Five Years

Five years ago on April first I lost one of my best friends, Justin. I would think that by now I would be "over" it or something but apparently I'm not. I'm not at all. I miss him terribly.

I don't know, I thought that after five years it wouldn't hurt quite as much and it wouldn't make me quite as sad, but it does. And this really sucks. This time of the year, all I can think about is Justin and how we hung out every day during Spring Break and had plans for after he went out and spent time with his family. It just really sucks to think that this could have been so different. I can't help but think about all of the plans we had and everything we were going to do and it makes me so sad. And it makes me cry. Every fucking year, this brings me to tears. I guess this isn't something I'll ever really get over.

Just knowing that I saw him the night before, just hours before he was gone forever is heartbreaking. Just knowing that I spoke to him in the phone right before he went out with his family and we planned on meeting up later breaks me to pieces. Just knowing that I laughed when I was first told because I thought is was a really shitty April Fool's Day joke makes me feel like a terrible person. Can you just imagine, you get the phone call telling you that one of your closest friends is gone and you laugh and tell them to get real? I don't think I'll ever get over that... It took me actually going over to his apartment and realizing he wasn't ever coming back to realize he was truly gone. I don't remember much of the day after it hit me, I just went into a haze and followed the motions through the day and went where I was told. But he really was gone. Nothing I could say or do or bargain would make that any different. Even now, all I want is to see Justin and talk to him and I can't.

And when I hear so much about people complaining about stupid things this week I can't help but get pissed. Last week and this week I will be and I have been overly sensitive about things, not just because of my own health problems but because I know Justin never had the chance to deal with any of this. And it's not fair. How could it possibly be fair that someone so great and amazing and smart and thoughtful had to go so soon?

It's not fair. Life isn't fair. And sometimes, most of the time, life really does suck.

I miss you Justin.

Music Mondays?

It's been a while since I gave you guys a review for an album or artist. It's been a while since I even posted any music that I thought you all should enjoy. The last song I posted was off of Ben Kweller's newest album, Go Fly a Kite (an album that you should all listen to). Since mif-February, I've gotten the newest Lucero cd, the live American Aquarium cd, began listening to Ed Sheeran, Scouting for Girls, Tom Milson, the newly released song by Alex Day, Chameleon Circuit... The list could go on. And that's just in the past month! In light of the serious lack of music I've had on here, I'm going to make it my goal to start talking about music at least twice a month, hopefully once a week.

 I think a "Music Monday" would be a nice little feature... I haven't completely decided on this, I guess it all depends on the music I find. And if you readers actually care to read about my takes on various bands and artists. Looking at the list of artists I've been into the past month, I think that with my varied musical taste you'll be able to find some one new that you like! My hope with these new additions is to introduce you all to a new group every now and then. Or maybe just revisit an artist that I used to love and reintroduce them to you.

I'll start this on next Monday, April 2nd and we'll see how it goes from there. On Monday, you can all look forward to my take on the new Lucero album, Women & Work. Just a little peek into my thoughts on it: Women and Work is a brilliant album.

Thoughts? Suggestions on artists or cds?

It's a Birthday Win!

This is going to be a very picture heavy post... Be forewarned. 

On Saturday, Austin and I went to the Stars game. Before the game started, there was a ceremony honoring Karlis Skrastins, a former Stars player who died in the plane crash that killed many players, coaches, and trainers. The ceremony was incredibly touching and made me tear up a bit. It was beautiful. After the game, Austin and I met up with a few friends to celebrate Taylor's birthday! We started off at Stroker's and progressed to the Nodding Donkey and Uptown Bar and Grill. Instead of talking too much about the night, I've decided to put up a few pictures from the night! Enjoy!! 

 

Computer Deaths and NHL Hits

I give a quick recap of my computer and talk a bit about the hits that have happened in the NHL lately. I watched both the Keith hit to Sedin and the Doan hit to Benn. Since Doan was a repeat offender, I understood and agreed with the fact he received a three game suspension. As for the ruling against Keith, I think that giving him a five game suspension is ridiculous. This is his first time to do something like this, why give him more games than Doan? Because Sedin is a big name for the Canucks. It's preposterous.

It's Official. My Laptop is Dying.

I just talked to the IT guy that has been working on my laptop for me to try and save it, and he's informed me that it's dying. Apparently my motherboard is completely fried and since my computer crashed while I had a lot of programs open and a lot of files open, there's a lot of stuff that got corrupted that I wont be able to recover. There are a lot of pictures that I've been working on, an essay I was working on, video footage I was editing... I guess multitasking isn't always a good thing. And I know you're supposed to back up all of your stuff on a regular basis, and I have backed up my computer, just not anytime recently. It's been a good five or six months since I last backed everything up. This is very bad since I have (well, I had) quite a lot of new information on my computer since then. I've had several photography jobs since the last time I backed up my computer and that could all possibly be lost. So remember kids, back up your computers on a regular basis. You never know what could happen.

There is a bit of good news though! Apparently Mr. IT is working on getting my computer at least functional with some other computer parts he has. He has warned me that I shouldn't run a lot of programs at once since these are all parts from other machines. Mr. IT is going to bring me a working computer on Friday, but it wont last for more than a couple months. He tried to explain it to me but I honestly don't understand, but he's replacing certain parts to give me a little extra life. I will have an extra 3-4 months with my computer if I use it minimally. If I can keep my memory usage down and keep it from running too long, I will get four months. If I use it like I was using it before, I can give it a few weeks. This means, less time online, very little picture editing, very little video editing, minimal usage for the next couple of months. My goal is to get my computer to last until May since that's when I was originally planning on getting a new computer. That's when I've budgeted to get the computer I really want with the programs I need.

So, in summary: I will get my laptop back soon. It will be working. I will lose pretty much everything I had open at the time. I can't use my computer as much for as long as I was. If I manage to follow Mr. IT's rules, I will still be able to get the computer and programs I want in May.