I spent a really absurd amount of time researching computer parts. I have 3 of the 5 things now (motherboard, CPU, RAM), waiting on the video card and Windows 7 to arrive. I'm reusing my current case, harddrive, optical drives, and power supply unit. I could only barely play GW2 at the lowest settings, but this new stuff should let me run it at the highest or next-to-highest at consistently good frame rate, especially since my monitor only supports up to 1440x900 resolution. Which is already makes thing annoying small to me, I'd rather it was 1280x800 again, but that stopped working recently. This computer has lasted 4 and a half years, which is pretty good for a gaming computer, although I guess I haven't really bought any games that require modern graphics in several years.

CPU: Intel G850 2.9 GHzx2 - Not exactly a "gaming" processor, and kinda the weakest link, but I might be able to get away with it for 4 or so years.

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-H61MA-D3V LGA 1155 Intel H61 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Micro ATX - Cheap, has enough slots, has a lot of room to upgrade the CPU if I need to.

RAM: 4x2GB DDR3 - It was fairly cheap, so I went a bit overboard with 8 gigs. I don't know if I'll ever touch that much at once.

OS: Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit OEM - Would have stuck with Vista, but I have the OEM version, and that is one-license-one-motherboard. I got Vista pretty shortly before 7 came out, and now I'm getting 7 shortly before 8 comes out.

Video card: Radeon HD 6850 1GB GDDR5 - I was originally going to get a weaker card, but I thought I had just enough left in my Paypal account (this was the last thing I bought) to buy a new one of these. Turns out Google shopping lists some outdated prices, and occasionally neglects to add shipping. There was only one brand available for under $140, and it was a huge monster that I didn't think would fit on my tiny motherboard. It's a really good deal for the power, and I'd fallen in love with it, so I went to eBay. There were two people selling used ones, but both auctions ended so close in price to a "pulled out of new computer, never used" one, that I went with that instead. The seller is pretty dependable, so I like to think of it as saving $10 at no risk.

I'll keep telling myself that I'll have more fun with a nice computer than a trip to New Hampshire.

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I wanted to make mom some kind of art for Mother's Day, like back when I was in school. Originally, I thought I'd make use of those old plastic "BBs" that have been lying around for years. They are little plastic spheres, and I was going to paint them different colors, and then glue them to a piece of paper in the shape of a seahorse. Like little circular pixels. I bought the paint, and painted a bunch of them a single color, but I discovered the next day that the paint doesn't really coat them at all, and sloughs off really easily. So then I thought I'd just use the paint to make a seahorse painting. I didn't have any paintbrushes, so I attempted to fingerpaint a seahorse. It was awful. It could have passed for a 5 year old's work.

This was Monday night, and I was going to see mom Tuesday, since she unexpectedly moved our meeting day up. I was talking to Transformice friend about this and said I'd probably end up buying her a card instead, and she suggested that she make a drawing for me. I don't know if she meant "and claim it as your work" or "like a commissioned piece", but I don't have any printer ink but yellow and black, so it was somewhat moot. It made me consider drawing a seahorse, though. I'm an ok drawer, always been terrible at painting, so why not try?

I took 4 pictures of it, and this was somehow the best.

It turned out a low better than I imagined it would. There are some mistakes, and I wish my eraser didn't just make smudges so I could have fixed them, but I'm pleased with it.

Jo, I don't feel like going to your blog to post this tiny message, but I somehow was not alerted when you sent me that Twitter message, and I also somehow missed it, so I'm sorry about that. I'm glad school is over for now for you, but also disappointed that you're going back so soon. Maybe I'd forgotten you writing about having summer school. How long will it be, and why are you taking it? Maybe we can still web cam sometime if I can build my courage.

It's getting pretty annoying not being able to eat flat foods. I can't really close my jaw yet. I guess I could, but it feels like one of the upper teeth is going right into the wound, and that kinda freaks me out. A yellow bruise has appeared on my cheek, and my jaw area is too sore to shave, so I'm getting scraggly.

Things have been good with Transformice friend. She's been really busy with some interests that I can't really participate in, though.

The Guild Wars 2 beta weekend event was fun. I decide to pre-purchase. Really miss click-to-move, but it controls ok. I've been researching how I might put that money I put aside for the trip towards upgrading my computer. It's been a bit of a nightmare. I'm getting conflicting information.

I guess I'll write this in chronological order.

I'd barely talked to Michelle for about 3 weeks. I sent her a message saying I'd really like to get a date settled on, which went unanswered. She seemed to be keeping herself offline of the Facebook chat. She started sending pictures back and forth with a girl. This weekend, she changed her relationship status to "in a relationship". I started getting very worried. On Monday she was actually online. She pasted something she'd written to me 2 weeks ago, but either didn't have the nerve to send it then, or wanted to send it in person.

She started talking to an ex-girlfriend of hers (her only ex-girlfriend I think?) over Facebook. Their relationship ended very badly with lots of drama, something like 8 years ago, and they hadn't spoken since. However, Michelle found herself falling madly in love with her again, which was apparently mutual. Michelle described it like being completely obsessed with this person, thinking about her constantly.

She's become so enamored with her that she's going to move to Hawaii to be with her. Immediately, as in mid-Juneish. This other girl (maybe I should say woman, she's 27ish) is also serving in the military at a military base. Michelle has a very good job for someone without a college education, and she's told me several times that she's lucky to have it and get paid as well as she is. Her sister recently had her baby too, and she was quite gung-ho about being an aunt to her, and wanted to be very involved with her life, even planning on moving into a duplex with her sister and sister's boyfriend in the other side. So now she's moving pretty much as far as is possible within the U.S., based on a couple weeks of chatting with someone, to a place where she has no job waiting for her.

Because she's going to be very busy getting ready to move, I won't be able to visit.

This is quite a....bummer to me. This wasn't just going to be a trip to see a friend I've known on and off for 15 years, this was going to be a once-in-a-lifetime-adventure where I finally learn to do scary new things on my own and learn to get my together. We were going to go camping, and visit Boston, and a cave, and eat all sorts of restaurants, and we had all sorts of things planned. This was something that I thought about every day, made some new little plan for constantly. Something I'd already went to a fair amount of trouble to prepare for.

When Michelle started talking to me again, I had to really ask myself if I was willing to forgive her for going silent for 4 years. And now this....setting me up with all this hope, offering probably the kindest thing anyone has ever offered me... and then pulling the rug out from under me. I mean, forgiveness is supposed to be a virtue, but am I just a fool if I let myself be disapointed by this person again? She was certainly apolegetic, and said she wouldn't blame me if I hated her, but that she had to take this opportunity.

Is it worth trusting anyone? It just seems like I'm such a fool for trying to be friends with people...

I didn't say anything about all that, though. I said it's great that she's found such love, and told her I hoped it worked out. And then I logged off. I don't even know if I mean that.

 

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Today I had my wisdom tooth removed. I liked the doctor. The actual procedure was pretty quick, although it was somewhat painful. They split the tooth into sections, and then pull the sections. Some disconcerting noises. And then I had to drive myself to a pharmacy to get my pain meds, with my mouth numb, and biting down on a piece of gauze.

600mg Ibuprofin (I was surprised that it's used for this, I take it for headaches and such and it's never clear to me that it's working) and Vicodin if the pain is still too much. 30 Vicodin, which seems like way more than needed for something like this. Supposed to take the Ibuprofin every 6 hours. I've taken one so far and although the local anesthesia has worn off, I've felt pretty much no pain. No noticeable swelling so far.

The bleeding, though, oh the bleeding. My mouth fills up with saliva and blood pretty quickly, and every swallow is an event. You're supposed to be very careful about not disrupting the clotting process. It worries me every time I swallow and feel that little tug from where the wound is, that I'm screwing it up. And you're not supposed to spit or rinse. I've been drinking a lot of water to help with the blood taste. If I get water on the side where the tooth was removed, is that considered "rinsing"? It can't be too bad since some people get 4 wisdom teeth removed at once, and since you can't use straws you'd pretty much have to dunk them in water constantly. It's hard to drink from one side of your mouth, and swalling pills isn't easy, either. Still taking the penicillin, too. I guess the bleeding has gone down a little, but it's supposed to last for about 24 hours before mostly subsiding.

Haven't had anything to eat yet. I have lots of pudding ready to go, though. The cookies and cream pudding looks so good. Mostly just feel kinda tired, but I don't think I'll get any sleep tonight.

I got a "syringe" thing that I'm supposed to use to remove food from the space around the wound after eating. For a whole month. This whole thing is obnoxiously inconveinent. I think I'd rather break my leg.

The doctor said I handled it really well for someone with a partially impacted wisdom tooth with only local anesthesia. I think he said it's about as bad as it gets? He was interested in my extra teeth, too. Said I had 3 and that they were rare.

 

I hadn't been to the dentist in a long time. But the tooth next to my wisdom tooth on the lower right started to hurt after using it to chew. It happened on and off, and I just kinda ignored it for a few months. But the third or so time that the pain was really really bad, I called the dentist to make an appointment. Except that it was Good Friday and they were closed. My tooth stopped hurting and I put it off again. The next Thursday, at night, it went crazy with pain again after biting into a Junior Mint, which is quite soft. The pain went away in time for bed. I slept about 2 hours, and was awoken with great pain. They're open 8am-midnight on Fridays, so I decided I'd stay up until 8, and hopefully get an appointment for the same day. Except that they were closed again. On Monday I managed to make an appointment for Wednesday (today).

I barely got any sleep last night. Felt like I was just lying there bored for about 6 hours. They took two x-rays since the first wasn't positioned correctly. Put some cold stuff on the tooth to check its sensitivity. The tooth is dead, and infected. After three anesthetic shots, they put this dental dam thing in and scraped at it and "drained" it. And put something on the top of the tooth. I guess they drilled into and patched the hole? I need to have the wisdom tooth behind it removed, so that the tooth can be worked on more easily, and because it's pushing on it. And then I guess a root canal on the tooth? Is that the right term? I'm not sure what that is. And then I guess they're going to remove the tooth and build a new one, but they said that would be after my trip. They also gave me a Penicillin prescription, 4 pills a day for a week.

He said it was going to cost about $2500 total. I don't really have that kind of money. And then there's the trip expenses, and Guild Wars 2, and I might need to upgrade my computer to play it...