09/15/2012:
9:44: I get a call from a client seeing if I am available to come in today to change out a network switch with one that she had purchased today. I tell her that I have an appointment with a client for 11:00, but I can be there after.
10:00: I get up out of bed and let Buster out.
10:15: I jump in the shower.
10:30: I jump out the shower.
10:45: I am in my van heading over to my office.
11:00: I get to my office. I take an old computer that I have in the back and attempt to install Windows XP on it. The regular cd rom won’ t work. I gotta go old school and make 6 disks to be able to boot the computer properly to launch from the cd rom to install Windows XP Home Edition Service Pack 2.
12:30: I call the client who was supposed to show up. She forgot about me until she saw the name on the caller ID. She said she would come right over.
12:45: The client arrives, and brings me back my power cord that I loaned her. I examine the power cord and find that it is chewed. Luckily it is chewed between the wall and the power supply and not the other end, that side is cheaper. I will have to order another cord and just send her the bill for the cord. I put in the new battery and and plug in the power supply and everything is good to go.
1:00: I head on out to head to New Orleans East. I have to first fill up with gas because I am at 270 miles and I can get close to 300 miles per tank, a little more. I don’t have a gas guage so I have to go by the mileage.
1:15: I get to the gas station and fill up. My van only took 17 gallons, meaning I had 5 and 1/2 gallons left in the tank and could had made the round trip.
1:30: I hit the interstate heading for New Orleans East. I have to pass up a mobile home being transported that is taking up the entire left two lanes, interesting.
2:15: I arrive at the client’s office. I take down their network and plug all the computers into the new gig switch that she had purchased, and plug the machines into the back of the router which is only 100 MB. I also have an issue getting online. Stupid AT&T and their passwords needed to get online. COX just comes on with no passwords to worry about. Did I say I prefer COX? After trying a number of things, I reset the modem and the router and it magically comes back online accepting the password. WHATEVER! AT&T. I check all the computers to make sure they all have internet access and can access the shared drives on the server. With that I leave.
3:15: I get into my van and head back to Metairie.
3:30: I hit the traffic 5 miles away from my exit. I get off at Canal Street and take the backroads to Veterans and head to my office that way. I am 3 blocks away from my corner and traffic is backed up and doesn’t move much with each redlight so I turn off earlier. Going down the block I think I recognized the mailman and turn around and catch him on his route. I ask if what I think is his name is his name, and he says yeah, and how did I know that. I tell him that he worked with my dad at another office and I remember him from there. He immediately remembered. We talk for a little bit and then I continue back towards my office.
4:00: I get into my office. I see the Music Computer has finished installing Windows XP and I put it up in the closet on the shelf where the old computer was. I then remote into it and start the music playing throughout the office again. 4 weeks with no music was too much…
5:15: A prospective client calls me up asking me if I work on personal laptops or just strictly networked computers. I tell him that we work on everything. He explains to me the issue and I tell him it could either be a hardware or software issue and that I would really have to look at it to tell. He says that he will bring it over shortly.
5:40: The client arrives with the laptop. I attempt to boot it and it just gives me a blue screen and restarts no matter what mode I try to start it in. I then put in a linux boot disk and boot into a gui. I see that I cannot tell the drive size data on the hard drive in this interface. I then do a chkdsk scan on the computer which finds 4 bad sectors and number of other problems with files on the partition. The chkdsk fixes all of these problems, and then I am able to boot into windows. The computer seems to be running a little slow, so I do a registry clean which removes over 500 registry issues and also stop the extra startup items that don’t need to be starting up when the computer starts. I do a quick virus scan and nothing is found.
7:45: The client returns to pick up his laptop. I restart the computer with him and it seems to restart faster after the work I did to it. The client is satisfied and takes the laptop home.
8:00: Time for me to head home.
8:05: I get in my van.
8:20: I arrive home.
8:30: I sit down at the table and start eating some BBQ shrimp and shrimp creole. Good stuff.
9:30: I am laying in bed. Catching up the blog. I got three days to catch up, so here it goes…
11:59: Time to go to sleep… The blog is caught up and I am getting tired 😛 Goodnight!
