Infection

Great news: My laptop has been saved from the brink of electrical devastation, so feel free to let out a near orgasmic sigh of relief. I’ve retrieved the lost blog updates, so expect some new updates next week (and by next week, I mean ten months time).

The I.T. guy spent the better part of a day retrieving my files. He told me that a Trojan Virus had decimated my hard drive, and it had gotten there through a downloaded internet file.

I immediately thought that I had contracted the virus through my video downloading:



But no, I.T. dude tells me it was attached to a song file I had downloaded a week earlier.

Which can mean only one thing, somebody is hiding viruses in the music of Kid n Play

Why would somebody do that?

Isn’t the internet a sick fucking place? Identity theft, Kiddie Porn – and now I can’t even download the House Party 3 soundtrack without contracting a computer STD.

Fuck.

Postcards from the Dormant

These aren't great times for blogging.

I've got four articles in the pipeline I've been working on (I was going to post whichever one came to fruition first), but they have been progressing excruciatingly slowly. That creative part of my brain required to write this shit has completely shriveled up, like your Grandpa's nut sack if Superman zapped him in the groin with his heat vision; or a half-eaten kitten left on a plate in a Sauna. I'm obviously devoting too much of my brain power to other problems (too cumbersome to go into) and the writing output is suffering because of it.

And so we’ve hit a real stale patch here at the Shoddy Blog ( I've still got a Christmas tree in my banner and it's the middle of June for fuck sake).

The last minute ironic kick in the nuts was that I completed a post (the second part of the News stories to be precise) - and then my wok lap-top up and died on me. It's completely goosed, and everything I had saved on it is now in limbo - including important work documents and even more important blog updates.

The I.T guy says he should be able to retrieve everything on my corrupted hard drive at some point (and he seems quite happy to fix it, even though this is my fourth work computer I've fucked since being with the company), and when he does I'll put another post up next week.

It's crossed my mind many times to just shut the blog down and call it a day. But I've ultimately decided to keep it going for a number of reasons:

1. It would be a shame to shut it down after all of this time: the Shoddy Blog has been running (at various speeds of productivity) for over 27 months now. Personally, this a long time for me to commit to any one thing. 27 months is longer than I keep most jobs, longer than I live in most homes, and about ten times longer than I've stayed in a relationship for.

2. I've got a hefty backlog: while lying on my couch one lazy Sunday, I got a pen out and scrawled all of the post ideas I had on the back of a threatening letter from the Electricity company* – the list topped out at 45 ideas.

3. I don’t want to let you guys down: I know if you stopped by the Shoddy Blog and saw it had been shut down, you’d go through a range of negative emotions. First shock, then confusion, disappointment followed soon after by indignant anger. It’s the exact same anguish Clark Griswold suffered after travelling across America to Wally World – only to find it closed for repairs.

I just can’t be responsible for putting you through the same emotional rollercoaster. There’s already millions of neglected web-sites on the internet, I’m hoping not to contribute to this ever-growing mountain of stagnant cyberspace.

That being said, I wouldn't count on there being a barrage of posts in the upcoming months - Fuck, it's going to be a slow ride until the end of the year (2009 will be different, for reasons that will become clear later).

My comments box is open anyway, so let me know how you are all doing. Everybody getting laid? Anybody get into a fist fight on the weekend? Downloaded any Astronaut Porn?

I like to know these things.


*The threatening letter from the Electricty Company said "Pay your overdue bill, or we will send Raiden over to kill you." I shit you not.