Erratum

When talking about my recent acquisition, I referred to the S&W .38 revolver as a Model 60 — my mistake, as Reader Ken had originally told me that it was a Model 10 M&P (Military & Police, for those not familiar with S&W’s various nomenclatures).

Of course, I’m an idiot and can only plead Old Fart’s Disease plus (if I may make just a feeble excuse) my complete confusion with Smith & Wesson’s cuneiform-style of model numbering.  (And I mean “cuneiform” in terms of its incomprehensibility and not how they write it — although it wouldn’t surprise me if their next revolver model is termed as a.k.a. M&P, I mean why the hell not?)

Anyway… I seem to have wandered somewhat off the track — yet another symptom of OFD — so let me wind this up by making a fulsome apology.

And yes, I’ve gone full Winston Smith and corrected the earlier post, not because I’m like the New York fucking Times, but because for some reason people sometimes use me as a reference, and I wouldn’t want the mistake to cause confusion.

All that apology stuff aside, I should point out that this lovely gun shoots a lot better than I can shoot it:  at 25 ft distance, 2″ groups rested and palm-sized groups offhand.  Interestingly, I’m more accurate shooting .38+P than regular .38 Special ammo.

It has replaced the little Model 637 snubbie as an alternative carry piece to the 1911 if my clothing requires a smaller profile.

The only question remaining to be asked is:  Why the hell did it take me so long to get one of these fine guns?

[exit, kicking myself]

System Update

Got a new laptop.  Lenovo.  (Hello, my little yellow friends over in Beijing!  Enjoy what you read here!  You fuckers.)

Busy re-installing my entire life, which may take a while.

Blogging will be light today… and maybe even tomorrow.

I haven’t broken anything yet, nor have I felt the urge to throw the thing in the pool;  but the day is young.  At least all the keys respond when pressed, and I don’t need packing tape to keep the power cord plugged in, to mention just a couple of benefits.

Computing Thoughts

While waiting at not-so-Best Buy to have my hard drive backed up / wiped prior to sending my ASUS Brick Model off to be repaired, I took a little walk around the store just to look at my options should the laptop be “unrepairable” and ASUS refusing to replace it (I know, it shouldn’t be a problem to replace a piece of equipment that was purchased in January of this year, but it’s a fool who doesn’t make at least some contingencies in case of corporate bastardy).

All the laptops looked the same, had too many unnecessary features and cost too much, so I didn’t spend too much time there.

Then my eyes fell upon this creature:

It’s one of those “everything in a screen” systems, and I must admit I was drawn to it — in no small measure because of the earlier suggestion from The Reader Formerly Known As CoffeeMan that I look at a desktop PC instead of a laptop. 

While my need for portability has admittedly been reduced because I no longer travel as much as yore, I still might need to take a computer out of the house when going somewhere on vacation, for example — or needing to carry the thing out if there’s a fire in the apartment block.  Carrying a PC tower and screen out is a non-starter for all sorts of reasons, but a single screen (plus keyboard) that in extremis  could be carried in a large suitcase?  That is a distinct possibility.

Here’s the White Monster’s spec sheet:

Hmmm.  Big screen for my Aging & Failing Eyes, a properly-sized keyboard for my Fat & Fumbling Fingers, manageable size (see dimensions) and if I may be greedy for once, more computing power than I would ever need for the remainder of my existence on Planet Earth.

There’s the small matter of the dollars required, but I’d just raffle off a gun or two from my ever-dwindling stock of Second Amendment appliances.

If anyone’s had actual experience with one of these beasts, let me know in Comments, because right now it’s looking awfully attractive.

Still Bricked

Here’s the back story, and it’s time for an update.

There is no update.  The fucking ASUS is still dead, unresponsive to all blandishments and tricks (such as suggested in Comments originally) and a trip to Geek Squad up the road to see if someone perchance could go “Aha!  We know that problem!” and fix the thing (Best Buy does sell ASUS laptops).

I have a warranty — and an extended one as well — except that the details thereof are safely installed on the hard drive of the ASUS itself.  So I’ll have to contact ASUS through their website [groan] and try to get the situation resolved that way, somehow.

In case you’re wondering, Best Buy does do warranty repairs on ASUS laptops… but only on machines purchased from Best Buy.

Doubleplusfucked, I am.

As I said in the previous post, blogging is going to be light because trying to function on the old HP laptop is akin to taking a covered wagon from coast to coast instead of flying the friendly skies NYC-LAX.  There was a reason I quit using it, after all, and replaced it with the shiny new… brick.

Raw, unadulterated suckage.

Wish me luck as I try to get this issue taken care of.