The Gremlin Counteroffensive

I forced myself out of bed in the wee hours this morning, hoping to get in a little editing, a little writing, and a little portfolio-ing. I started with a blog entry about the boys and our electronic drug switch. A few paragraphs into it, Safari crashed. I took that as a sign to get my butt downstairs where my old 2000-era Windows laptop was recharging after having the battery drained during a power outage. I have an academic paper to edit. I have trouble getting the computer to come out of its no-power-available sleep mode, but manage to get it restarted (sacrificing whatever may have been open and unsaved at the time). When it comes up, I don’t have internet access. Network is acknoweldged but no web, email or anything useful. This has happened a few times before, and only time in the off mode has seemed to fix it.

What a perfect time to go get a new computer. It seems a bit hypocritical to do this on the heels of my recent money rant (), but it’s my birthday. And we’ve got a half-dozen relatives chipipng in for some new hardware as my graduation gift.

I’m not sure what I’m getting. I like the idea of having a wireless laptop, but don’t like the idea of spending an extra grand to make a computer portable. I want a machine powerful enough to do real video editing and DVD production, but I need to be realistic in how much time I’ll have for that in the shorter-term. I want to be able to run windows and mac stuff simultaneously, but I’m not convinced that feature is going to be worth the investment. Mostly, I want a feeling of technological victory after suffering a couple defeats this morning.