Technology-dependent woes

My laptop is dead. Or dying. How blog i thus, you ask? House-sitting for my parents, on their desktop computer, taking a mini break from reading articles in preparation for a highly intimidating telephone interview with a renowned landscape architect for a research paper. Why did i request an interview with said person!? He is a principal at a huge firm. Designer of award-winning gardens. Busy important man. Very gracious to agree to an interview. I will learn a lot reading published material and in the interview, but I AM A GOOF (e.g. i have to put on my grown-up hat for this interview and that takes much effort), i hate telephones, and i'm second and third guessing pursuing this avenue. Panic! I don't want to shame my school. Or me.

And now my laptop won't start. Thankfully, i backed up everything 10 days ago. Miserably, that doesn't include last week's work or photos. And my parent's old desktop is fine for word processing and web browsing, but it doesn't have the Adobe Creative Suite that i need to finish presentation boards, nor Sketch-up to make models (because i can't adequately draw them yet), nor Autocad to load base plans for a final project due in two weeks...their computer can't handle all that software, not to mention their lives involve going to bed at nine in the evening and mine involves studying/working/(goofing off) until midnight, and in a different town. Mooching off their computer won't work. People did this work before computers, but now, well, i need mine.

Panic panic...ha. That reminds me of the cover to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

And now, to avoid panic, i am going to return to reading articles and hope my brothers have an idea of what to do. I've replaced the motherboard on a desk top before, walked through it on the phone by my techie brother, but i think a laptop is over my head. I can read. Reading i do well. Back to reading...

EDIT: Thanks to some techies from church, it is working again. Believe me, i am backing up much more often.