Because my computer keeps crashing. Dammit.
It crashes in the usual way : screen goes black and nothing I do will bring it back to life except for rebooting the whole machine.
It’s been doing this for a while and it’s always been very irritating. But now it’s happening more and more.
And I don’t like that.
For a while, it was only happening maybe four or five times a week. But lately it’s been happening after about half an hour of gameplay and sometimes even less.
There’s this one difficult battle in Pathfinder : Kingmaker that I finally figured out how to beat only to have the fucking game to crash my computer right as I’m about to win.
That is so freaking exasperating! I’ve actually had to decide to see if that fight is necessary for the plot and I am pretty sure it isn’t, so I guess I just have to skip it.
But I have cleared out all the rest of the three floors of this dungeon except for the big final fight and so my need to be thorough is going to give me hell for not finishing what I started and beating this particular gang of bad guys.
And all because my computer regularly goes blind on me.
Which means I am going to have to finally get around to getting that new power supply. That’s the most likely cause of these crashes. The high speed setup I have uses a LOT of power, and sometimes my current power supply can’t meet its needs.
So the graphics card poops the bed and stops putting out any video information and that’s why the screen goes black.
And there’s nothing I can do but reboot when that happens because computer are rather hard to use without graphics.
I’ve tried power cycling my monitor and unplugging it from the graphics card then plugging it back in, but neither of those worked.
I do wonder what caused it to get worse recently, though. The most obvious answer is that this is a progressive issue and thus has been getting worse over time.
And that’s not impossible. It could be that my el cheapo power supply (I needed one in a hurry) is being overtaxed and that causes it to burn out slowly.
Which would mean I need to get that power supply like NOW, before my computer becomes completely unusable and I am forced to find something productive to do.
Perish the thought.
Actually, a lot of my life would be unlivable without a computer of some sort. Not only would I have no video games to play, but I wouldn’t be able to blog to you wonderful people. plus I order my groceries off of the Internet
So yeah. Should probably get right on that.
The other possibility is that it’s a heat issue. Something in the computer (probably the graphics card) is overheating and that trips a sensor somewhere and the whole thing shuts down to keep the microchips from melting.
Kind of important, that.
If it’s a heat issue, the solution might be somewhat complex. I would have to get spuug to find somewhere to install more case fans.
And the graphics card already has four of them.
Come to think of it, I haven’t heard that signature “plane revving up for takeoff” noise from my computer lately.
Maybe the real problem is that the fans aren’t working so when the chips on the graphics card get too hot, the only thing it can do is go offline.
I am going to be listening very carefully to my computer during my next gaming session.
More after the break.
Society’s biggest secret
The reason rich people need to surround themselves with things that remind them they are rich, and indeed to keep buying more of said things, is that otherwise the spell would wear off and they would realize that money does not, indeed, buy happiness.
They are as much slaves of that powerful cultural delusion as the rest of us. We need to believe that money can buy happiness because if it doesn’t… what does?
What if the hidden truth is that we do not have the power to make ourselves happy. even if we had all the money in the world.
What if true happiness can only come from other people. Our fellow humans. What if true happiness cannot come from individualistic consumer society at all, no matter who we are, and no matter what we buy?
What if you can only be happy if you have good relationships in your life?
That seems to be where the science points. And yet, our souls reject this truth. We might superficially agree that money can’t buy happiness because it makes us feel better of our lack of it, but we don’t really believe it.
We all think that if we had a lot more money, we’d be happy forever. But we also know that isn’t true, don’t we?
After all, the homeless person we pass on a downtown street looks at us and thinks about how much more we have than them and probably thinks that if they had what we have, they’d be happy forever.
And we’re not, are we?
No matter what it is, it becomes the new normal and fades into the background. And then you have a choice : seek happiness in relationships instead, or delude yourself by thinking, “Well sure, getting more money didn’t make me happy THIS time, but surely the next time, it will. ”
And in a way, it will, because getting the money might well make you happy for a while.
And spending the money might also make you happy for a while.
But having the money never will.
And I think that is one of the prime reasons becoming rich turns people into monsters. They have gone all the way to the rainbow’s end, and there was no fucking gold.
Just more rainbow, on and on, forever.
And if you are born rich, it’s even worse, because you don’t even have the sense of accomplishment you’d get if you’d made all the money yourself.
And yet pop culture screams at you that you are “living the dream” and should be ecstatically happy all the time.
But you’re not. And that gives you a deep feeling of having been ripped off somehow and yet, society’s programming keeps you from seeing what the real problem is, so the pain makes you lash out at the world instead.
That’s why so many rich kids are assholes and bitches. And why they end up fucking up their lives with sex and drugs and dangerous sports and all the rest.
They’re looking for the happiness society has promised them. And they aren’t finding it.
And that really pisses them off.
Surely it must be around here SOMEWHERE….
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.