I slept at 2am and I hardly woke up at 8:30am. My dad said that the computer upstairs was acting up again, so I had to fix that problem before going to church. It was quick anyway. There was a lot of distractions. It's true that the devil would throw you a lot of distractions just to keep you from going to church. The devil makes it frustratingly difficult for something as simple as going to church in the morning. My soul laughed in disbelief how we had to overcome such a simple 'problem'. We left the house at 9:55am.

Something personal happened at church today. I don't think it would be suitable to expose it here. But let me just say that the pastor was able to negate the 'issue' that was apparent in the morning, and we felt the moving of the Holy Spirit during praise and worship. However, I shook my head at what had happened moments before the end of the service. I said to myself that there's a lot of work to do in this church. The pulpit is holy ground. I decided not to dwell on this matter anymore, as I'm looking forward to next Sunday.

While at church, I received a text message from my cousin saying that he'll swing by my house around 2:25pm. I told him I'll notify him at 1:30pm if there's a change of plans. Service ended at 1pm. But since my mom and dad were chatting to some folks in church, we stayed until 1:30pm. Unsure if we're leaving or not, I still sent my text to my cousin that we're going home. In the end, we came back home around 2pm.

I only had a hot chocolate before going to church; I haven't eaten anything yet. So I told my sister to hurry up cooking before it reaches 2:25pm. Fortunately, the stove was cooperative. I'm stepping out so I could replace the defective item I purchased this past Friday. Ugh. Such a hassle. On his way, I got a call from my cousin that he wants to borrow my spare keyboard and my spare videocard. I thought-- uh-oh. He's going on a spending spree again. Does his mom know how much he's really spending?-- On credit?! I gave him another of my two cents as to check and balance his intention. He's supposed to dedicate his baby on May, they call it 'binyag'. I call it dedication. Even though they call it 'Christening', there is only one Christ. Anyway, it's just my way of thinking. Moving on, I told him to take it easy. Like take it easy for real. But I felt his determination to finish building this 'dream' PC this afternoon.

I was planning to go to sleep in the afternoon after I get my keyboard replaced. I was not able to deter him. I found myself carrying two keyboards, and a videocard at the end. While he pulled up on our street, I found the folks riding in the car behind staring at me. We were thinking of the same thing; what am I doing? Goodbye lazy Sunday. Hello grind!

Anyway, it was all good. We drove my auntie to work again before 3pm; it felt like Friday again. Then we headed to the computer store-- again. We found the same clerk -- again -- for the third time and I'm imagining him thinking out loud 'these guys again?!'. I know. Well, if that keyboard wasn't defective, I wouldn't be really seeing you. Fortunately, and indeed I would recommend going to MemoryExpress, -- there, free promotion -- the staff at the replacement services was really accommodating. I just told him that two of the keys aren't working, namely the caps lock and the tab key.

He inspected the keyboard for half a minute and he said that he would grab another keyboard for me. I like my new keyboard; it's illuminated and it has a fan. A fan. Yes, a small fan. Well, I type a lot and I want to keep my hands cool. The staff didn't even ask any questions, and he didn't even test my broken keyboard to see if I was lying. He was trusting. I'm honest anyway. When he gave me the new keyboard, I asked him to test it out. All the keys were working and the fan was working too (not that I had a fan problem in the first place). It was easy and great. No argument whatsoever. I was pleased with the service. He asked me my receipt at the end so he could print a new receipt and to keep the alarm from going off when we step out.

My issue was dealt pretty fast. I walked over to my cousin to see what he was buying. I didn't want to know how much he was spending anymore. But I asked him to sum up everything he bought and give me all the numbers. I want to make my own calculation for future reference. Apparently, we had all the necessary parts to run his new computer. We left the store around 4pm. He said that he felt hungry, but he wasn't really sure about it. Perhaps his stomach was just knocking him a friendly reminder. I told him that we'd eat later instead. We didn't want to leave all these parts freeze in the car. Besides, I wanted to tackle his main objective first. I got mine solved already.

We arrived at their apartment a quarter after 4pm. He grabbed his tools and we unboxed every part. First, the radiator and the fans inside the mobo had to be installed. We had to unscrew his two big fans on top of his case. There was no problem installing the radiator on his motherboard. Afterwards, we laid the case flat so we can screw the mobo in place. But before we could do that, the external cover for the ports located at the back had to be placed. We had a hard time putting this simple aluminum in place, because the size of the cover doesn't seem to fit right with the opening. I cringed when I noticed that the cover became a bit damaged when we tried forcing the cover in. It had to be in place properly, otherwise, we can't secure the mobo properly. Eventually, we had it placed and we exhaled our relief.

Installing the Wireless Combo card was a runaround. The instruction said to unscrew the cover and insert the core-chip in place. When we did, the chip was already in place and there was nothing else to do. We re-placed the cover and put the card in the mobo. Stupid manual.

Next, we secured the mobo using 9 tiny screws. The second to the last screw failed. It was so small, it fell into the crevice behind the mobo. We tried a search and retrieval operation for this brave piece of metal. However, after 5 minutes of search and rescue, the operation had to be called off. Instead, we just grabbed a spare one. I covered the edge with paper, so that this won't slip and fall into somewhere else anymore. It was a success. The last one was no problem. Thus, the mobo's officially screwed.

He placed his two 8GB DDR3 RAM like an excited kid. Then we installed the WIFI's antenna. Around 6pm, we tried figuring out where to plug all the wires from his casing to his mobo. It was a tedious work reading the layout on the mobo with the font size set to .001 in RL. Our cheesy Filipino music also stopped. I couldn't concentrate, so I logged into Youtube and picked my playlist. Now work can resume. I asked him if the casing had a manual so we could figure out what to do with the wires. Unfortunately, there isn't. Okay. We'll just wing it.

Around 7pm, it was time to install the power supply. I was getting sleepy. And it felt like I did some serious yoga just to properly see where we're installing each part. When the power supply was in place, we checked the manual for the ATX power supply pins. He installed the DVD-ROM and the harddisk too, so we can plug them with the SATA and the power supply. We followed what the manual said. At this point, 7:30pm, the casing and the fans are done, the mobo is secured, the processor tucked in, the wireless card is in, the two 8GB RAMs are inserted, the power supply is placed, the harddisk and the ROMs are hooked up, and I grabbed my spare videocard. Upon inserting the videocard, I asked him his Windows 8 CD, and we plugged in my spare keyboard. He hooked his 23.6" monitor into the VGA adapter. We plugged the computer itself into the electricity, crossed our fingers and pressed the power button. 8pm, we looked at each other why the computer wasn't turning on.

I sighed.

The mobo's LED is on, and it seems like we've done the right job of plugging every pin. I had a hunch and read the mobo's manual again. I knew that the motherboard wasn't getting enough power. But we had an 850-watt power supply. That's already too much. Then I had a thought that the power supply might be defective, because the fans weren't working and the power supply's fan itself isn't doing anything. However, the LED lights are on for the mobo. I checked the manual again and found three diagrams in the instruction that had 'OR' on it. We chose the second illustration. I thought that might be what's wrong. We had to unscrew the radiator and the two uppermost fans so we could plug another 4-pin into the slots. Then we placed the second 4-pin cable into the 8-pin slot -- so there were two 4-pin cables attached. I told him just to place three screws on the radiator. Then we pressed the power button again. It was the moment of truth. And the truth revealed that there was something wrong again as the mobo seemed to be receiving power, but the computer isn't turning on.

The videocard wasn't running. The fans aren't rotating. There was no noise in the harddisk. It was just quiet. As if this computer was mocking us. I even asked my cousin if we were pressing the right button, the power button, since it wasn't labeled yet due to the removed cover. I lied on the bed for a few minutes, because all that yoga made my back act up. It was now or never, we chose the second and the third illustration. It was clear that the mobo wasn't getting enough power to turn on. We picked the remaining illustration, we just plugged in 4 pins into the 4-pin slot separate from the 8-pin. Long story short, the computer turned on. I slapped my forehead. The instructions that had "OR" wasn't clear enough to save us from an hour of miserable second guessing.

8:30pm. It was time to install Windows 8. We also had to pick up my auntie from St. Amant at 9pm. I was so tired from the impromptu yoga and the troubleshooting. But three pieces of marshmallows kept me cool. Well, they were lying on the counter. Around 8:39pm, we left the apartment and my cousin insisted that we pick up her mom first so he could treat me. Again, he was very persuasive, and I found myself just keeping quiet without retort in the SUV while driving to St. Amant.

9:10pm-ish, auntie exits the hospital. I felt a bit embarrassed, because we already drove her there, and I was still bothering them when it was time to go home. I rode shotgun too, when I should've gone to the back. I felt a bit embarrassed too, because I didn't want auntie to know that we were going to McD's first. I mean, she's already tired and I'm sure she wanted to go home already. But my cousin insisted with the treat. It's his fault! Also my pesky sister and my dad also wanted something from McD's too. They told me what they wanted as soon as I stepped out of the door. I mean... really? Well, since I'm really kind, thoughtful, considerate, and gullible, I bought them their share too. So it took some extra minutes of waiting for auntie. On our way home, I told my cousin we'd go to Starbucks on Sunday and that we'd let my sister tag along. There. Happy? My sister's like she's on her period when she doesn't get her Starbucks. Pfft. As if she's paying for it *looks at my wallet*.

They were watching the replay of the Winter Olympics when I came home. I watched a little bit and then I plugged my gaming keyboard to test it out. Everything seemed to be running fine. I checked my Facebook. I hesitated to send her a message, because I felt like perhaps I was rushing into things -- indeed, I thought. So I held it off for the day. She was probably busy too since it was noon at her time. I didn't want to bother her, even though my selfishness wanted to say hi to her. I went to bed and opened my laptop to write. I expect to change my work schedule tomorrow.

Labels: 365-project