Decision Time and Computer Space

So, today I get a new hard drive installed in my computer.  I currently have 13 GB of space remaining on my 160 GB hard drive and am afraid to download anything of substance any more.  I can't even anti-frag my hard drive because it is requesting more space.  So I phoned my computer guru last week to talk with him about hard drives.  He'll put a drive in for me today that has more than 600 GB of space (I would get a bigger drive but a larger one won't work with my older computer).  This will carry me through until I can afford to have him build me a new computer, something that I would love to have happen this year but which may have to be put off until next year because of money.  My total expenditure for this will be somewhere around $200 total for the drive, installation, and data transfer; well worth it to me.  Then I can actually get the software that I need to work with installed, clean up my hard drive again, and get back to downloading some pictures that I've been wanting to show people on my blog.  So this is a high-priority item on my agenda, even though I'll be fighting snow to get there and back today. 

I usually buy the souvenier bead - I have not missed since 1997.  I'm
not really sure about the bead for this year.  The "gourd" look is not
one that I am fond of.  I may save my $60 for something I like more. 

Next week is the date for registration for Bead & Button Show 2011.  That's the annual beading show that I attend in Milwaukee, WI (jumping up and down and waving at Zhie, hoping that we can get together for a drink or a meal).  Last year I went for a shortened time and spent less than $300 on class fees.  There weren't a lot of classes that I was interested in, and I really didn't have the money.  But I've been saving carefully for a year for this and there are actually some classes of interest to me.  There are also a lot of pretty projects that I think I could figure out on my own, so I don't want to pay money to take classes for them.  But there are a few classes that I am very interested in that will require a longer hotel stay this time.  So I will register next Tuesday and then I will deal with the hotel issue afterwards.  I'm determined that this year will be a more creative year, and this will be the beginning of it.