Truncated ... To Truncate?

This morning, when I first woke up, my computer flashed a dialogue box at me that had the word 'truncated' in it.    To which I promptly hit 'OK' because naturally ok was the only option.  And then I went and looked up the word truncated.

Truncated:

a) having the apex replaced by a plane section and especially by one parallel to the base - a truncated cone b) cut short : curtailed - a truncated schedule c) lacking an expected or normal element at the beginning or end : catalectic.

So.  That worries me a little.  Bear in mind that I (of course) have no idea what the rest of the message said (I had only just gotten out of bed, hello), so I cannot put the word into any kind of context for you.  Whatsoever.  Basically, my computer may or may not be having some kind of reconstructive surgery (?), plotting an unusually early demise (?), and/or lacking something important (well I already knew that).  

The only thing that comes to mind:

(Tangent: I am having a helluva time adjusting to this Danish keyboard.  My fingers are in a constant state of confusion what with the æ and ø and å keys and all my punctuation symbols being shifted around.  My apologies to any of you who have received an email with an emoticon that looks like this : æ)  As far as I can tell, this is some kind of one-eyed goblin named The Wicious Wiking.  Don't ask.)

On the other hand, my computer may have flashed the truncated dialogue box at me before and I completely failed to notice.  Which is probable considering my track record.

At this point I should probably not admit that I went out into the apartment stairwell yesterday and actually said, WOW! They painted the stairwell blue last night!  To which Tim immediately replied: It's always been that color; notice how dirty it is.  And there you have it.  Me, being my naturally unobservant self.  (Don't pity me; every day I see new and exciting things I have walked past hundreds of times before.)

In my defense, this is an especially hectic time of year.  We are travelling home to the States in FOUR days!  Naturally I haven't completed any of my Christmas shopping, despite the fact that every year without fail I swear up and down I am going to do my Christmas shopping early.  I'm just going to chalk this up as one of those New Years Resolutions you fully intend to fail.  (Speaking of, where oh where did I put that 2011 Resolution List and how much of it do you think I can possibly cram into the next twenty-four days, something-ish hours and odd-something minutes?)  

Le sigh.  If only I were rich I could just walk through the mall and throw things into a bag at whim rather than painfully weighing out my options with a wailing child at my side.  Then I could buy that six-foot giraffe statue for the White Elephant party ... and mail it back to the U.S. piece by piece ... 

Other things that make this month hectic:

1) Planning out too many social events for a brief three-week period.

2) Packing for the remainder of December.  I hate packing.  It makes me crazy.  

3) Finishing up all the odds and ends I should have finished up last month, so that I would actually be ready to leave in four days.  This includes the donor conversion project I should be working on right now.

4) The heel of my boot is falling apart.  I know this sounds irrelevant, but I am considerably upset about it.  They are, after all, my Lucky boots that I wear basically every day.  So I think the fact that the binding is peeling off should count for some of my current pre-holiday stress.

5) I got a new stalker this week and it really freaked me out (also irrelevant but I meant to blog about it anyway).  

Here's the scoop: Some guy followed me into the library and sat next to me while I looked through the entire dvd section.  At first I didn't think anything of it (you know, just some guy sitting in the library who has a problem with his face - for instance, why is he staring at me like that?).  Then, when he brushed up against me and began looking at the dvd's to my right, I started getting a little concerned.  So I went into the kiddies branch of the library (to borrow a Harry Potter film, of course), assuming that he wouldn't follow me in there because ... you know ... it's for the kids (and me).  He did.  He followed me to the children's dvd's and stood directly beside me and watched me look through every single film (all the Harry Potter movies were missing).  Probably at this point I should have said something like hey man, what's your problem, but I was getting a bit too freaked out to address the issue.  So instead, I pretended like I was about to head down to the music section, and he went on ahead of me (to wait for me?).  After which I immediately went and sat in the most populated section of the library, sent a couple text messages about having a stalker, and spent the next half hour staring at some weird gold tea pot relics.  He didn't reappear and, as far as I can tell, that was the end of that. 

At this point you are either laughing at me or want to tell me how I should have responded (my handy-dandy squirt gun, a knuckle sandwich ... or maybe he wanted the Bob Dylan film I had checked out?).  

Or perhaps I should act like my computer, and start throwing out the word truncated whenever something seems wrong.  That would show him.  (Kidding.  Rest easy, I have mace.)

I have to go now.