Also, not a moron. (That is, you are not a moron. My moronitude is still an open question.)

I'm fine. How are you, soon-to-be-married lady?

Don't you hate people who only stop by to visit when they need something? That would, um, be me. Sorry...

So my iBook G4 was getting sloooooooow. Aha, I thought! I shall add more memory! And so I did, I tripled the amount of memory (I now have 1.25 GB, woo hoo!!). And faster it was. BUT, I still was having issues. Turns out I was almost out of free disk space. Oops. So I have purchased my very first external hard drive, a lovely 250GB model. I'm copying things as we speak - my plan is to move everything I don't use very often (including both files AND applications) to the external hard drive so that my lovely little iBook has room to breathe again.

Here are my dumb questions (I warn you, they are very dumb):

1. I only need to have the external hard drive connected if I actually want to USE something on it, right? The rest of the time I can leave it unconnected, yes?

2. Do I need to leave the external hard drive plugged in (to power, not to the USB port)? Or when I'm not actively using it, can I pack it in a box and stick it in a closet?

3. If I want to run one of the applications I've moved to the external hard drive, do I need to copy it back to my iBook, or can I run it right off the EHD?

4. Anything else I should now, having NEVER used one of these thingies before?

I am good. As per usual, I am working too hard. And planning a wedding. And trying to figure out how to pay for it. But wedding planning is going well. I have:

-a lovely sexy dress and a hideously expensive veil and tiara -a maid of honor and three lovely bridesmaids -a location that will handle all the food and drink -a DJ -a cake (well actually, I haven't actually hired anyone to make it yet, but at least I know what i want)

Oh, and a wonderful groom to be! :)

How's tricks with you?

1. Yes.

2. Yes, you can turn off the power.

3. I'm pretty sure you can do this on a Mac. I know this worked pre-OS X.

4. Don't lose it.

eta: pretty much same as always.

Good, good. Would kinda suck to have laptop with a constantly attached appendage. Particularly since the EHD I ended up with isn't very attractive. I wanted one of the Lacie ones that look like Legos, but stupid Staples didn't have any and I didn't want to wait for it to be shipped.

So basically, I've spent approximately $260 on my computer in the last month, but now it's gonna run like a Porsche, right? :)

Thanks DX. I'm gonna get back to dumping files again. I appreciate your help!

Any time.

Hi, me again.

Everything is copied (I gained back almost 8 GB of disk space), but this thing is still thinking or something. Whenever I try to eject it, it says it's in use. Now what? How can it be in use????

Fuckity fuckity fuckity. Need to go to bed now. Need to unplug this stupid EHD so that cat doesn't knock it over during the night. Why won't it let me disconnect????????? NOTHING is running (except Safari, obviously, and Dashboard apps). Is it just reorganizing itself or something?