The best laid plans of mice and men gang aft a-gley.

Ugh. Nothing like spending 4 hours trying to fix your computer, finally deciding that nothing but a reformat and reload of all information will save it. Thank goodness I have a recent (1 month old) backup of our documents. The software can be reinstalled, but at least I could save as much data as possible.

Note to self - monthly backups are a good thing. We shall keep doing this.

And the culprit? A Linksys "Installation Wizard" CD, which really wasn't even necessary to get our new router set up. However, it managed to fuck up my PC so badly that it went into the Hell of Infinite Automatic Reboots. The router is good, but that CD is pure evil compressed into CD form.

And yet, I'm not really mad. Just mildly frustrated and resigned to fixing the thing.

Ugh.

Running on about 4 hours of not-too-restful sleep, and I'm still just scratched the surface of software I have to install. This weekend is going to be... interesting.

Irrelevant Poseur Reviews.

Saw a link to this on Plastic.com:

100 Albums You Should Remove From Your Collection Immediately

This guy wants to be the David Spade of the music world, apparently, because he doesn't actually review the albums; rather, he throws out some sarcastic piss and vinegar, and leaves you feeling annoyed at his bitterness. As far as I can tell, his reviews all follow one of the following four patterns:

1. This band/albums sucks. It's just a rip-off of (insert obscure minor-label artist here), which you should listen to instead.
2. I got so tired of hearing this music coming out of people's dorm rooms at college. I didn't like those people, so therefore, this music sucks.
3. I just don't understand this album. Therefore, it is overrated.
4. (Insert cute attempt at dry sarcastic wit with cutting insult here.)

Taste is all subjective, of course. There are CDs on the list that I agree with him on - U2's Zooropa comes to mind - but the annoying manner in which he delivers his opinion renders it totally irrelevant. Constructive criticism is good. Public flaming, not so much.