge pain in my ass!

Anyway, it would seem that everything is pretty much in working order, now. I say that with a big fat knock on wood, too, because the last thing I need is to curse myself forever via blind optimism. Fortunately, it�s hard to be an optimist when you�re always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Have you ever noticed that optimists always call themselves out as optimists, while pessimists call themselves �cynical� and cynics call themselves �realists�? I think that�s because only we cynics are truly possessed of a firm grasp on The Truth. Of course, now that I�ve called myself a cynic, by my own logic that makes me a pessimist. Shit. I hate being a pessimist -- pessimists suck.

In any case, with a little luck, I�ll be able to do stuff on my computer now without worrying that it might literally start melting in front of me. Fingers crossed, people!

Someone Got Here By Searching For: dirty old ladies I�m Watching: The Apprentice. Is Trump on drugs, people? Seriously. Pamela? Not the most deserving of the axe, y�all. With My Free Time, I�m: Talking to the yahoos at Tech Support. Support, this, yo.

my last adventure: Lie Down With Dogshit
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my next adventure: Ch-Ch-Changes