Beneath the Surface

The Sims is an evil, evil game.

That is all.

Actually it's not supposed to hit until almost noon tomorrow. As long as I don't have to drive in it I don't mind too much--there's something cozy and slightly smug about being in a warm house, looking out the window for the three feet you can actually see before there's nothing but white, listening to the wind shriek.

I'm up trying to change my email address wherever I've been using the old one up until now (like Livejournal, for example :)). I've had it for about ten years, I know I'll miss something or someone.

I finally made the chicken soup today--wonderful stuff, homemade egg noodles, but every time I make them I remember just why I don't make them more often than I do. In addition, making them so rarely means that every time it's a revelation that egg noodles have not just eggs but EGGS!--more eggs than I'm strictly comfortable putting into anything that isn't brownies :).

But that's okay, I also made chocolate chip cookies. Only two eggs in chocolate chip cookies. Clearly the healthier option.

We watched the Barbarian stuff on the History Channel tonight. The part on the Vikings wasn't bad, but the part on the Goths didn't seem to have as much solid content as one would like. Plus I kept being distracted by the phenomenally bad hairpiece worn by one of the experts-in-the-field. I don't think I'm all that shallow but when it looks like you lacquered your hair to your head, it's an unfortunate thing. Then again, I was working on a quilt while I was watching and likely not paying close attention, so maybe I shouldn't criticize :).

The new ISP seems to be mostly an improvement. The connection speed is much better (we're actually getting 56 now) and not only is there someone there when you call tech support (I think I mentioned Dan's 2 1/2-hour wait with the old one before he gave up), they seem to know what they're talking about.

And I've got a little over a chapter left to read in Road to Hel. I'll want to read it again, it's been such a good read that I find myself reading instead of studying :).

We're trying out a new ISP. Dan has been having more problems with the old one than I have--it keeps telling him that his empty inbox is taking up most of his allotted disk space :P--but I haven't been very happy with it either. So last night, after he spent 2 1/2 hours on hold (yes, he's stubborn) with their tech support line and finally gave up (no, he's not that stubborn), I signed us up for a month with another one. I'm still in the process of switching mail lists and so forth over, and currently both addresses work. But--I was finally able to upload some new LJ icons! Yay! (Yes, the old ISP has a problem with letting me upload those little tiny LJ icon files!)

Before I went to bed last night, I had the brilliant idea of letting dinner cook in the crockpot all night so we could eat at noon or so. Checked it this morning--it had been coooking at low for about 9 hours at that point--man, slow cooking means SLOW, doesn't it? I turned it up to high, hopefully we'll have our corned beef and cabbage sometime this afternoon. I guess I don't use the thing often enough to understand it yet :).

Our winter has returned. Winds have been fierce, and it's been snowing again, a little bit. A good day to stay indoors.

My isp is having fits again. Emails sent to me have been bouncing, mail lists arriving days late and out of order, and very likely some mail lost entirely (I haven't answered any ADF office mail in a week because I haven't received any). So if you've tried to email me, and I haven't written back, I may not have gotten it yet, or I may never get it at all. Supposedly my isp is doing an upgrade over the next few months; in the mean time I'm looking into other local options. Not that my isp is local anymore--two buyouts ago it was, now I have no idea where they're located in the physical world.

Grr.

On the plus side, the spam is down as well :).

Damn phone company. Remember we had a cable cut last week? Led to email problems? I found out yesterday that at least one important message I had been sent, I had never received--it was just lucky that I wrote the person back (figuring that my message might not have reached them). No, it had, and they recent the message they'd sent back.

Well, I know there's no such thing as a foolproof form of communication. Maybe I should start making use of those annoying-as-hell automatic "let me know if you got this" things. Sigh.

But mainly I'm worried now about what else I might have missed. Most of the email I receive is trivial, but some of it isn't.

As if regular old spam trying to get me to enlarge body parts I don't have isn't bad enough... What it looks like is that someone else has been sending out spam using my email address, so that I get the bounced messages (and presumably the complaints although I haven't seen any of those yet). I've been getting over a hundred of these a day--and they all have an attachment! Grrrrrrrrr!

Seriously, is there anything I can do about this? I'm guessing not.

I suppose it might be a virus on someone else's computer? (I use a Mac for email so I don't think it's one on mine.) Should I tell my isp? I'm assuming they can't do anything about it either.

Okay, I am happier with my isp again. They are apparently now forwarding email sent to my old address (the one they changed on me a few weeks ago? and said they couldn't do forwarding? so I've been having to find all the places my old address is and change it? and I've been on the net for long enough that I have no idea where all these places might be? :)) so that I get it at my new address.

I discovered this when I noticed that I had a lot more spam in my inbox today than I'd been getting just recently.

Well, it solves more problems than it creates, so I'm happy :).

Still no email, grrrrr! I was supposed to call my isp if it wasn't up and running within 24 hours of the last time I called (yesterday evening), you'd better believe I'm calling!

I started reading Egil's Saga the other night (when I was at the laundromat, where I went to try to destress--yes, seriously!--after doing laundry I went to the lake, waded in and found a rock--just seemed like the thing to do, the rock is on my nightstand where I can see it--and of course stayed to look at the lake for a while, it's nice to live a few miles from a lake :)); I meant to keep up with it but I haven't picked it up since. It's a good read, too.

A few months ago Dan and I were going through some of the lore, he'd read out loud while I worked on whatever sewing project I had going; we got through Beowulf, and started on the Saga of the Volsungs, but never got through it. It might be nice to start that again.