Don’t Mess With My MoBo!

After a three week absence I have finally returned to the blogging world. It has nothing to do with ideas to blog on. Some of you might suspect that Hottie and I have slipped away to a romantic getaway, turning up the passions on our fire and lust for each other and ignoring modern technology completely.

Nope.

The truth is I've been working long hours and those that I didn't work have been spent doing yard work and trying to fix my computer.

Can we talk?

First, this post has nothing to do with working long hours (I don't mind), or yard work (I really like it), this is about my computer and my MoBo. What you say, there still must be something wrong with your computer because when you hit the "J" key it types a "B"? Don't you mean MoJo? Nope, "MoBo" it turns out, is the computer geek term for "Motherboard". Don't believe me, Google it. If you have a computer you have a MoBo. How important is a MoBo you ask? Every computer has a MoBo, just like, hmmm, every person on earth has a mother. And just because every mother on earth is not perfect, you know, maybe bad, it turns out that not all MoBo's are good either. It turns out my MoBo has been playing the part of Joan Crawford in "Mommie Dearest" and the rest of the computer has been playing her children.

I don't know why it's called a "Motherboard" instead of a "Fatherboard" either. "FoBo" sounds stupid as an acronym. Maybe the geeks who created the motherboard designed it after their hardworking mother who sacrificed her life to make a better life for her child, always giving, never taking or complaining. Why not the father? It's hard to design something based on a guy who sits on the couch all day, eating, drinking, watching TV, and farting. Probably doesn't wear pants at home and scratches himself in some embarrassing places. Leave him a list of things to do and you'll be lucky if he can find the paper the list was written on. No, the MoBo has work to do, driving the kids to school, helping with homework, multitasking and doing all those unpleasant things mothers do. Just in computer speak.

Now when I want a new computer I find that it futile to just go out and buy one. Buying a new computer is like buying a new car, you have to justify why you need a new computer. My excuse this time was that my wife, who prior to inheriting my old pc was still using pen, paper, the telephone, and Kinko's to communicate and create calendars. Since my kids are out of the house she seemed like the natural heir to my old, yet not really outdated, pc. When I bought a brand new car (Ford Escort) in 1982 it was to replace my old AMC Pacer Wagon. The muffler had gone bad and it was a Pacer. In my head the new pc argument that I couldn't run Flight Simulator X on my current pc, sounded just like the argument that I needed a new car rather than replace the muffler. That was my argument, in my head. You don't usually win a lot of arguments outside of your head with the inside the head argument.

So I casually approached Hottie and suggested that she might like to have a computer of her own and that my computer was just the ticket. It would be tough but I would go out and build me a new computer to compensate for my loss. I really don't remember how we came to any agreement, more than likely I just went out and bought it after informing her of my intentions. I'm a jerk that way.

Which brings us back to the AMC Pacer and the Ford Escort. The Escort was a good car for a couple of years but I found myself looking back and pining for my old, reliable, ugly Pacer. Since I bought my new PC I have looked over my shoulder at my wife as she e-mails, blogs and reads blogs and pinned for my old pc. It was reliable, even predictable, it ran my programs (except for Flight X) with not even a whimper.

Not my new pc, it has been, pardon the expression, a REAL MOTHER!!! Won't turn on, won't turn off, has great graphics, doesn't recognize the graphics card, and runs slower than my old pc. I'm constantly pulling the case apart and trying to fix something. Two weeks ago it finally happened. Stupidly opened a file that someone sent me, turned out to be a virus. My son who was visiting decided to check out something on the internet, pushed the chair away and announced that he was going to use "Mom's pc because you have a weird message on your screen.

Can I get an "AAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

It turns out that my MoBo was and has been a bad MoBo from the start. And I had to replace it.

So I have a few people and Corporations to thank as I've spent the past two nights putting my pc back together. They are listed in no particular order.

• Microsoft – To the employee who came up with the idea of the "blue screen of death", thanks for creating it, I aged 10 years just last night frustrated every time that it showed up on my screen. I lost count at 52.
  
• ASUS – God Bless every one of you that contributed to creating my new MoBo. I will love and respect MoBo Model # P5Q-E and treat her better than I treat my own mother.
  
• ASUS – On the other hand the concept that everyone has hands the size of fairies is just plain wrong. You guys could also maybe rewrite the manual so that everyone that reads English can also understand it the way you guys use it.
  
• InfoTech – How lucky was I that the guy that sold me the original motherboard sold me the new one. What I thought was cute was the way you kept talking all geek and techie even though I kept telling you with my inside voice that I got lost at "How may I help you?".
  
• Hottie – You kept encouraging me, I think you were really concerned about my computer's condition. Or, it could be that you just wanted me to stay off of your computer as I entered every possible query into Google about the demise and the rise of my pc using yours.
  
• JW – You know who you are, I doubt that the virus you sent me caused the problem, but as I mentioned before, I'm not saying it's your fault, I'm just saying I'm going to blame you.
  

And last….

• EVGA – Don't know if you know but, the nForce 780i SLI Motherboard or Mainboard as you call it really SUCKS! Maybe if you had called it a "Motherboard" like everyone else it wouldn't have turned into the bad mama it did.

I’m A Ramblin’ Guy

Winter is now behind us, Spring is nearly halfway through, and I'm finding it hard to stay awake long enough to post a blog. My problem is that I'm an early riser. Somewhere between 5:20 and 6:00am my internal clock goes off and it wasn't built with a snooze alarm. I show up for work around 6:30, 7am at the latest. I really hate the internal alarm clock on Saturday. 7am comes and I'm wide awake trying to find something to do around the house that isn't noisy so that I don't wake the sleepers in the house.

As for writing the blog I have a number of ideas that I believe have some validity but again, spending hours on a pc at work don't motivate me to come home and do the same. It was during one of my many trips to the men's room at work, a side effect of blood pressure medication that I'm on, that I had a moment of revelation.

Why not take a number of the random thoughts and put them on paper, or the screen. Fair warning, I'm not going to make much of an effort to censor my thoughts.

• Our cat died the other day, last Friday to be exact. And we're sad around our house and no one wants to talk about it. It was sudden and unexpected. Well, not really. Truth is I took her to the vet and they put her down. She was old, maybe 16-18 years old. We had named her Drooler because she drooled. I was surprised at the options given me by the vet. Did I want to spend time with her before they put her down? Did I want her cremated and put in a special urn that I could display at my house? I'll tell you what I wanted, I wanted her to quit peeing and pooping all over my family room. Any compassion and love I felt for the cat went right out the window the first time I found that where I put my feet while sitting at the pc was her choice of a new litter box. Besides, there is a point that you have to make these tough decisions. I reassured my wife that if my mother-in-law showed the same symptoms that I would be happy to put her down too.
  
• I was in a rather unusual conversation with someone the other day and at the end of the conversation I walked away and started thinking about sperm. The conversation had nothing to do with sperm; I just wondered after finishing the conversation about what would I be like if a different little swimmer of my dad's got to the egg instead of the one that did. I mean one little swimmer basically was in the swim meet of his life, odds of winning the race anywhere from 50 to 500 million to 1 and all of a sudden my dad's 23 chromosomes and my mom's 23 chromosomes collided and I'm here years later wondering what would have happened had a different sperm won. Nobel Prize, serial killer? Who knows?
  
• I'm thinking about selling my truck. I have a 1996 Ford F150 that I have owned since 1999. It has been a good truck considering that except for regular oil changes I have done nothing for maintenance over the past 10 years. Yes, I replaced the u-joints a few years ago, new brakes, tires, minimal stuff but nothing major. Now my "Check Engine" light comes on and I'm feeling betrayed. And the guys at Ford, the engineers, they are sadistic evil men and women. Both of my oxygen sensors went bad. The engineers put the first sensor in an easily accessible area of the engine, easy to access, easy to replace. I was singing their praises! Then the slime sucking pig dogs placed the second one in a place right near the catalytic converter that was as easy to replace as say shoving a baby back into the birth canal. And that's what's got me thinking about selling the truck. I replaced the sensors and figured that I spend most of my time driving the bed of the truck around town so it might be time for a change. Besides, I don't have a dog anymore so what's the need for a truck.
  
• Mothers Day. To honor mothers our church congregation decided to serve the women in our congregation cake and ice cream during the third hour of our meeting schedule. The men would cover the responsibilities that the women had for that hour. I was asked to do "Sharing Time" in Primary, 15 minutes with about 20-25 kids ages 7-11. Plus I had to conduct the meeting. Oh my gosh! I think that I would rather put my private parts in a vise and deal with the pain than do that again. If I had to do that more than three weeks in a row I might kill a few of them or at the very least myself. Kudos's to all of you that teach children and have compassion to do it week in and week out. I felt like I was herding cats.
  
• I finally broke down and hired a company to take over the lawn fertilizing chores. What a great feeling to see someone else take care of those responsibilities. And I feel really good about the decision to fertilize. Until now. I don't know what I've been doing all of these years because it hasn't been fertilizing. Yes my grass is greener now, yes, the unwanted weeds are going away, but DANG! I didn't think that lawn would grow like it has been. Now I'm going to have to mow twice a week. Maybe there is something to that brown and rough look in a lawn.
  

So this is just some of what's going on in my head. Thinking out loud can be therapeutic.