My laptop stabbed me in the back—it took so long to figure things out and fix them that I didn\u2019t have enough time for a long soak in the hot tub tonight. Man, life is poopy sometimes\u2026 I\u2019ll write about it tomorrow.
\n_ _ _ _ _<\/p>\n
Okay, even though I usually write this stuff when it happens, I was a tad frustrated and also wanted to preserve a little more sleep that night if at all possible. It didn\u2019t work out like I wanted.<\/p>\n
I got into bed early enough that I could pass out for six hours. There was just one problem: I couldn\u2019t sleep. I rolled around for a while, then turned on the light and ended up finishing the most recent Stephen King novel (“Cell”) in less than an hour. I wouldn\u2019t have read for that long, but you know when you get towards the end of a book and you can\u2019t stop reading because you just want to finish it off and see what happens? Yeah, me too.<\/p>\n
So now I was down to five hours of sleep, but I was still tossing and turning. I eventually got up, surfed the Internet for a while, then crawled back under the covers for a little more than four hours by the time my alarm went off. So much for getting to bed early\u2026<\/p>\n
I had plenty of time to get dressed and head downstairs to The Liffey (an Irish pub that\u2019s attached to the hotel—I put the tab on my hotel bill) to eat a nice, hot breakfast. I suppose I could have done a little more cramming that morning or skimmed through a book or something, but I figured if I didn\u2019t know the material by then, tough noogies for me. When I was done eating, I headed out into the cold fully loaded:<\/p>\n
Heavy jacket and stocking cap. Laptop. Black pens. Backpack with study materials that I didn\u2019t use. A 6? Subway sub. A bottle of Mountain Dew. A bottle of Gatorade. An energy bar. A bad attitude. I was ready to rumble. That was the plan, anyway\u2026<\/p>\n
I got to RiverCentre pretty early for registration, got my nifty name badge, checked my bag and coat at the desk and decided to head into the testing area right away. Hey, it\u2019s not like I was going to accomplish anything by sitting around outside. So I found my seat, plugged in my laptop and got it running (Yaaaaay!), then put on some headphones, crank up the tunes and play Solitaire while I waited.<\/p>\n
There were proctors wandering around the room already and one of them stopped to ask me if I was listening to music to relax—when I said I was, she decided that was a really good idea. And then another proctor came over and told me I wasn\u2019t allowed to run any program on my computer aside from SofTest, the one we use for testing. The song playing at that moment? \u201cCruel\u201d, by Tori Amos. Boy, ain\u2019t that the truth\u2026<\/p>\n
Oh, and as a side note, I found out that RiverCentre also had a wireless system that didn\u2019t require a password. I just connected to the network, then took a peek at my e-mail before \u201cCruel\u201d proctor told me to shut it down. Grumble grumble grumble\u2026<\/p>\n
Eventually, it was time for the instructions for the morning session. \u201cHere\u2019s what to do during the MPT [Multistate Performance Test or something] section of the test: don\u2019t talk, don\u2019t leave the testing area screaming like a crazed lunatic and don\u2019t keep writing when I call \u201cTime\u201d or we\u2019ll tear up your essay and use it for toilet paper (and still submit it if you really want us to).\u201d Same old, same old, really\u2026 When she said \u201cGo,\u201d I went.<\/p>\n
This time around, I felt like I knew what I was doing, like I knew what I was supposed to write and how I was supposed to write it. (I\u2019ll feel much better if that was how I was<\/i> supposed to write it, but that\u2019s what makes waiting until the middle of April to get the test results so much fun!) Sadly, I still<\/i> didn\u2019t finish the essay, but I got closer and I\u2019m happier with the results.<\/p>\n
Same thing with the other two essays in the morning: it felt like I knew the subjects, I was writing decent material and explained what I was writing\u2013I probably missed a couple things here and there, but that\u2019s what partial credit is for, baby! If you get a bunch of \u201csorta-not-really-crappy\u201d answers, you\u2019ll probably get a higher score than if you write two really good<\/i> answers and get no credit on the others. So overall, I think the morning session went better than the last two times.<\/p>\n
After I left the room to pick up my bag with lunch \u2018n\u2019 stuff in it, I saw the back of a former classmate, so I snuck up behind him and flicked his ear. At least that was the plan\u2026 I was trying to barely catch the edge and completely missed. I didn\u2019t try to be as careful for the second swing and definitely caught his attention that time. We got to say \u201cHi\u201d, I found out he watches lots of reality TV, he found out that he missed my appearance on reality TV\u2026 he already had plans for lunch, but we decided to grab some food together on Wednesday so he could get some juicy details.<\/p>\n
It was nice and sunny outside during lunch, but also really frickin\u2019 cold (remember, we\u2019re talking about Minnesota in February here\u2026), so I found a nice, fairly secluded spot in the building that had some decent rays shining in and chowed down on my sandwich and other dining materials. When I got up to throw away my trash, I was confronted by two people, one of whom was a second former classmate. The first girl was asking if I played on her Frisbee team (she never specified whether it was ultimate frisbee or frisbee golf, but given that I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve played either of those more than once or twice, it didn\u2019t really matter). The classmate then clarified that I was a famous TV star! She didn\u2019t seem entirely convinced and mentioned Frisbee again, but I guess part of my being famous is that people recognize my face, but don\u2019t have the slightest idea who I am. Woo hoo!<\/p>\n
So I hit the road. I had been debating going down to The Liffey for dinner, find a restaurant somewhere else, order room service\u2026 I ended up driving home. I had a couple Norton Anti-Virus disks back there and thought I\u2019d try using one of them to double-check for a virus, see if I could get things back in order. Mind you, it\u2019s at least a twenty-minute drive, but at that point, I had other things on my mind than mileage on my car.<\/p>\n
I walked in the door and no one was home. (I\u2019m still not sure where the parents were, but I imagine they might have been surprised by the few changes that occurred while they were gone.) I peeked in the mail and found a package from Bill (from B&tG), so I pulled it out of the pile and moved it into my mail slot—I didn\u2019t have the time nor patience to mess with it for too long at that point. I also turned on the TV, changed the channel to FSN and found out that the Timberwolves lost. Even more good news\u2026 But I managed to find two disks (there was a third, but it looked kinda old and I left it behind), so I packed them up and left.<\/p>\n
On the way back to the hotel, I decided to stop at Perkins for dinner. I wasn\u2019t thinking about getting anything spectacular, just something that\u2019d fill up my tummy for a while. I ended up getting a shrimp and bacon wrap (something along those lines, anyway)—it tasted pretty good, but it also fell apart onto my plate. The waitress said they\u2019d started making it that week, so they\u2019d only had two days practice to get the proper wrapping technique down. Yes, I was still peeved about what was going on that night, but I told the waitress I was fine and that having to pick the food off my plate wasn\u2019t a big deal.<\/p>\n
When I got back to my hotel room, the first thing I did was try the two disks to install a different anti-virus program that might find the problem and take care of it for me. There was just one problem: they were waaaaay outdated. Even if I\u2019d installed either one, it might not have worked, so I tossed both disks into the trash next to my desk. Since I still had the hotel\u2019s wireless gizmo, I used that to click on the Security Center and it let me download the software (I got a free two-year subscription with my laptop, so it better<\/i> have let me download it\u2026). Thankfully, it was a DSL connection—if I\u2019d been using dial-up, I probably still be in that hotel room hoping to God that I wasn\u2019t picking up any more viruses\u2026<\/p>\n
Once I got the program set up again, I got the most recent updates and did a virus scan: nothing. So either the virus was doing an extremely good job of hiding itself or there was something else that was fucked up with the computer. I was out of answers and I still hadn\u2019t used the hot tub. It was not a good day.<\/p>\n
After another restart or two, I noticed that my laptop kept connecting to a network that wasn\u2019t the hotel\u2019s. It had a weaker signal and wasn\u2019t nearly as fast, so I kept having to click on the \u201cwireless connection\u201d icon to change it around. I\u2019m not sure if it was because I had to keep making that change, but I eventually went to \u201cNetwork connections\u201d and found a link to both networks. I also saw an icon for the wireless card in my computer. It said: \u201cInactive.\u201d I activated it, restarted the computer\u2026 problem solved.<\/p>\n
The only thing I can imagine is that when I turned on SofTest, it turned off everything else. And I mean everything<\/i> else. I didn\u2019t have a problem with that when I first registered the program to use during the bar exam—it obviously worked when I first got to the hotel—but maybe when I ran an actual test as opposed to a practice exam, the program deactivated the wireless card (it won\u2019t let the user run any other programs, so why the hell not?).<\/p>\n
To be honest, I haven\u2019t checked and I\u2019m not sure I want to. What happens if I\u2019m wrong? Is the wireless card just taunting me before it shuts down permanently? Is my laptop shot to hell for the remainder of its existence? Am I infecting all of you with a virus by writing this and posting it on my blog? Like I said, I\u2019m not sure I want to find OIsahtoiw7e90851o2hb5sDLTKHsaodthoqh5087ytoWuhgouLKishogls\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My laptop stabbed me in the back—it took so long to figure things out and fix them that I didn\u2019t have enough time for a long soak in the hot tub tonight. Man, life is poopy sometimes\u2026 I\u2019ll write about it tomorrow. _ _ _ _ _ Okay, even though I usually write this stuff … <\/p>\n