we're so back.. despite it all....

hello again! any avid checkers of my website may have noticed that progress completely stagnated this past week. that's because my laptop decided to go to super hell for no reason! i kid, it wasn't super hell-level bad, but it was briefly very scary.

i got my current laptop as a high school graduation gift! it's an hp envy x360 - i specifically wanted a laptop that was touchscreen and had a good deal of ram so i could do digital art in my lecture hall classes. about halfway through my first semester, it got knocked off of a table while i was doing my laundry. it dented the frame of the lower half a good deal, and it shattered the screen (thankfully, the shattered section was in a corner with no visual display, so only a couple of small cracks across the screen get in the way of the display). my touchscreen dreams were ruined, though i thankfully kept my plug-in tablet as a plan b. ever since the drop, though, my laptop has always felt sort of uneven in my lap. last week, when i opened up my laptop to work on an online exam, the plastic piece connecting the screen side to the left hinge slipped out from under the screen! i tried to wedge it back myself to no avail. i called nearly every computer repair place in my area, and all of them wanted to conduct a full screen replacement and just redo my hinge as part of the replacement - the replacement would've costed me more than it would to just buy the exact same model of laptop! thankfully, my very last resort offered to fix just the hinge, not a full screen replacement. it was estimated to cost $40 rather than $400 and only take about 2 days rather than 2 weeks. so of course, i immediately jumped on the opportunity! the epoxy that was used to fix up the hinge took multiple applications to properly fix the damage in the hinge, though, so 2 days became 5 became 8. i finally got it back earlier this afternoon, and i am absolutely elated!!!

while i was stuck offline, i got all but confirmed at a new job, wrote an a-worthy paper, did great on two exams, saw two killer local shows, and had some of my best sounding radio sessions to date! as frustrating as it's been to manage everything without my trusty computer i have certainly been keeping myself busy enough for time to pass fast. now, i just need to lock in on the digital art projects i've been meaning to get done...