Month: October 2023

Last summer Ben and I were trying to figure out what do to over his fall break.  I had a ton of vacation time available, so taking a week off at the same time as his break was a no-brainer. He suggested a road trip to see Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art again and visit our friends Erik and Robert. I thought that would be a great idea since I could also get my 20 year cancer anniversary tattoo at the same time. (Erik is the only person in the world I allow to poke ink into my skin.)

But then Life Happened

Cancer. Yeah, that bastard. Ben's aunt is battling a particularly aggressive form at the moment, so we decided to eschew our road trip and instead to spend a little more time with her and perhaps just take her on a day trip to northern Arizona.

Even that fell through. She's in the middle of treatments, and while we could've still done it this weekend, all the poking and prodding have left her feeling wiped out. (#relatable)

And then life happened again.

Wednesday a week ago Ben started having vision problems with one eye. He wasn't able to get in to see his regular ophthalmologist, but he was able to get in for an emergency visit with mine first thing Friday morning. I wasn't planning on taking the day off, but I insisted on driving him since I knew he'd be dilated. It turned out that it was a detached retina. From the eye doctor we went to a retina specialist and then directly into surgery. He were back home by late afternoon.

He's doing well. His followup exam was good, and while he's still an eye-patched bandit, he's able to drive and will see (pardon the pun) the doctor again in two weeks.

Technology is Not My Friend

Robopsychosis

Several weeks ago I ran across a post where someone had mapped all the places he'd overnighted on a Google Map. That looks fun, I thought. I was able to get all my old domiciles and about 80% of my overnight trips mapped, but there were a couple years where I didn't have exact locations—but—because of my inveterate anal-retentiveness, I was sure I had emails from the venues locked away in old Outlook .pst files.

I was able to access all but one file of the files. For some reason, I'd password-protected it and after trying all my usual passwords, came up empty handed. Found a piece of Windows software that would unlock it. After downloading it and running it in demo mode, it indeed identified the password but required purchase to actually tell me what it was. Go figger.

So I bought the software, installed it on my work laptop (my only source for Windows) and entered the registration info. It wouldn't register because it was blocked by the Enterprise firewall!

See where this is going?

This is where I'm gonna lose a lot of you. I know it and I'm prepared to accept it. "That bitch be cray!"

I'd been wanting to get an inexpensive Windows box for a while. I didn't want to spend much or get anything high-powered, but there were definitely instances (like this password thing) where it could prove useful. I could "borrow" one of the machines that are scheduled for disposal from work, reformat it and put it to use, but I'm too honest to do something like that. For the past few years we've been buying the Dell micro Optiplex desktops for those users who still require desktop machines. They're tiny (about the size of a Mac Mini) and would suit my need perfectly. I looked on eBay and found a model from 2021 with 16GB RAM and a 256GB hard drive for $150. It seemed reasonable, and it even came with a warranty. I placed my order.

The box arrived a week later. The moment I started unpacking it I knew something was amiss. I pulled out the power supply brick and the power connector was not the correct form factor for these micro PCs. Then I pulled out the laptop.

Yup, they'd shipped the wrong unit.

Finally got that sorted out and received the micro desktop machine. Powered it up, and while it looked like it had been set up with a generic user account, it also came loaded with a bunch of crap I neither wanted or needed. I had a Dell Win10 Pro DVD, so I figured it would be an easy matter of wiping and reinstalling a fresh O/S.

Oh, you stupid, stupid man.

To my credit, the install went fine…but there were no device-specific drivers installed. No problem, I thought. I can go onto the Dell site with my Mac, download the drivers, put them on a USB stick and go from there.

The Dell recognized the USB DVD-ROM drive I had plugged in, but none of the USB sticks were seen by the O/S.

I ended up burning the bare minimum of drivers onto a CD from the Mac and attempted to load them. The two I needed most—graphics and wireless—would not load because the O/S was too old. Yup…the Windows 10 DVD I had was from the initial release back in 2018 or 2019 or whenever the fuck it came out.

Back to the Mac. Downloaded the latest Win10 ISO. Burned that onto a DVD and ran setup on the Dell. That brought me up to date. I was able to load the video and wireless drivers, and then finally go online to get everything else I needed.

I swear the universe was telling me I just didn't need to be doing this.

It was 1am by the time I got the Dell up and running. I'd been at it since before dinner.

The next day I went to load the .pst password cracking software and realized that when I purchased the license, I'd actually gotten the .pdf version!

FUCK ME SIDEWAYS IN TRAFFIC.

So, after spending another $30, I loaded (and successfully registered and activated) the software and finally got that .pst unlocked. And I found what I'd been looking for. (And also found all of the first emails Ben and I exchanged!)

Was it worth it? Yes…no…maybe? Seeing it all from the outside now, I realize how OCD it was; all that work and expense just to retrieve the half-dozen overnight locations that were missing from my map.

I noticed that the software company that has the password cracks for .pdfs and .psts also has one for Word docs. I have a several of those that I haven't been able to get into for more than a decade, so it might be worth dropping another $30 to gain access to those.

My only real disappointment when all was said and done was that this Dell 7050 can't do Windows 11 (it's not capable of running TPM 2.0), but as Ben pointed out, "You don't need Windows 11 to do what you're wanting to do."

#truth

And The Week Goes On

Admittedly, the rest of the week was reather relaxing. I solved the problem with my work laptop (something I spared you from in the previous section) negating the need to run back into the office before tomorrow (since I'm WFH) to reimage the infernal thing. Many afternoons were spent napping with my beloved or just hanging out with him at Starbucks, or with the dogs watching television. Other than getting the problem fixed with the work laptop, I haven't looked at work emails, have kept the work cell turned off, and feel like I can face tomorrow's undoubted onslaught of stupidity somewhat recharged.