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caring about explosions
Sunday, February 28 2010
It had been snowing for about a week, though it never amounted to much because temperatures had only dipped below freezing at night, and then only grudgingly. Today the snow gradually petered out and there were even brief glimpses of sun, usually through a thin web sealing the gaps in the cottage cheese of overcast.
Woodchuck, my main computer, is built around 1.5 TB of hard drive and an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, but every now and then I do an assessment of one of the several other available computers near my workstation, all of which I can reach through a KVM once I turn them on. I use them so infrequently (usually to test a network configuration) that sometimes fundamental problems have developed since I last used them. Usually these are dust or insect related. For example, a CPU fan will have trouble turning if 30 hibernating bugs are crammed between it and the heatsink. (I'm referring here to the true bugs that like to hibernate in our house by the thousands, though they usually end up somewhere in the wall insulation.) Today I powered up the old Athlon-64 machine (whose motherboard and CPU used to run Woodchuck) because I wanted a more reliable GTA-San Andreas playing experience (and I have the Windows version of the game). But then that computer started crapping out with bluescreens of death. Was it overheating? Or was it some software issue? I did a little internet research about the unhelpful error message I was seeing (DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL) and GTA-San Andreas, and so decided to try updating the sound driver. I did this using the simplest procedure offered by Windows, a procedure that (to my knowledge) has never actually worked but which I always try anyway. I told Windows to check the internet to see if a more up-to-date driver could be found, and if so, to install it. And so it did. Miraculously, the bluescreens of death went away, indicating something good had happened.
So then I loaded up a saved game I found somewhere on the internet, one where CJ, our ass-capping hero, is all rippling with muscles and slathered with tattoos, has a safehouse full of guns and food, a jet fighter parked on a neighbor's roof, and even a tank waiting for him under a nearby overpass. I have no interest in following any of the linear elements of the game; I just like seeing how spectacularly I can make things blow up. For example, I stole two trailerless tractor-trailers, parked them on a railroad track, and then, shoulder-launched heat-seeking missile at the ready, waited for a train. But even with all that obstruction and firepower, I could not make the train catch on fire.
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