We ran out to get groceries last night and decided to swing in to our local Goodwill on the way – Matt to check out books for sale, and I to look at table lamps. (Really? Table lamps? Ok, interesting confession.) I eventually wandered over to the book aisle to find Matt browsing Sci Fi and decided to take a look around myself.

Let me just say that this Goodwill has a SWEET selection. Chances are, if you can’t find what you’re looking for at our very comprehensive library, you will most likely be able to find it at our local Goodwill.

From Daily Daguerreotype

I walked away with these two classics. I felt, in light of the recent unfortunate news regarding GM, that I should see what Jack Welch had to say… and I want it straight, Jack. Straight from the gut.

Sam Walton was a last minute find, and you should have seen the crap that the cashier put me through. Ok, dude. So I’m excited to read a book about Sam Walton. YOU’RE A CASHIER AT GOODWILL. Nuf said.

It is such a pleasure reading the things my sister writes. She is a beautiful writer, and prose matters so much to her. As a going away gift, she tucked her copy of “Gone With The Wind” into a basket with the Jack Daniels, some collard greens, and a subscription to Southern Living, and lovingly sent us on our way. It was the book that made me tear up.

Gina said that I needed to re-read the American classic, and with it all of my pre-conceived notions about people south of the Mason-Dixon line would be shattered. And boy, was she right.

I’m 474 pages into it and CANNOT PUT IT DOWN. I have such a major crush on Rhett Butler that Matt is starting to sneer at the very mention of his name. He’ll walk into the living room and glance over at me with piles of unfolded laundry to my right and left, nose buried in the book.

“What crazy antic is Captain Butler up to now? Raping and pillaging?”

“NO! It’s those DAMN YANKEES who are doing all the raping and pillaging! There was NO NEED for them to burn everything in sight… to steal food from all of the women and children! They went absolutely overboard and had no right to do these horrible things just to get their point across! Scarlett is a changed woman now… a changed and hardened woman forever and it’s all because of US!”

Matt, rolling his eyes, “I’m off to get a water ice at Ritas. Do you want me to get you anything?”

“Yeah, how bout that yummy chocolate custard and gelato thing they have? Thanks, babe.”

The least we could have done when we burned down their plantations was replace them with a reputable gelato chain!

For years now, my family members have come to me for computer recommendations because I am, theoretically, the most tech-savvy member of my family. Most of the guys that I dated are laughing as they read this because they were all varying levels of Mr. Built My Own Computer, and they saw me as the Idiotic Techless Wonder. Yet another reason that marrying Matt was good for my self image.

At any rate, I’m going to go ahead and write a blog post about my recent purchase of a Dell Inspiron 1525, really, for my own laziness – so the next time I get an email asking for a computer suggestion I can merely point them to this blog post and be magically done.

Now, this laptop is the first computer I’ve purchased since Janet, the thing I put together from mangled computer parts 5 years ago. Always an early adopter of technological ideas but a late adopter of hardware that I am expected to purchase with my own bank account, I put this buy off until the very last minute.

A few things you should know, first being that I’m a PC user. I think Macs are great, but see paragraph above regarding how I spend my own money, and Macs are not worth the money you pour into them. Piggybacking on that thought, I’m a big fan of Dell’s refurbished machines because, like a used car, you can get a lot of bang for your buck if you’re willing to accept the fact that someone else owned this beauty before you.

In this case, I had to buy my Inspiron new to use a gift card I acquired from cashing in my credit card points, essentially slashing the cost of the computer in half. Otherwise, I would have bought refurbished. I had also recommended this laptop to my Dad who purchased it about a month before me and so far has really enjoyed it himself. So I wanted to make sure I had made a good recommendation.

Here are the specs on my particular machine, so if you want something that is good and fast and will last you 4-5 years (assuming you’re a standard user who wants to edit photos, use a word processor, surf YouTube, and check your Gmail), I think you’ll be more than satisfied with a machine with similar power.

• Intel Pentium Dual T3200 processor @ 2 GHz
• 3 GB Memory

All the rest is just details. As for Vista, a lot of annoying things there, but the new 2007 Excel is completely worth all of the annoying bugs in the rest of the operating system. You will be amazed by all the new shortcuts.

Now that I’ve moved into my Inspiron, I’m undergoing the process of wiping down Janet and installing Xubuntu. I’ve been wanting to play around with a Linux-only system for a while and, by my calculations, have about 5 more years to get used to Linux before purchasing my next Linux-only machine.

Best wishes with your computer-buying!

P.S. If you want to go with a little less power for a little less cash try the one I recommended for my sister – same model of Inspiron but with 2 GB memory. So far she seems to be enjoying it as well.

P.S.S. I believe I gave a recommendation to Big Ma that wound up being a catastrophe. Could you give us a Consumer Report on that one, Big Ma?

P.S.S.S. Back in the day when I was working in the IT department of a really great company that seriously gave their employees the best tools for the job, I was hooked up with a beautiful XPS M1530 that was great for running the entire Adobe Suite all at once. If you’re doing a lot of multimedia all at once, I highly highly recommend this machine.

A big warm and wet thanks to Chad for fixing the sidebar bug in IE. Way back in 2002, he sat me down in a computer lab and taught me HTML. He is also responsible for my affection towards the following bands:

• Hall and Oates
• Gorillaz
• Radiohead
• Chemical Brothers
• And Supreme Beings of Leisure.

Clearly, I owe him a lot. Tonight, we toast our ginger ale to you, Chad.

So I have in my inbox the new design for Verbal Intent! I will work on rolling it out this weekend, and assuming there are no major technical glitches, you’ll have some new digs to check out on Monday!

Note To Self: Do something about the dreadful amounts of comment spam you’ve been receiving lately.

OK, well we’re back online. We’ve decided to go with a USB modem which costs a bit more than DSL per month but is highly portable and allows us to finally power up Janet, my dinosaur of a PC (yes, we name our computers), to use Photoshop to touch up my photos for upload. It’s been a policy of mine to touch up photos only slightly, but now I’ll be able to remove those poles from behind people’s heads. At least the ones that aren’t being used for dancing.

This weekend I have lofty plans of taking Berlin to the dog park to get her swamp on and to hit the city for a photo shoot. I have missed playing around with my puppy and my camera. So I’m sure next week will be rife with blog posts and photos for your viewing pleasure.

Oh, and how could I possible forget to tell you that WE’RE GOING TO SEE BRIAN REGAN ON SATURDAY NIGHT! It was a strange and pretty unnerving realization when Matt and I concluded a few years ago that we love going to comedy clubs. We are so white trash.