Well, bless my heart
Southerners have some of the best sayings in the world. I’m talking about gems like “Horny as a three-dicked dog,” or “Nervous as a long-tailed cat in a rocking chair factory.”
So, to put it in good Southern fashion, I’ve been busier than a one-legged man at an ass-kicking contest.
How busy? Read on…
I’ve been lusting after a 24″ iMac since Apple first introduced them (in the original shiny white version). But the word in Mac circles was that the iMac line was due for an update, so I waited ’til Apple introduced the new aluminum and black versions. Very sexy.
After the hardware update, I decided to wait for Mac OS X Leopard to come out. After all, why buy a new computer a couple of months before the new OS comes out? Just wait and get them both together. Besides, Apple might raise the specs or lower the prices in the meantime.
Last week I finally ordered the computer. Much as I love Apple, they charge sales tax (9.75% here), so Amazon.com got my business again. Even better, they were offering a $100 rebate. I bought my MacBook through them, also with a rebate, and was very happy. This time I saved almost $300 from what Apple would have charged me.
Amazon originally listed the computer as “Shipping in 3 to 5 weeks.” The buzz in the discussion forums was that the pre-Leopard iMacs had all cleared the sales channel, and the delay was because Amazon was getting the new machines with Leopard pre-installed. (Macs that were sold when Leopard first shipped had Tiger installed, with a Leopard update DVD included in the box—end-users had to do a 1-2 hour install.) So the wait seemed reasonable.
But Amazon surprised me with a ship notice two days later. Woo-hoo! I wouldn’t have to wait ’til Christmas for my new Mac. Unfortunately, I had to scramble to order the other things I “needed” for the new computer: 4Gb of Crucial RAM, $160 (Apple charges an absurd $850 for the same upgrade); a pair of Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 THX speakers, $140; a Western Digital My Book Studio 500Gb drive for Time Machine, $200; and last but not least, an APC Back-UPS RS 1500VA to power/protect everything, $225.
Well, everything arrived last week… and then sat in my living room for three days. Yes, folks, my shiny new computer sat there for three, count ‘em, three days. I just didn’t have time to take it out of the box, much less move the other computers around to put the Mac on my main work area.
I finally had a chance this past weekend to at least take the Mac out of the box and install the RAM. Unfortunately, I got one of the “old” Tiger Macs with the Leopard upgrade DVD, but the install was relatively painless. I didn’t even boot to Tiger. I simply inserted the Leopard DVD and booted from it to do the install.
I still haven’t set up the speakers or UPS (I’m currently running the Mac from my old Back-UPS Pro 1400, along with my main Windows PC). I still haven’t installed all my apps or data either. But at least it’s up and running, with 4Gb of RAM and Leopard in all its glory.
Now I need to get back to writing. I want to edit Ch9 today/tomorrow, and send it out to my editor. And I’m still hoping for Ch10 by the end of the year, but we’ll see.
I did a little writing on Ch11 yesterday (~500 words, which was a minor miracle), but I’m still busy. Worse, I have a new computer to distract me, along with all the other usual holiday distractions (kids, shopping, parties, etc.).
Ah well… at least I’m not bored. And that’s the update.
- Nick
Comments
56 Responses to “Well, bless my heart”
Leave a Reply
Have fun !!!
I write from Paris France…
You did understood now, that most of us DO NOT wish you to hurry your natural rythme because we do FEAR the end of the story …. we are like addicted to SC since…. 1903 ?? So after nearly 105 years… we learned just to sit by the dock of the bay….(well known tune…)
So enjoy the christmas break and hope to read chapter 4 in january !! (what do you say, mamma ? It is already chapter 9 ??? My god … how the time goes by….)
Great, thanks for the update. I wish I had this many new toys to play with.
Have fun.
Thanks,
Dennis
Nick,
Have fun with the new systems I am sure that you will love it once you get it running just as you want it
Just keep the kids away from it over the holidays
Mick
Hi Nick - Enjoy your toys, the same as the rest of us will in a few days’ time!
Steve.
Nick,
I’ve been so hooked on SC that I’ve gone back and re-read everything a second time. Enjoy your rest, I look forward to the next chapters
Tony
Suggestion: 24″ screens are _not_ advantageous for doing work. Great for videos, but at that point it’s better to spring for a 20″ or 21″ and a second 19″ monitor — ergonomics, eye movements, and boring claptrap I can go into offline. That way you can work on the novel on the “small” screen while keeping the erotic input going on the larger screen.
Besides, if you’re going to horndog over a monitor, then Apple’s 30″ screen is well worth the drool (if not the price). I keep playing fantasy Mac/PC configurations (some of us don’t do American Football); for some reason I keep coming up with over $18,000 (before tax/vat).
Sigh. Have a wonderful holiday!
Ploni
Well I see SC came early (in your case Santa Claus)..lol..well enjoy the new toys and we will look forward to the next up date later…thanks again…happy holidays
Have fun with the new electronics, Nick. Best of luck with the writing. And Happy Holidays.
I’m so jealous… I miss my old Mac, and I’d love to switch back from the dark side. Maybe someday…
Happy holidays to you and yours, Nick!
OH NO! A fruit computer.
BTW, I saw Paul, Gina, and the girls on TV when they panned the crowd at the UT vs LSU game.
Happy Holidays,
Carl
Happy Holidays to you and yours!
All I got was a re-furbished Palm Tungsten T3,
Now I can read chapter 9 in color!
The only difference between men and boys…
If you wait too long to enjoy your new toy, the next generation will be out!
May you and yours have a wonderful holiday season!
Orb
yeah, leopard rocks doesn’t it? I bought my macbook two months ago, but apple give the upgrade for 10$ for recent buyers. (yay)
personally i like the white look more. Let us know how leopard works for you. Some bugs, but that should be fixed soon.
Have fun with all your new toys.
I-Mac…ehh…to each his own…
Looking forward to the next chapter.
My sympathies. One of our household members is a dedicated Apple hater… I acquired an ipod touch unexpectedly recently and my son threatened to disown me …
The aggravating thing about iTunes and the iPod is that there is so much capability that is hampered by the lack of an open source OS. This thing could be a full PDA with a little tweaking.
But I digress. Hardware arriving and sitting for lack of time is it’s own worst irony for those of us who have lives. In this case it is a pile of boxes from Newegg that will, when put together, comprise the latest and fastest PC in the house [Mine! All Mine!!!] and today is the day (FINALLY) to put it all together. Lots of fun but also lots of aggravation.
But it’s great fun when the holidays start early.
Enjoy.
Nick,
Thanks for the update, but speaking as a geek you really need to get that Mac set up and going.
In our house when a new box is delivered my kids practically mug the Fedex guy as he gets out of the truck!
Enjoy the new toy, have fun, and relax through the holiday season.
Thanks for the fine work through the year, and have a merry christmas
Paul
The snowy mountains
New South Wales
Australia
Nick,
My friend, regardless of the wait, the cost, or the delay, you have to agree Macs are worth it.
Al
From My G5 desktop
or my MacBook
or maybe my iBook G4
but not my Color Classic
For the person above saying “The aggravating thing about iTunes and the iPod is that there is so much capability that is hampered by the lack of an open source OS.”, keep an eye on http://www.rockbox.org
It’s an open-source firmware for various mp3 players that adds tons of functionality (from faster playback and more codecs to Doom and other add-ons). Unfortunately, it doesn’t support the Touch (yet), but it supports many ipod versions (along with Archos, iriver, Sandisk, and other players)
There’s also http://ipodlinux.org if you’re looking for something less polished out of the box and easier to tinker with–but again, no Touch.
Nick,
WOW! I just read the new chapter, I felt emotionally drained at the end. Fantastic work, I am REALLY looking forward to chapter 10.
Thanks for fantastic work throughout the year.
Mark
I just finished reading the new chapter as well. All I want to do is imprcate Kendall. I am glad Paul can finally move on. Thanks for all your hard work Nick.
I’m a long-time fan of the story, but first time poster, and I gotta say Chapter 9 is amazing, because personally, Kendall is starting to get on my nerves, so I’m glad that’s over with. But I’m pretty sure the worst is far from over from Kendall and her tactics.
At least Paul can move on now…to what Book 4 is titled “Christy”. LOL.
Love your work, and keep it steady. And have a great holiday!
just read Chapter 9…
all I gotta say is that it’s gold, the chapters keep getting better
Chapter 9 was fantastic work, and I can say I really share Paul’s feeling of relief.
Thanks!
nick jus read the chapter and i loved it but on a side note… 3 DAYS!!!?
come on nick… ur slacking
What a relief that Paul has finally told Kendall his feelings. I always thought she was up to something behind his back and her actions at the camp only confirmed my suspicions. However, Paul should remember the old adage “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”.
Great job Nick! I’ve always wished that Kendall is out of Paul’s life. Anyway, enjoy your new Mac.
Fantastic Chapter 9. Glad to see the end of bitchy Kendall. Good grief - 9.75% salestax, and I complain about 6% here in sunny Florida.
Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year.
Enjoy your new toy!
I myself got a 20″ 2.4 iMac a few weeks ago… it’s a sweet piece of machine…
Somehow, I was not surprised that you’re a Mac user…
Chapter 9 was one of the best you have written. I have enjoyed reading this story since the beginning.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone
i love sc i cant tell you how many times i have read the cahpters and i can say after the last one i felt a pang of sadness i fell the end comeing at the end of this book or the next
an intentive fan ~mark
noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
Sigh. You know. I hate you Nick. I guess thats the reaction you were looking for though. Man, you couldn’t leave us with a little more closure during the break. Good job.
You Are!
and wish you a prosperous and happy New Year, and the successful completion of B4 (for us readers:-)!
But we new it and like You and your story very much nevertheless.
I don’t hate Kendall as much as some above, although I didn’t feel good about the story told in Dealing with the Devil, and her lack of communication, but…
I hope you had a pleasant Christmas (if you do it
John
Hi Nick:
I hope You had a Merry Christmas and that You and your family will have a wonderful New Year. I too built a new computer. A AMD Core Duo. I was going to do a quad but decided there is not enough software support yet. I put in 2 gigs of ram and three 320 samsungs in pullout drawers. I also upgraded my older computer so now I network between the new and old towers with my laptop. I will wait for the next installment to Christy because it is worth it. I appreciate art but can neither paint or sculpture. I read but can’t write a good ole novel. I can wait, see you in March.
Nick.. i just read that chapter… and all i have to say is that was evil
lol
i only have to wait three months to hear the rest of that conversation…
but yea loved the chapter. Hope u have a happy new years
-Jay
Regarding Chapter 10: Fuck you.
Can’t wait for chapter 11. =)
that is no ordinary cliffhanger, that’s torture!
Happy new year to all.
Yeah. That was evil.
I think that Gina is smart enough not to say yes.
Nick,
You truly are a cruel, heartless, evil and just a plain outright MEANIE!
You’re my hero!!
I Love it!!!
Well, they don’t call Nick T.E.R.B. for nothin”.
Good work, as always, Nick. I wondered if Paul would ever try to get back with Gina, but I admit you caught me off guard. Way to hang that cliff.
If getting yourself back in order with life and writing could be an enjoyment for you, please do enjoy writing the rest of the book.
What a mean, mean, mean, MEANNNNNNNNNNNNNNN thing to do to us. And then make us wait months for the ending to the great mystery.
It’s love/hate man!
OH MY GOD ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME!?!?!? AHHH NO FUCKING FAIR!
Nick, you are evil, just so you know. Why would you do that to me? Why? Seriously!
And Gina can’t say yes, because then Paul can’t get with Christy, whom the book is named after, and from past experiences, we all know that the books are named after the main girlfriends.
Gina, say no. Don’t be a rebound for Paul. Come on, Nick. If that was your story line, you’ve gotta change it. She can’t say yes.
I hate you.
I don’t know, John. Paul could get back with Gina, break up, and then get busy with Wren, and then Gracie, and THEN Christy all in the same book.
Or break up after getting busy with gina and her sister.
Damnit man!
I have to wait until March! Well, if you must. To say I am waiting eagerly would be an understatement. Keep up the excellent work.
-Ed
nick have you considers switching to linux instead of mac? there is ubuntu linux (i dislike but most dissagree ) and PCLinuxOS is pretty easy to use….
both are full featured and have OpenOffice that is almost 100% compatable with windows or you may opt for abiword witch is very fast and lightwieght…
i am not sure that there is a mac version of Openoffice but regular Linux will run on the newer intel based macs not to mention compiz-fusion (google/youtube it) makes mac os x look like a toy
now… must read.
Openoffice does work on OSX, as does Neooffice which is based on Openoffice but runs a little better on the mac, the problem is openoffice doesn’t run well on ANY operating system, it’s java based and tends to use far too many resources for any sort of serious work.
Openoffice and abiword are both decent I suppose, but they aren’t to the power of MS Office yet no matter how much we all want it to be, even MS Office on the mac runs superior.
I’m a big linux fan, but neither ubuntu or anything else I’ve seen runs anywhere as nice as OSX for a desktop system.
I use linux on all of my servers, various versions and am quite a fan of it overall, but OSX is simply beautiful and very powerful (and I may add, pretty linux compatible, most linux software compiles and runs on OSX, OSX even has X.org available for running if you want to run X apps on it)
Incidentally, compiz-fusion is what looks like a toy, it uses far too many resources for a few visual interface changes that over all are pointless. At the end of the day, a computer needs to be usable, far more then visually beautiful. It’s nice when a computer runs visually stunning, but when those visual interfaces like the compiz-fusion cube use up resources that are needed for actual development, then I choose development every day.
why not use virtualization is osx? (or simply dual boot)
I don’t think so, Wiggy. Maybe he should get rejected by Gina, go into a funk and screw the shit out of Leah. Now that would be interesting. Then come home to college, and in his depressed state get soothed by christy, and then they can end up together. However, it is the last book, so they are probably going to get together at the end, which would provide the resolution to the problem that the books as a whole ask-who the fuck is the wife at the beginning????
aaaarrrrggghh!!!! 3 months to find out whether Gina says yes. This is sheer torture. Please Nick, have some mercy on your fans.
Oh man, oh man, Nick!
I’d almost echo Travis’ comment, if it weren’t so hard to convey sarcasm in text, so I won’t do that.
But you’re a wonderful mean bastard, aren’t you? Such a nice chapter and then such a cliffhanger… And to toy with us by bringing Gina back into scope. And make everything worse with Leah!
Nonetheless, I hope you had a good festive time, and that you and yours have a wonderful new year.
And now as an aside:
The geek in me wants to chime in about compiz-fusion. Yes, it’s resource hungry, and yes, most of it’s eyecandy, but there are parts of it that I find help my productivity. Transparent Cube allows me to spot on which virtual desktop the window I want is. Or if it’s too cluttered, the Expose (stolen from MacOSX, I know) is handy too. Also the whole grouping/tabbing thing that compiz-fusion has is really useful, and easy to use.
So if you have the horsepower to run it, it’s definitely worth it. And it looks purdy. But I will admit that it’s a big if. Still, Compiz runs faster on slightly older hardware than Aero, so it’s not _that_ bad.
hey nick just got back to your site….
in reference to compiz being resource heavy I fail to see that. you see it runs on ancient hardware …gforce2 (anything useing the 9xxx driver and up which is OLD like 5 years old) or intel 810 etc…
I had most all the effects in beryl/compiz-fusion enabled and the only time resource useage goes up is when the window is redrawn…that is normal most of the heavy lifting is done by the GPU compiz has much lower cpu requirements than the devs let on i have herd of it running on as little as 600mhz cpu probably even less with a suitable gpu
as far as “stealing” effects lets just call it even does anybody really thing that compiz developers stole os x code NO…neither did MS (which is obvious cause it be SLOW)
I recently installed Vector Linux and am happy with it except for a few niggles has full slcakware compatability and cruxports4slack that is a boon
I hear ya about java hate it…
my only experience with os x was on a macbook and was not impress i guess if they had more ram it would have made the interface snappier
Like I said highly dislike bloatbuntu that is why I’m useing a slackware dirivate… least they have the KISS mentality… I think they only use one “s” though LOL
if I had to use windows it would be windows 95 with office 97 …back when an grapical office aplication ram in 16mb ram those were the days
OSX runs on a 300 mhz, 32 Mb G3. 11 years old, not very fast but I can read my mail and do word processing.
Can you run compiz or vista on an 11 year old pc? Actualy… can you run XP on an 11 year old pc?
compiz requires a graphics card with texture mapping…. and I bet you have the effects disabled on that G3 I have had recent Linux kernels running on a PII 300mhz twice your ram if would recompile the kernel specifically for the PC It would probably fly much like a Mac has a custom kernel
must I remind you that e16 will run on a P 166mhz(according to the developers i’ve only had it down to 300mhz)?
Well Nick hope you figure your publishing issues…
No effects disabled.
I wouldn’t even know how to do that actually. Macs are funny like that. You get lazy. When you’re an XP user you need to know all this stuff, mac you can’t be bothered. YOu just get on with you’re using your pc.
it’s ‘meaner than a 3 dicked dog’
more nervous than a cat in a room full of rocking chairs (no one in the south has a factory)
and i suppose you could use the one legged man in the busy sense, but i’ve always heard it in the context of feeling like you were being taken advantage of, sort of like if you were playing cards, and turns out you’re getting sharked. that would be a good time to say, “i’m starting to feel like a one-legged man at an ass-kicking contest”.
in case you were interested in a few more, just last night we had a real frog strangler (it rained like a sumbitch). and though i’m not sure if this is particular to the south or not, just today i saw this asshole i know that i wouldn’t cross the street to piss on if he was on fire.