So I had yet another birthday, they just keep piling on.

In the morning Ian dropped off my presents, a new desk (some assembly required) and 2 monitor mount arms. I didn’t have time to play with anything at that point since in the afternoon I got together with Alicia who graciously agreed to keep me company on my birthday. We saw a movie and had dinner, and I walked her home. By the time I got back I was far too tired to mess around with the desk, but I did watch some of Alicia’s gift to me, the Get Smart box set. Such nostalgic memories, coming home from school, changing it to one of the 3 channels we could receive, and watching Get Smart and the old batman series. She also got me Punch Out on the wii, but I haven’t tried it yet.

On Sunday I was off home for a family BBQ. Well, limited family, since virtually all the family members invited couldn’t make it for one reason or another, some even going so far as to accept, later decline, re-accept, and finally bail on the day. Spent a few hours there, and also bought a new videocard for my parents computer since theirs was grinding its way to oblivion. It scares me since we have virtually the same model of computer, so I await the day that mine starts sounding like rattling teeth and angry.

When I got back to the apartment from the BBQ I started assembling the desk. I took an inventory of all the parts, checking them off on the master sheet. I was far more organized with this than any other thing I’ve put together. All the screws were in separate bags, and the instructions were mostly clear as to what bits to assemble with which screws, and as it happened I had the correct amount. The makers also saw fit to include a bag of spares, which had 1 of every type of fastener, which I appreciated though didn’t need. It still took a couple of hours, and a few of the instructions were ambiguous, but I got it together. It’s reasonably solid, though I still feel like my old desk is slightly more solid for some reason. I guess I don’t trust my screw-tightening skills.

Some assembly required, 3 hours

I put together the monitor arm mounts a bit, and finished them off today (since I basically had to attach the monitors as I put them together, which involved shutting down the computer). So today I shut down, and unwired everything to start again. I moved the old desk and table out and did some sweeping (far too much stuff in the way of the closet to get the vacuum out). I put the desk in place and rewired things as best as I could. I took out the dead usb harddrive, and its supporting wires. Also the old computer finally got moved out of the way, and the old subwoofer and speakers it used.

Down to 4 external hard drives

Still endless rat’s maze of wires

The swingarms work well enough, but I find that they force my head to look up, since they raise the height of the monitors a bit, and further the desk is high anyway, making it worse. I’ll have to experiment. I also have some difficulty moving the monitors because there isn’t any clearance behind the desk, so the swing-arm portion of the mount just hits the wall and I can’t move it further. Such is life in a small apartment. Also, one of my monitors still has the stem from the base attached. I can’t see any way of taking it off without breaking the monitor, so for the moment it stays on.

And the computer booted once more

But it’s pretty neat to be able to move them around so freely. They use a weight-tension system, so I just reach out and move things around. And the new desk comes with a swingout table which goes over the spot where I kept my computers, so I didn’t lose any room, but gained more desk, which is very handy. Thanks to brother and parents.

So another year come and gone.
Until next year.

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Edit: Now you can see the arms in action

Even the swing-table got in on the action