happy day - my return to the internet

i was without the internet for about a week and a half. i have found: that i love the internet, that i interact with my real life friends mostly through the internet (except the one i work with who lives very near me and is extremely cool about my transportation needs, and tends to be awake and bored at night, too), that my brother sleeps a lot more when there is no internet, and rather annoyingly that the library does not always call when your holds are in, and therefore it is handy to have a friend there (who happens to run into the one friend i ever seem to see without an official event being involved).

the whole computer problem sucks majorly. the issue was that our hard drive totally failed and had to be replaced. apparently the problem was that it had gotten dirty inside, and dad has decided that it is all my brother's fault for chainsmoking in the office with the door shut, and while i'll admit this doesn't help, i've decided to blame hp and this is why. all the computers we have ever owned have been compaqs, but this is the first one since they were bought by hp. i'll give you that a laptop is considerably more sealed than a desktop, but my big grey paperweight was somewhere between 11 and 13 years old when my hard drive crashed and died. the other laptop is 7 years old and while massively slow and crappy (with frequent sightings of the blue screen of death), it does technically still work. this computer is less than 2 years old. that's just not right.

for a real mindblowing concept, the promised explanation of the jeep's issues. it has: 2 thrown rods, 4 twisted rods, one broken cylinder (most likely from being hit by thrown rod), 4 severely overheated cylinders (despite the fact that the temperature gauge never indicated that the engine was too hot), holes in the block (again from those thrown rods), cracks in the block, and coolant in the oil (although the coolant level is only very slightly low).

there are several issues with this. first, almost all of these problems (not the coolant) mean IMMEDIATE death to an engine, meaning that you can't have one and then the other, so they must have all happened simultaneously. secondly, throwing a rod is something that basically only happens if you have literally no oil, and it was full, although some of it was notably gummed up because that's what happens if you mix oil and coolant. also, there was no indication of problem from the temperature gauge or oil light (or anything else for that matter). just bam, loud noise (although not loud enough for all that) and dead car. but the most amazing of all, the adjuster from the warranty company, in his report, says it's my parents fault, citing poor maintenance. i guess they were supposed to know that the coolant was going to leak into the oil and turn it into goo.

so, she's waiting for official word from the company to see of they agree with the adjuster or the mechanics. if it's the former, then all hell will then ensue, for them, expressway dodge, and anybody else who gets in her way. basically, she'll be damned if she paid extra for an extended warranty, and still has to pop 6 grand for exactly the kind of things warranties are for. regardless, the next car will probably be a pontiac and she will never buy anything from expressway again.