Dear Diary #55: Like Sandpaper Inside Kettle, Loose PSU Cable Pins

Dear Diary,

I was trying to be smart and downloaded the "offline installer" for a program. The file name got cut off but I thought I saw "img" at the end... Thought it was an image but I thought it would magically be executable this time without me burning it to a DVD or USB key first. Nope. Had to download the "online" installer that was half the size and everything went smoothly.

Used my coffee drinking cup for plain water and found black bits in it. I've seen fruit flies around but it looked more like bits of instant coffee flaking off the rim that my simple rinsing doesn't always get. Still won't drink it. Thank goodness that it is only water and not alcohol or coke -- I'd never let that go down the drain.

Tried the 30 day free trial of Microsoft Office 2016. I'm amazed at how many Outlook features I never bothered to use or even knew were available despite the fact that I had to use it for years at work. Still didn't see a reason to pay $300 to upgrade from Office 2010. Maybe I'll do it anyway in a few years but not right now.

Went to clean out the kettle after seeing flakes of mineral deposits or whatever in the water being poured out. Instead of properly cleaning it, I just washed it with soap to get rid of any loose bits. I used my hand to do some of the rubbing and it felt like rubbing my hand against sandpaper. Well, at least my fingers are properly exfoliated now.

Well, that's just awesome. I finally got around to getting that multimeter because a cheapo model I had my eye on went on sale for $15. Wanted one to do a continuity test after I found out that the power cable to my computer's two video cards for about 8 years had a loose pin on the end that connected to the PSU. The hope was that the loose pin was part of the +2 part that I never used and not the 6 main pins. Nope. It was one of the black wires that connected to the 6 main pins. That might explain why both of my previous two cards were locking up the system every so often -- the second dropped dead after about 5 years. Never would have guessed because power hungry applications like games were extremely stable. It was only on the desktop that I ever had lock-ups or graphical glitches with the cursor. I never would have found out if I didn't disconnect the PCI-E cable months after getting a video card that didn't need one. Guess I'll know to check the pins on both ends in the future before and after plugging them in.

Later.