Some Assembly Required.

After the steaming pile of doo that was Vista, I am pleased to announce that I have finally managed to move off of XP and on to Windows 7. I’m actually in the middle of reinstalling/transferring back everything onto a shiny new install as I write this. It is as countless others have reported: a new version of Windows that is worth switching to. I think the most apparent difference from Vista, the one that has jumped out at  me in this first hour or so is this: Vista was full things that were graphically wasteful and worthless, 7 is full of things that are graphically wasteful and…really goddamn useful.

It’s subtle, really, the differences between the two. The devil, however, is in the details, and where as Vista got them all wrong, 7 appears to have gotten them all right. At first glance they seem to be set up almost identically, but as soon as you start to use it the (often) minor and (sometimes) major tweaks really pop out. It’s also allowed me to finally utilize all of my hardware. Where as I was running a 32 bit version of XP, I’ve upgraded to the 64 bit version of 7, not only allowing for 64 bit processing, but allowing me to finally tap into all of that RAM that was going to waste. Huzzah!

I suppose I should report for anyone thinking of upgrading that you cannot upgrade directly from XP to 7. The two most common options are: upgrade to Vista (free trial, don’t even have to activate it) and then from there to 7, or to simply back up all of your old files and do a clean install. Of course, to go from 32 to 64 as I did requires a clean install, but if you select that route, not only will 7 move all of your old files into a archive, if you run an included utility beforehand, will even help you import them back. A quick Google search will turn up all the information you need, and I found this guide in particular to be quite useful.

A Series of Unfortunate Events.

A couple of friends and I took a late-night walk to WinCo. Not out of any particular desire to go to WinCo, but because it was a destination that would make out walk the approximate length we wanted. Upon arriving there, however, we decided we needed to buy something. This was our first mistake. We then decided what we really needed was a dozen doughnuts from the (now closed) bakery. Our second mistake. And then, on the way back, we decided to eat some of these doughnuts. Our third and most grievous mistake.

Not only were they the most foul-tasting pastries any of us could remember eating, but they made all three of us sick. So, moral of the story, never eat baked goods from WinCo. Unless you hate yourself, in which case it’s a pretty cheap way to inflict pain.

This was also the first week I was able to attend all of my classes, having been absent at least one day of each of the previous three weeks due to a series of unrelated events. Trying to fix my sleep schedule at the same time made it quite the ordeal, and while I’m glad to finally be settled in, I am equally glad that it is now Friday and I can be comatose for the next 48 hours.