I would like to point out to all readers of Al’s journal my admirable restraint in not posting pretending to be Al.

— Marysia

Sitting in the lounge with a laptop, working wirelessly. Everyone but Marysia is now on-line with broadband, and the cables are put away. I’m happy.

Saw Donnie Darko last night. Brilliant film. I’d talk more about it, but I know there are people reading this who haven’t seen the film, and I don’t want to spoil it for them. I’m going to have to get the DVD, because I need to watch a few more times to make my mind up about who/what some of the characters were, or if they were exactly as they appeared, and actually the whole thing was a self-correcting problem. But yes, like everyone else I know who has seen it, I say “If you haven’t seen it already, you must.”

The iPod is playing Here Comes The Summer by The Undertones. It feels like it, too, sat here by the pagoda in Battersea Park, looking out across the Thames, enjoying the break in the weather. I’ve missed lunch by the river, especially this one.
Battersea suits me. Power station behind me, water in front. There’s energy here. Haven’t felt this good in months. When I can put my hand to the charger, I’ll brinq the camera out here and share the views with you.

I spent most of my weekend working on Andrew’s computer. After extended fighting, I admitted defeat on ressurecting his old 98 installation, and (after more extended fighting) in the end would up installing 2000 on his machine, which is running again, with no serious loss of data. On the one hand, result! On the other, I don’t feel like I’ve had a weekend. I spent most of Saturday afternoon/evening, and all of Sunday doing tech support. Right now, I am tired, and for no reason I can adequately fathom, my lower back is utter agony. Welcome to Monday.

Have been fighting with Andrew’s computer most of the afternoon. Neither side is winning or loosing – I appear to be keeping it from complete death, but it still won’t work useably. But I’m not out of ideas yet. Regardless of outcome, I shall be advising a rigourous backing up as soon as possible, and then a re-format and re-equip as it is a badly unhappy machine. Must leave to see Fin soon. Will continue battle tomorrow.

I’m sure I don’t rember the Wizard of Oz being anything like this.

We’ve decided that this flat has some kind of electronic death jinx. In the not-quite-a-month since I moved in, my iPod died (and then came back), Andrew’s monitor died, Marysia’s new computer shat itself and then her scanner blew up, and today, both Andrew’s new TV and his computer have choked.

I’ve spent the night fighting with his machine, which bluescreens whenever you try to boot in anything but safe mode. I have got somewhere, in that I’ve determined what doesn’t work. I suspect that something has gone bad in the registry after I installed an Alcatel USB modem, but I don’t know what – the one site I found that was any help was pointing me at keys that simply weren’t in his registry. I’ve uninstalled everything I can think of to do with the modem, and still it throws a wobbly.

Here’s a question, kids – I don’t know much about Win98: if I simply re-install Win98 over the top of his current installation, will that wipe all his files and bits and pieces, or is it bright enough to only write over it’s own system bits? Would doing this repair a damaged system? Would Andrew be left spending weeks replacing all his old shotcuts and gubbins?

Basically – how can I fix a fucked Win98 install without resorting to a complete wipe clean? Are there any tools out there to help me with the registry? Or anything?

I think I’m supposed to be fixing Marysia’s computer tonight. Tomorrow night, I’m going to try and persuade my Dad to lend me some kit, to apply a temporary fix to our house network (well, I say “fix”, but actually it’s to get it working as we want it to – we’re waiting on a replacement router, because the one we were sent is deficient in the wireless department, and I’m hoping he’ll lend me his wireless access point for a week or so). Thursday night, I’m fixing Fin’s computer.

I am filled with cold dread when working on computers owned by my friends. I hate doing it. I always feel like whatever is wrong with their computer is my fault, and that if I’m the one that has to pronouce a machine dead, or in need of a formatting, or if it’s something I simply don’t know enough to fix, or even if I just discover that I need a bit of software I don’t own, that somehow I’ve failed them. That I’ve let them down.

This is irrational. I am a perfectly competent IT support boy. It’s been part of my job for four years, office network support. And in my professional capacity, I have no hesitation in pronoucing a machine dead, for wiping everything and starting over. And I have no sympathy for users who lose data, either. If it’s important, it should be backed up. As an IT professional, I know that computers aren’t infalible. Parts give out, software becomes corrupt, hard drives get old and tired, wear and tear causes computers to just die. You wouldn’t expect a car to last forever, why would you expect a computer to last forever?

But as soon as the paycheque isn’t involved, as soon as it actaully *isn’t* my problem, I tense up. I second guess myself. I feel guilty when I have to tell them that they’ve lost years worth of stuff.

I can guess, in part, why it is – nobody likes being the bearer of bad tidings. Everyone wants to be liked, and giving people bad news is not a good way to do it. And nine times out of ten, if someone needs my help with a dead computer, it’s pretty horribly dead.

But I find it amusing that when it was my professional responsibility to ensure a computer operated, I had no problem with admitting defeat, and saying that no, the only solution was a new computer. And then when it genuinely isn’t my problem, and I’m only doing it to help out, suddenly I feel much more obligated to make it work, even when I know it may be impossible.

Well, that’s what I felt like when I got to the March yesterday, and realised I’d forgotten my camera. So, no pictures of the March. It’s not that I don’t think there’s a case for going to war against Iraq – I think there’s a very strong one, and I’m quite prepared to believe that Bush and Blair (well, maybe just Blair) know more than they can jusitifiably tell us – it’s a sad truth of intelligence that governments something cannot reveal what they know to be true, because they found out in a less than legal manner. The problem is that until they can convince the public that there’s a case for war without resorting to scare tactics, then I can’t support it. No matter the reason, there is no mandate for leading a country to war if it’s against the will of the population, which is why I went to the march, even if only for a little while. Convince the people, and I’ll go along with it, even if it flies in the face of my pacifist beliefs.