Excellent Timing

I didn’t post an entry yesterday mostly because I just didn’t feel like it, but also because I really didn’t do anything all day so there wasn’t much to write about anyway.
Today would have been much the same, though I did end up doing something noteworthy.
For a while now I’ve been beta testing a VoIP phone service. Today the service – and as a consequence, the beta test – shut down.
This mostly means that I’ll have to go back to using my cell phone for everything, but that’s okay.
It also meant removing the Terminal Adapter – the device that connects to your broadband modem and into which you plug your phone – from my configuration.
Since I hadn’t gotten around to it previously, I decided that the removal of the TA presented a perfect opportunity to hook up the Network Attached hard drive I bought back in Michigan.
So just to be on the safe side I shut everything down, disconnected the TA, ran an Ethernet cable from the cable modem to my wireless router, and hooked up the network drive, then turned everything back on.
I threw the installation CD into the drive and ran the configuration program, waiting as it did a search for the drive.
And I waited.
And I waited.
No drive detected.
Okay…I’ll try again, I decided.
No drive.
I launched my browser to try to look up some information on the Web.
I got a message telling me I wasn’t connected to the Internet.
I went into my network settings and found that my wireless network wasn’t listed.
In fact, my wireless adapter wasn’t even listed, so it wasn’t simply a matter of me not being able to connect to my wireless network, it was a matter of my computer not even recognizing that it was possible for me to connect.
I figured it must be a driver problem so I tried reinstalling it, but I didn’t actually have a copy of the driver files saved anywhere.
I tried a system restore, but that didn’t work either.
In extreme frustration – and after a lot of swearing – I actually plugged my computer into the router. It still didn’t allow me to connect to the Internet or to detect the network drive because my computer wasn’t set up for networking at all anymore.
I did what I had to in order to enable networking, restarted, and found that my computer didn’t actually restart properly as several start-up processes appeared to be hung. I got restarted and was able to connect to the Internet, but my existing network was no longer accessible.
(In the meantime, Munin was still working just fine and I was actually able to run the configuration program for the network drive on there just fine.)
Eventually I managed to track down the drivers for the wireless adapter and install them, but it still wouldn’t work.
Finally, in desperation, I thought, “Maybe it’s actually a hardware problem,” and swapped out Hugin’s adapter with Munin’s. Bam, Hugin recognized the adapter and connected to my network. With the Hugin’s adapter connected, Munin spat out an error message saying that the device was not recognized and may be damaged.
Apparently the wireless adapter just randomly chose that exact moment to crap out, most likely solely for the purposes of pissing me off.
So Hugin was back up, but Munin was down until I could replace the wireless adapter.
Obviously this could wait, as my main system was working.
Except that it would have eaten away at me to leave matters unresolved, so I put on some pants and, despite the fact that it was well after my usual 2 PM cut-off point for venturing into the world, I headed over to Best Buy.
Since it was close to dinner time anyway and I didn’t know what I was going to make, I figured that I’d stop at the bank first to get some cash and then pick something up from Arby’s after I was done at Best Buy.
A quick look at my balance made me panic, as my mortgage payments come out tomorrow and I had $200 less than what I needed to cover them. This was both troubling and puzzling, as there was no possible way that I could be short (on money). Still, it was a puzzle best saved for later, and I hit the Best Buy, found a suitable adapter (I was going to buy an internal card, but the USB adapter I found was cheaper. Cheaper + Not having to open up the computer = Sold). Next up was Arby’s. While there, I realized that the last time I’d been there was the day I flew out to Michigan. Thinking about that made me think about my dad, which made me sad.
Anyway, after that I made my way home.
Somehow, despite the fact that the plaza where the bank, Best Buy, and Arby’s are located is only about 2 miles away, this quick little venture into the world took over a half an hour.
Once I was home I checked my account activity and saw that my second mortgage payment had come out a day early, which explained the seeming problem with my balance.
After eating my dinner I set up Munin with the new adapter, and everything was, once more, hunky-dory.
Except that I just realized that I never got around to setting up Hugin to use the network drive.
*Sigh* There’s always something.