all things me

I don’t know if it’s my bad luck, poor choice of products, heavy use or a curse but my DVD+VCR combo is kaput again. This time I think even my dad believes me. I can’t remember when was the last time the device was in service but then it may’ve been a false diagnosis on my part… Now the problem started off with a little vertical jiggle of the picture, then the picture started rolling and sometimes doesn’t show at all. DVD side is all good but neither the TV picture (through the VCR) nor the video picture show properly. Sigh.

It started very suddenly. I taped a movie Friday night (12:40 till 2:30 am) and it shows up properly. Our “” decided to make a cement-shake from our house on Thursday/Friday so perhaps that has broken something inside the device — I don’t know.

I’m going to have to tape Sex and the City on my old and crappy VCR and hope that because I haven’t used it in a long while, it has recovered enough to work at least a little. I think can tape Gilmore Girls on upstairs’ VCR and everything else I’ll just watch. Luckily this time I won’t have XF worries because I don’t watch the episodes from TV anymore.

This is so frustrating! Only the computer behaves nicely in my hands. (…crash…) kidding!

Does the youngest child have it easier? Or is it only in this family? Or maybe if I had been a typical teenager I wouldn’t be ‘rent whipped now.

I have a sister who is 6½ years younger than me, which is a lot, but I feel like our parents treat us as being about the same age. She also demands things at a younger age on the pretense that I have them (not just material things but privileges too); no matter if I’ve been 6½ years older when I’ve got them.

On Monday she’ll turn 18, and right away she’ll get to be home alone: Mum got a “great” idea that she, Dad, and I (and the dog) go to the summer cottage and leave my sister home because “she’s always wanted to be independent, let her be independent.” I can’t tell Mum that “I really need a vacation from you not with you” so I suppose I’m going (bye-bye to my plans of getting the passport stuff rolling next week). What bothers me is that when I was home alone for the first time. Of course, it’s only a matter of circumstance. Maybe I could’ve been home alone when I was 18–21 if only a situation like that had presented itself, but no luck, Mum was always there. Sometimes it would be nice to get some distance between the parents and I. At least I can take comfort in knowing that in February there’ll be 15200 kilometres between us for at least 2½ weeks. (Better not jinx it by thinking that I’ll probably break my leg or catch a horrible disease and can’t go…)

My sister gets everything without having to do anything. When she needs things — we all need things every now and then — she refuses to pay them herself because she’s “saving.” For what? An apartment! Because she’s never spent any money, she’ll probably get together enough to move out first (and I’ll be a bitter spinster left living with the parents — hurray!)! My sister is anxious to move; I worry how my parents would be left with the dog and 4 walks per day. I am, however, musing of and half-planning to move out by the end of next year; if I have the money.

In our previous apartment my sister and I shared the bedroom (I had a tiny room for myself in a walk-in closet), this was over 12 years ago. One time when she was sick and threw up on the carpet I was left alone in the room (and in the stench) and my sister went to sleep in my parents bed.

Maybe I’m just imagining things, maybe it’s just some sort of sibling rivalry and envy. At least I’m better in the brain department.

Ps. Maybe I should create a new category, “Whine.”

… you’ve been on the computer too much!

A moment ago, as I was excitedly about to continue with my re-try of Splinter Cell Chaos Theory, the extension cord that holds all the computer plugs wouldn’t work. There’s a switch that obviously had resigned. (And now it’s dead, because Dad wanted to take a look inside despite the lack of screws that would’ve made opening it a whole lot easier.)

I was sort of hoping that we wouldn’t have an extra extension because it would be healthy for my sister to be away from the computer for a while. Honestly, she doesn’t do anything else. She’s on a 2½-month summer vacation and I think she’s been out of the house once. She sits in front of the computer from the moment she wakes up around 3-4 pm until she goes to bed around 3-4 am. She even eats at the computer if it isn’t Saturday or Sunday. Alas, the lure of the Panamanian Bank is too much to handle…

I have a short and only vacation coming and I’m already bored out of my skull after work (on weekends, too)! Today there’s nothing interesting on TV until 11:40 pm; I could watch XF episodes but I can’t concentrate on taking notes. I finally finished Prince of Persia (The Two Thrones) on Saturday and now I don’t really have any games that I feel like playing; Quake’s a bit too exhausting, Tomb Raider a bit too puzzling, Luxor just too many times finished in Expert mode and I’m afraid F.E.A.R. would freak me out which would be embarrassing. Reading makes me sleepy, there’s no one to chat with…

Oh, but I do have this morning’s episode of Gilmore Girls to watch! Now I’ll have something to do for about 50 minutes.

Maybe I should take up crocheting or something.

That’s not a typo — it’s a fact! I only have 8 days of work and then I’ll have 14 days of summer vacation!!! It’s depressingly little compared to past when school holidays were 2½ months or as much as 4 months (in Uni) and I didn’t work or worked only for a part of the summer but it’s a great improvement to . I don’t know yet how I’ll spend the precious little time except that I’m going to an art museum and a restaurant with Grandma one day, but what I will not do is get up at 6:30.

I know I haven’t been writing for ages but that’s because I have nothing to write about. I just work and I can’t talk about work. I’ve been playing Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones and I think I’m almost finished (with PoP, you never know). I had to find some help with an abominable fight and found a great place, Stuck Gamer, that has video walkthroughs. Very wow-y! It also has a guide for Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory which I haven’t played in ages and I’m horribly stuck, but I’ve decided to re-start the level or take an earlier save game to save some sticky shockers and try again.

Thanks to Kory I’ve been listening to some wonderful music by Stabilo. I’ve listened to the songs so much that it doesn’t matter anymore whether I have them playing on computer/mp3 player or not. The other day I had recharged batteries for the mp3 player, replaced the old batteries but then forgot to take the player to work. Of course, inner player isn’t as effective in blocking the outer noise as a tangible player with earphones but it did keep me entertained. If nothing else, go to the Stabilo site » Albums » Happiness & Disaster » listen to Don’t Look in Their Eyes. Listen to all the songs if you have the time!

Owning — or having the possibility to borrow — a season boxset of a TV series is unbelievably liberating. The reruns of the X-Files started last week. They’re shown at 10pm on Mondays and Tuesdays and — hold onto your chair now — I haven’t been watching them. Instead I’ve been watching other channels or dozing off if I’ve felt like it (and boy have I). No need to stare at the little channel logo (it disappears just before the commercial break) in the top right corner with my thumb on the Pause button, no need to keep my fingers crossed that my stupid DVD player records the episode properly. I’m hoping to borrow season 1 box of Lost on my summer vacation so I haven’t been watching that either. Now, if only they had season boxes of the news I’d know what’s going on in the world…

From this day on I will never hesitate to say proudly: I like Stephen King books. He’s a great author!

In the past few weeks I’ve said too many times “weeeell, I don’t know if I should say it aloud…”

Alright everyone, out with the confessions!

Finland has just won the Eurovision Song Contest for the first time in our 40 years of participation. Great. But take a look what it took to win…
(I’m assuming most of you live outside Europe and have never heard of the Eurovision — Finland is supposed to do bad, we’re supposed to get 0 points — not all-time highest.)

OK, so the numbers go backwards in the photo, who cares. I had numbers 5 and 6 (the big ones in the middle) and the rest arrived today. Thank you! (although I think — and hope — the sender doesn’t read this blog)

Related:

I just transferred a load of money for the XF box sets — I sure hope the seller sends them as soon as possible. Usually I would never ever buy something someone sells on a forum, at least nothing for that much money, but I hope that a fellow X-Phile — especially one that I sort of know — can be trusted.

I can’t help but feel a little nervous nevertheless.

Related:

I want all X-Files season boxes so I tried to look for them. As it happens, someone had just placed an ad on a Finnish forum selling boxes 1 to 9, either all or the ones you want (I just calculated that if I buy 7 of them, it would cost almost as much as if I buy all of them but what would I do with double boxes — let him make more money ). Also, I may even know the person who’s selling them! Let’s hope someone hasn’t already bought them…

Then I remembered, “oh, Storm of the Century has been made into a book too” (it’s originally a miniseries). So I looked for it at the two bookstores I always buy/order from. I ordered it. As I was going through the trouble anyway, I decided to order another book (Different Seasons) which hopefully is from the correct series. I also looked for yet another book, Regulators, but decided to order it from the other bookstore because the cover is (hopefully) nicer-looking.

Today I also found nice “slippers” for work. I saw walking-shoes (or “pumps”?) I liked but they had only sizes 4 and 5,5 and I would’ve needed something in between. (My shoes are usually size 5.) Oh well, I’ll keep looking despite the fact I’ve looked and looked and looked everywhere. I also bought Cujo (Stephen King movie) and Forrest Gump. I already had Forrest Gump on VHS but it was a 2 for 20 campaign so I’m going to give the VHS to my grandparents.

Hmm, I didn’t write about the “money come” part. No, I haven’t received a raise but now that I think about it, our payday was on Wednesday.