Digital Impulses

Alex gets a new PC

So this morning I get a text from my cousin Alex telling me that his 7 year-old Gateway PC has died and gone on to PC heaven.  It turns out he took it to a friend of his for some "tweaking" to enhance the performance.

All of that had the end result of a FRIED Motherboard and CPU.  The PC was dead, dead, D-E-A-D.  So, we decided to go have breakfast at Piggies and then while we were there, we looked at the specials in the Sunday L.A. Times.

We found a special where for $399.00 ($349.00 after a $50.00 rebate) for a desktop PC with:

• AMD Dual Core PC
• 320 GB hard drive
• 2 GB RAM
• DVD Writer/CD
• 16-1 memory card reader (in place of floppy drive)
• Windows Vista Home Premium

He called his mom, got her to agree to lend him the cash and we drove to his house to get the money from her.  From there we drove over to Office Depot in Hawthorne and bought the computer.  Another drive back to his house and we were sitting in his pad in the back.

I watched him unpack the computer and set it up and all was well.  All of his peripherals worked and his Internet Connection was up and running too.  The same guy that was bumming out over the death of his Gateway a few hours before was very happy with his new PC.

Nice.  Now if he would just blog about it, we would be all set. :=)

Staring into the void: More family drama

It is so unbelievably overwhelming, that I don't know where to start....

Fuck it.  I'm just gonna say this:

They found it.  He copped to it.  It was destroyed.  Many promises were made. Much gnashing of teeth and weeping ensued.  Alex was at the house and spoke some words of wisdom. Subject at the center of this controversy was very emotionally upset.

The drama ramifications of this whole sad state of affairs is going to serve as fuel for the slow flambee of my liver over the next 12 to 18 months.

Un-Fucking-believable. If it's not one fucking thing wtih my family, it's another.  I don't know just how much more of this crap I can stand.

Shit.

Food for Alex: A trip downtown

Just got back from making a food run to my cousin at his job as a security guard in Downtown Los Angeles.  I was on the way to my mom's house for a visit when I got a call from my cousin, asking me if I could take him a little Carl's Jr. since he could not do it himself due to current job logistics.

I stopped by the house and picked up my son and we drove over to Carl's, got the food and sped over to my cousin's job site to quench his hunger.  It was very good to see him and he was very appreciative of our food run.

On the way back, we got lost trying to find the 110 Harbor Freeway and ended up on the 10 West, which we had to take over to the 405 San Diego Freeway and come back to the house the back way.

As a result of getting lost, the ride home ended up taking 35 minutes and by the time I made it back home, it was too late to head to my mom's.  I called her and begged for a rain check and as usual, she was cool with it, so I will be going to see her tomorrow night instead.

All in all, It was good to get some free clean Karma points by helping out my cousin in a moment of need.  Yay!

Isa's birthday

A little stressful, though not as bad as I would have thought.

The evening started off with a rendezvous at the Chili's in Torrance, CA where the family met up to have dinner and give my sister her presents.  We had some good food and the presents opening was calm enough. 

After dinner, we agreed to meet somewhere in the City of Commerce to go dancing.  Once Alex and I arrived, we saw that the place was really crowded and we waited outside for everyone else to arrive.  When we got inside, we were seated at a table and were expected to eat, while we waited for a table near the dance floor to open up.

It never did and there was hardly any space to dance, so my cousin and I took off and came back home.  I drove him back to Chilis to pick up his car and eventually made it home.

I am glad this is one more social event that has been put to bed.

Alex visits for a bit

Just a quick note to record the fact that my cousin Alex stopped by today for a chat and we hung out in my office discussing life, health and a myriad of other topics. 

It was a nice visit and I look forward to doing this with him much more often.