Computer said no
I was the first person in my street to get a PC, back in the days when home computers were still a bit of a mystery, and most machines were only used in offices.
It was love at first sight - and I've never looked back since.
But, as with any relationship, we've had our ups and downs, and many a tear shared over a blue screen of death.
I'm probably the worst kind of user, who doesn't really know that much, but mistakenly believes I do - and am brave enough to dive into the registry, changing settings, deleting essential files, just 'cause for some reason, I don't recall seeing that DLL there before - was it there before? hummm... oh well, let's just delete the bugger and see what happens...
But, worst of all:
I never back anything up - I think about doing it, but I never do it - there's always mañana.
So, as you can see, more often than not when my PC goes down, it's entirely my fault.
Last year the cooling fan packed-up, but instead of installing a new one, I just sellotaped a hand-held fan to the back of the beast. It worked!
But, a couple of weeks ago, just as I was about to publish the band website I've been painstakingly putting together for the past few months - PC went completely dead.
Not your average nervous breakdown or virus that I can easily kill with a couple of sharp clicks, nope, it was a major hard-drive failure.
heart stopped beating.
All my files, music, photos, website, new lyrics - everything: gone.
This must surely be one of the most stressful malaises of our digital age - we should have helplines, free opium from the NHS - and a handsome nurse come round to comfort you and ease the pain - for painful it is.
And so it was that I hit PCWorld, teared-eye and desperate, and this time determined to buy a brand-new-machine - no more 2nd hand PC worries for miss monteiro.
Got sold a decent modern PC - well, that is, until I got home and tried bloody WINDOWS8.
And what an absolute joke of a system it is.
Crammed with free crapware, restricted access, dreadful interface that doesn't even allow you to open more than 1 window at the time - how shitty is that?
When I'm working with music or graphics, I don't need 2 windows: I bloody need 6, 7, sometimes 8!
The system also wraps itself around your browser, adding an extra ugly band on top of every website - how crappy is that for people working with web graphics? - and more worryingly, it controls your browsing habits.
Sorry, I've got nothing to hide, but that doesn't mean I want to take my PC desktop online with me. No.
The list of what's wrong with WINDOWS8 is kilometric, and if you don't believe me - just google: WINDOWS8 + annoying, frustrating or shit etc.
It just had to be taken back - but that's another blog entry, when I got to read PCWorld's small-print return policy.
Long story short (-ish) had to buy yet another computer, but thankfully this time, with XP-pro installed.
I'm not obsessed about operating systems, in fact, the best ones, are the ones that are invisible, and just let you get on with your work.
So, where are we now?
Well, I've spent the last week or so trying to recover whatever online files, folders etc are still around and started another website from scratchio - this time, something simpler, but hopefully not embarrassingly poor.
I'm pretty much done - website will be up and running next week - also have some really cool Drugstore news in the bag - and can't wait to share with everyone else.
I'll leave this post with a warning from the heart, so you don't have to go through the same horrible pain I endured - and ask permission from the graphicologists out there to, on this occasion, allow me to use 'capital bold':
1 - BACK EVERYTHING UP
2 - DON'T - UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES - UPGRADE TO WINDOWs8.
blip blip bye bye
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