Crap, thy name is Dell

Our laptop is dead. Again.

This is the second time since we bought it that the motherboard has died because it overheats. Dell replaced it the first time, but they won't this time. Five months ago we bought a new hard drive for it because that died.

A little bit of Googling taught me that this is a common problem in certain models of Dell computers, and while some batteries have been recalled due to fire hazard potential, Dell kind of refuses to admit that motherboards dying due to overheating is their fault, due to crappy manufacturing...though it definitely is.

Our laptop is two and a half years old, and when we dropped $1,500 for it in June 2004 we weren't really expecting it to have such a dreadful life expectancy.

I believe it is safe to say that Dell sucks. I believe it is equally safe to say that Dell also blows.

Fortunately our school's computer tech guy, when asked if he could install an Ethernet card into our desktop, said he would do it free of charge. He is also scrounging up a computer to put in my classroom for me to use until we have a new laptop. He also informed us that through our school's new laptop initiative, we can get discounts with both Acer and Apple, so when we do buy a new laptop in the near future it will be somewhat less of a blow to our carefully laid out savings plan.

In other non-exciting news, Thanksgiving came and went. Here it was just Thursday. I was home sick with the flu both then and today. We had Javanese chicken curry and Turkish flatbread for dinner, so no traditional trimmings. Sounds sad, I guess, but it really didn't even feel like Thanksgiving. There were no ads for holiday sales, no cold weather, and there are only a handful of Americans at the school so that actually made it easier. I think if it had actually felt like Thanksgiving we would've been a lot more miserable. We will have several Thanksgivings' worth of celebrating to catch up on next year, though, so turkeys, beware.

This weekend, provided I feel better, we're going to look for a little Christmas tree to put up in our house. We don't want a huge one because we don't want to buy hundreds of ornaments to fill it, just to ship them home and have two trees' worth of stuff next year. A cute, little one will do...just big enough for our cat to climb and try to destroy. Ah, cats.

My classroom is also decorated for the holidays. Like last year, I gave my 7th graders a day off from Humanities class and taught them how to make paper snowflakes. I just finished getting them all strung up on the ceiling, so it's nice and wintry in my room. Very pretty. I'll post some shots once we have something to download photos to again. (Curse you, Dell!)

Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone!