LETTERS FROM HELLSING IV

Power shot through me like a searing flame. My fear and anger were burnt away leaving only room for that voice. That voice, which I knew somehow, would let me keep my promise to that little boy. I did not even care at this point if I lived or died, but this...thing was not going to get those children!

Another chair bent, then another, and another. They seemed to jump into my hand as I needed them.

The voice, stronger now, was singing through my veins. The blood was pounding in my ears. My head was spinning. Distantly I could hear someone singing. Not well, but loudly.

"GOD IS BIGGER THAN THE, BOOGEY MAN!"

"Stop singing you stupid bitch!" the man screamed.

Startled, I realized it was me singing. I took a deep breath and bellowed out at the top of my lungs, "HE’S BIGGER THAN GODZILLA OR THE MONSTERS ON TV!"

He snarled and began advancing toward me. The blood was pounding so hard in my ears that I could barely hear myself. So I sang out louder. "OH GOD IS BIGGER THAN THE, BOOGEY MAN AND HE’S WATCHING OUT FOR YOU AND ME!!!"

I could almost feel the children smiling behind that door. I smiled back. Tears were streaming down my face and my head was pounding; "Thump, Thump, Thump, Bang!", but I was smiling.

He had just about reached me and I was just about to start verse 2, when he hesitated and cocked his head as if listening to something. I could not hear a thing for the blood pounding in my ears "Thump, Thump, Bang! Thump. Thump, Bang! Bang! Thump".

Bang?... No wait, that’s not right.

The man turned towards the door, he held up his hand and the ghouls instantly froze. So did I.
It was dead quiet.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!" Gunshots rang out in the hall. Then the sound of footsteps, then "Bang!" another shot, closer than the last. I sagged with relief. The police. The police had come at last!
A single set of footsteps echoed in the hall.

A man appeared in the doorway. He was tall and thin with wild black hair and dressed from head to toe in red. Well, not quite. His boots were black but his hat, his overcoat, even his glasses were all a deep brownish red. He took in our strange tableau and smiled.

"I’m sorry to interrupt your dinner" he said in a deep, smooth voice "but why don’t you try picking on someone your own size?"

He seemed to be alone. "Where are the others? Where are the police?!" I screamed in my head while frantically craning my neck to see past him.

"What the hell are you supposed to be?" said my attacker.

The man in red ignored the question, glancing at me where I still stood panting with a twisted metal chair in my hands. "Your dance card looks a little full. Do you mind if I take a few admirers off your hands?"

I stared at him speechless. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. How could this strange man possibly save us from these monsters?

"I don’t know who you think you are" said my attacker, "but if you wish to die a hero, I am happy to oblige you." He flicked his hand towards the man in red in a dismissive manner. The ghouls swung around and lurched towards my would be rescuer.

Slowly, almost lazily, the tall man reached into his overcoat and pulled out two of the most enormous handguns I had ever seen. One silver and one black, both glinting dangerously in the light.

My attacker gave a snort of contempt "you guns won’t harm me!" He laughed.

The man in red glanced over at me and smiled in a truly frightening way, winked, then addressed my attacker. "No, but the bullets will." and began to fire. A loud terrible booming in that small space. I flinched at the sound, dropping the chair.

The man moved into the room aiming and firing over and over so quickly his arms seemed to blur. I stumbled back as ghouls began to explode around me.

"Yes, silver bullets will most definitely kill scum like you." he said.

"Silver?" my attacker gasped.

"Yes." the man said "Now, will you stand and fight or must I waste more time on your filthy undead puppets?"

"Kill him!" my attacker screamed.

The ghouls lurched forward from all directions hurling any objects they could find at the man in red. The coffee pot whizzed past his head knocking off his wide brimmed hat. He pivoted and fired at the ghouls coming up behind him momentarily turning his back to us.

My attacker pounced on the opportunity. He pushed past me shoving me hard against the podium as he snatched up the flagpole with the Union Jack. He pointed the Fleur-delis finial at the man’s back and began to charge.

"No!" I screamed, as my hands closed down on the only weapon I could find. I ran up behind that horrible man and just as the man in red began to turn around, I brought that big bible down on my attackers head as hard as I could.

He did not go down. He just got angry.

He turned, and impaled me on the flagpole instead. The bible dropped from my hands as the force of the blow drove me back up against the podium. "That’s it for you bitch!" He snarled. He smiled as he twisted the pole "Does it hurt?"

Suddenly the tall man in red was behind him. Gripping his shoulder with one hand he reached around my attackers head with his other arm and pulled. There was a sickening crack as the head was snapped around to face backwards.

"What are you?" my attacker asked.

The tall man smiled, placing the silver muzzle of his gun against my attackers head "You’ll just have to die disappointed." he said, then pulled the trigger.

letters from Hellsing III

I felt a gentle pressure on my leg. The Children! My head snapped up and I found my self staring once again to that little boy’s eyes. He had refused to leave me. When I had tried to hand him through the window to safety, he had screamed and struggled until I gave up and began passing other children through as he clung to my leg quiet and content. He reached out and touched my cheek brushing aside my tears and said "It’s going to be OK.".

I looked at the boy and then over at the little alter. "Trust me" a small quiet voice inside said.
At that instant, the fog in my mind cleared.

I looked back down at the boy and said. "That’s right. Everything is going to be OK!" to him. "Somehow." I said to myself. Taking the boy in one hand and dashing away tears of self pity (never again, I promised) with the other, I strode towards the small closet.

"Everyone come here!" I said in a cheerful voice. The remaining children gathered quietly around me as I kneeled down. "We set off the alarm when we broke that window so the police are on their way" I said. "They will come and save us from these, these..."

"Monsters?" suggested a little girl.

"Yes, monsters. Like in a bad dream. Now, all we have to do is hide from the monsters until the good guys come to save us. OK?"

Small, hopeful smiles and nods. A couple of squeaked "OK’s". They trusted me. Believed what I was telling them must be true. "Dear God. Please let me be right" I thought.

"Trust me." The small voice said.

I slapped my thighs "Alright, huddle up! Here’s the plan" I said gathering them into my arms as best I could. "I want you to go into that closet and close the door. You stay in there, quiet like little mice, until the good guys come to save us. Do not come out until either I or the good guys say the monsters are gone OK?"

"Come with us." said my little boy.

"No. My job is to stay out here and distract the monsters until the good guys come."

"How?"

Damn! "Um..."

"Trust me"

"The bible. I’ll show them the bible and that cross. Everyone knows monsters are scared of crosses because they belong to God and God can beat them up." ....What am I saying?... "So I’ll fight the monsters with this bible until the good guys come. It’s a big bible, it will protect me."... Your raving mad woman... "So come on now hurry, into the closet all of you so I can do my job."

"What’s our job?" Asked my boy.

I smiled at him. "Pray hard for the good guys to get here real soon." I said and closed the door.
I leaned against the door for a moment and glanced at the flag with the cross. "I am not going to let him die." I said "I am not going to let ANY of them die.".

"Trust me"

I ran over to the big podium and began pushing it towards the closet. There was a loud crack and the door to the greenroom was flung off its hinges. With a desperate heave, I shoved the podium against the closet door. I sprinted to the center of the room and cast about for a weapon.
The horrible man was standing in the doorway grinning at me. "There you are my dear. Sorry to have kept you waiting."

I backed up a couple of steps still looking for a weapon and almost tripped over a folding chair. My hand closed over it. Any port in a storm.

"Where are the little ones my dear? My friends are hungry."

I swung the chair up and waived it at him threateningly. His grin only broadened.

"Still some fight left in you? You know you can’t win. Just give up now and I promise to make it almost painless."

I could feel the fog trying to descend again. I did not trust myself to speak so instead I glared at him in what I hoped to be a very brave and defiant "Fuck you" manner. The fact that I was trembling uncontrollably probably did not help.

The man sighed with feigned sorrow and shook his head. "I guess my friends will have to work a little for their supper." Pointing to the closet door he said "Get the ones in there and pull them apart, slowly. Leave the woman alive. I want her to watch."

He flashed the most charming smile at me as the ghouls streamed past him into the room. "Come here my dear like a good little girl."

I felt a pull towards the door.

"Fuck you!" I screamed in my head again and forced myself to step sideways to block the ghouls' path to the door. I felt a strange power surge suddenly through me. I pulled my arms back and swung the chair as hard as I could across the head of the first ghoul.

He went down like a ton of bricks.

"Good girl" said the voice.

Arms tingling, I swung again hitting the body of the next ghoul. "THWACK!" I hit him so hard the chair bent and his body flew back with a force that knocked down two others of his kind.

"How am I doing this?" I thought. "I am not that strong."

That Strange power began to well up in me again. Flowing through every part of me, singing in my soul.

"Trust me"

"Ah!" Without even looking I reached out, grabbed another chair, and held it ready.

The man applauded. "Bravo! Very good! Very good! I like my food with a little fight but come now my dear, that’s enough. You could get injured and I don’t want to waste a drop of you. There is no one left who can save you. Drop the chair and come here now!"

There was no fog this time. I felt no compulsion to obey. I was still terribly afraid but I could feel this power flowing through me and I could hear that voice whispering 'trust me' and I did.

I locked eyes with the man, shook my head, and smiled.

He seemed puzzled and annoyed.

"Have it your way then. Kill her!" he growled and snapped his fingers. The ghouls who had stood swaying gently back and forth while the man spoke, turned as one and began to shuffle towards me en mass.

"This is it" I thought.

"Trust me"

"Thy will be done" I whispered. I took a deep breath and began swinging.

Letters from Hellsing II

I ran across the orchestra pit to the door and praying, turned the handle. It swung open revealing a large, low ceilinged room running underneath the length of the stage. Two or three doors were set along the back wall. Over one of the doors was a glowing plastic "Exit" sign. It was the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen.

I turned back to waive more people down the steps and looked right into the eyes of a ghoul. She was stumbling down the steps, eating what appeared to be an arm. She dropped it and began reaching towards me with a gurgling sound. I screamed and ran for the exit sign dragging children as I went.

"Hurry, Hurry! This way!" the young man called from somewhere up above. He was there ahead of me kicking at the back door and cursing. It had been chained shut.

"The window" I screamed to him. He stopped kicking and looked around. There, on the floor was one of those old flat irons. The kind you used to have to heat up on a stove. Just the thing to prop open a door to catch a breeze on a hot summer day. He picked it up and smashed it against the window in the door. The glass shattered and a blaring alarm went off.

I looked ruefully at the small opening. "Can you get through?" I asked the young man.

"I think so." he said.

"OK, you go first and I’ll hand them through to you."

"What about you?" he shouted over the alarm.

"I’ll come out last after the children."

We both knew this to be a lie as it was painfully obvious that there was no way I could ever fit through that window. But we also knew that there was no time to argue about it so he handed me the little girl (his youngest sister it turned out later) and squeezed through the window.
I began picking up children and passing them through to safety. I was just lifting the 3rd child through when the remaining kids began screaming. I looked behind me and saw several ghouls advancing towards us. They were moving slowly, but surely in our direction.

I managed to hand two more children through the window before my nerve broke. "Run!" I screamed shoving the children before me. I had seen that horrible man from the stage. He was smiling and waiving at us like we were some old friends he had just spotted across a crowded restaurant. Panicking, I wrenched open the nearest door and without even looking to see what was in there, began pushing the remaining children into the room. I glanced back down the hall. He still stood there smiling.

"I’ll be right with you my dear, just as soon as I finish my appetizer." He shouted above the alarm. His smile broadened as he held up a small child who was staring at him with enormous eyes. "Waive to the nice lady" he said raising the child’s limp hand and wiggling it back and forth.

"Won’t be a minute." he said. "You just wait for me there, that’s a good girl."

I bolted through the door, slammed it shut and leaned against it panting with fear. I could hear his laughter echoing through the wood. I thumbed the lock and grabbed a chair jamming it under the doorknob as I’d seen done in the movies. Like that would keep out a vampire.

I looked around. The children stood gravely silent, staring at me. We seemed to have run into the old Green room which the producer had converted into a makeshift chapel for "Fellowship Time" before the performances. There were several folding chairs lined up in front of a podium which had a large bible placed on top. To either side was a flag pole stuck in a heavy base. One flag was white with a golden cross wrapped in red flames. The other was a Union Jack. An old battered couch, a side table with a coffee maker and a few overstuffed chairs scattered about the room made up the rest of the furnishings. A door in the wall near the podium stood open. It led into a closet which contained a card table and a few more folding chairs. That was it.

The alarm cut off abruptly. I could hear shuffling footsteps in the hall and scrabbling sounds as the horrors outside attempted to open the door. There was nowhere to run. We were trapped.

We were going to die.

I gave up, collapsing sideways onto the nearest folding chair. I stared at the door. I was so tired. I had been praying in my mind for escape this whole time. Perhaps, I should begin praying for a quick and painless death instead.

So tired...

So easy to sit. Just sit quietly and accept my fate.

The thoughts rolled through my mind like a comforting fog. I closed my eyes. Why keep fighting? It won’t make a difference and it will just frighten the children that much more. Why should they die so afraid? The scrabbling sound grew louder as a comfortable apathy swathed my brain in a soft, calm gauze.

LETTERS FROM HELLSING

A friend of mine who lives in the UK found this journal in the wreckage of a burned out car he was towing. The contents disturbed him greatly and he was afraid, for reasons which will become apparent later, to publish this in England. He thought that as I, like her, worked for a public library and we seemed to be from the same state, I might be able to figure out who she was and whether or not the story she wrote was true. It's too large to post in one go so I will publish it in sections in hopes the author will come forward. I can only pray she is still alive to tell me who she is. 

I had decided to take the job to get away from the stress.

Ha!

It sounded perfect for me. The job was fun, the people were friendly and a free trip to Europe all expenses paid. It was a short term commitment and I had plenty of leave available at my old job. They even said I could bring my son. What could possibly go wrong?

Ha! (I know I said that already but it bears repeating)

So here I am, lying in a bed, in a basement, with semi-healed wounds, silver wires holding my internal organs together. Not even in a proper hospital. National health my foot. Ow! And you would think that I would get some sympathy for what I’ve been through, but no!

........ Perhaps it would help if I backed up a little to give you some context. I am a 40 year old divorced mother from the United States. Sounds glamorous so far doesn’t it? Wait, there’s more. I majored in History and Secondary Education in college, have an extensive background in customer service and collection and currently work for a public library.

"Stop! Stop!" you say. "I can’t take it all in. Wow! You are so cool!"
Yes, yes, I know. Stay with me it will get better, I promise.

After the divorce, I was in a rut. Ironically part of the reason for the divorce was to get out of the rut but I just seemed to find a new one and jumped right into it. I was going crazy. So when a friend, who had a job with this traveling Family Theater group, had an accident which made him unable to travel, I jumped at the chance to take his place for the final leg of the tour. I managed to get an extended leave from work and soon found myself on my way to Europe for 8 weeks.

Suddenly, I was stage manager, wardrobe mistress and unofficial prompter for a popular Christian family musical review participating in an "International, Interfaith, Cultural Exchange Series".

The producer was a big man on "family values". He also had a big family (6 kids) which he brought with him along with his wife, a cook, a nanny, 2 dogs and a hamster named skip. He agreed that my son and I could be folded into the "family" for 8 weeks so I could bring him along. 3 weeks into my stint with the company, we opened in London.

Everything was in its usual state of opening night affairs, a sort of controlled chaos right on the edge of panic. Business as usual and I was right in the thick of it. My son and some of the other kids had come down with a cold and so were "home" at the hotel with the nanny. It was quite crowded, the animated series being very popular in the UK, and we were wall to wall with sugared up children and exasperated parents.

We were about ½ through act II. I was in the auditorium helping the board man with his light queues when all hell broke loose.

It’s still like a dream.

It started with a scream from above and the body of one of the theater technicians crashing to the stage. There was a break in the taped music and for a brief moment, the theater was deathly quiet. Then, as one of the actors bent to the fallen man, the sound of harsh laughter boomed down from the catwalks. Bodies frozen with fear, our eyes swiveled upwards to the source of the chilling sound.

A figure leapt down from above and landed lightly on the stage next to the actor and the fallen man. He was huge, well over six feet tall and grossly obese. His arms were unnaturally long and his face was oddly bruised and puffy. He looked a bit like a grey orangutan.

He glanced around the theater with wild glowing eyes and smiled. "The show must go on." he said and snapped his fingers. The music blared out. Casually, he reached out with one hand to the actor next to him and ripped his throat open. The large man chuckled and tossed the actor's body to one side. As he reached for the next closest person, an actress who stood transfixed, paralyzed with fear a scream rang out from the back of the auditorium and the spell was broken.

The audience began to panic and stampede towards the doors. The big man laughed again as he pulled the now struggling actress towards him. "Don’t leave" he shouted "you’ll miss the best part!" He snapped his fingers again then embraced the actress tightly. She screamed and he laughed with delight. He began dancing her around the stage singing to the blaring, happy music.

Several of the audience members reached the exits just as the doors were flung open. The theater staff; ushers, manger, concession clerks, even the ticket taker were all standing there blocking the exits. There was something very, very, wrong with them.

Even from a distance I could see that they had gone a shade of greyish green and their eyes... their eyes were like empty sockets. Black shadows at the entrance to a cave. They reached out to the nearest audience members and began to claw at them.

The front of the crowed surged back against those behind them. The big man laughing, bent his head and gently kissed the actress then reached up, almost tenderly and ripped one of her ears off. He tossed the ear into the panicking crowed then twirled her around stage a few more times before ripping her other ear off. Her took her head in both hands, kissed her again then twisted her neck. He looked out into the audience and shouted "Everybody sing!" The dead eyed theater staff opened their mouths and began to emit a gurgling, moaning sound. The big man smiled broadly. "Everybody dance!" he said and tossed the lifeless woman into the audience.

The panicked crowed near the stage stampeded towards the exits. The staff, still moaning, began to move forward grabbing the audience members who were being shoved up against them and proceeded to claw, bite and rip open any person in their path. There was another brief pause in the music. In it I could hear a child screaming for his mother. He sounded just like my son.

I suddenly found myself able to breathe, to move. Terror crashing over me in waves, I dove into the crowed and fought my way towards the child. I am still not sure how I managed to reach the front of the theater. Most of the audience, those who were not already dead, seemed to be either cowering in their seats or stampeding back and forth between the vampire and his undead servants. (I of course, did not know at the time he was a vampire nor did I know that the theater staff ripping us apart were ghouls I was to gain this knowledge later. Not that it matters to those who did not survive, dead is dead...Well, not really). We were trapped, terrified. Anyone who tried to run on stage was bodily thrown back into the audience by the vampire. Anyone running for the exits was ripped apart by the "staff".

I found myself shoved up against the low wall surrounding the orchestra pit. I tried to step back but tripped over a small child who was huddled under a chair attempting to pull the folding seat down over him. He was struggling not to cry, his small body racked with silent sobs. He looked up at me with terrified eyes which begged me to remove him from this nightmare. I numbly realized that soon he would probably be dead. We all would be dead.

I was shoved once again against the orchestra pit wall. I looked down into the darkness. There was what appeared to be a body lying broken across some overturned chairs and music stands but other than that it seemed to be empty. Dully I thought, how lucky for the orchestra that this production used canned music. Then I remembered visiting my mother at the Kennedy Center. She had worked there as an usher and on occasion would get us "comp" tickets to various productions. Before the show, we would often go down to the staff cantina to eat and once or twice, when a few of the theaters were "black" we were given a behind the scenes tour from one of the senior staff members. My favorite part of the tour was under the theater. It was a whole other world down there. Corridors, storage nooks, dressing rooms, little secret doors and passageways wandering around under the stages and lobbies leading everywhere including ... the orchestra pit!

Heart pounding, barely daring to hope, I crouched down to look under the stage apron. There, in the gloom, a door. If I could get us down quietly we might just be able to get backstage unseen. In the back of the theater was a loading dock. The big roll door would be shut tight but the stage entrance should still be unlocked as the actors and crew liked to sneak out for smokes between scenes.

But how to get to that door? It was a long drop and vaulting over the wall with a child under my arm would attract unwanted attention not to mention most likely leave one or both of us lying injured on the floor. I frantically looked around for a solution and suddenly realized I was surrounded by children. Parents were shoving their children behind them in a desperate effort to shield them from the slow relentless killers advancing on the crowd, sacrificing their lives to buy their children a few moments more.

I had to try to save them. I could not just grab one and leave the rest to die. Dammit! I could not just leave them to be slaughtered but how was I going to get all of those kids down there? I ground my teeth in anger and pounded my fist against the wall in frustration.

"Click"

???

Cautiously, I pushed against the wall. There was some give, then a "click". Holding my breath, I looked closer and saw two small hinges set in the wall. A small swing door was installed near the center aisle. Trembling, I reached my arm over the wall and fumbled with the latch. It swung inward into the darkness. Above it was a detachable rail, below, black painted steps leading down into the pit. I exhaled and smiled, then stopped. "Not out of this yet" I cautioned myself. I searched around for assistance. My eyes fell on a youth, he could not have been more than 12 or 13, who was shielding a young girl from the crush of the panicked but dwindling crowd.

I grabbed his shoulder to get his attention. "I think I found a way out!" I shouted. "Grab as many kids as you can and start sending them this way!" He stared at the pit and shook his head, his eyes wide with fear.

"Were going to die" he said quietly.

I squeezed his shoulder hard and locked gazes with him. "I’m not ready to die yet and neither is she." I said pointing to the girl in his arms. He looked down at her then his head snapped back up to me. He immediately began grabbing children and shoving them towards me. I reached below the seat to the small boy I had first seen. He jerked away. "It’s OK" I said "It’s going to be OK." He reached out to me. He looked so much like my son that my heart skipped a beat this could so easily be my child. I, at least had the comfort of knowing my child was safe and alive. This boy's parents, if they were still alive, had no such luxury. I took him into my arms and made a silent promise to God and his parents. "I won’t let him die. No matter what I have to do I won’t this child die!" Then quickly and quietly began leading the children down into the darkness.

Meeze, toys and giants

I started off with Meeze because I liked the word (say it with me now "Meeze") but it was filled with avatars which, like all animatronics, totally creep me out. You see there was this incident many years ago on the It's a Small World ride at Disney land and ... well... These avatars were especially bad as they just kept jumping around all over the place. Too scary for my poor scarred Psyche so I moved on.

I really liked FDtoys very easy to use so I "Warholed" Walter (the sexist man in anime) . Pretty cool.

I eventually ended up in Glass Giant which has very easy to use image makers. ......

And fun projects such as how to build a siege engine.

and links for fun things. Such as how to build a siege engine.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/lostempires/trebuchet/

Very useful. I love educational television.

Then I moved on to Library Thing and Rollyo

Nothing more fun than making learning more Ike work. Perhaps it's just me but really, come on. I tried to make it fun by listing my collection of books that were borrowed from the library and returned many decades late but even that seemed too much like working to me.

Now there is a similar site I really like called bookcrossing.

http://bookcrossing.com/

It is a collection of free range books that people register then "release" into the wild. It is fun to see where your book has been and where it goes after you set it free. I have been specializing in refurbishing old battered books. Sort of a wild book rescue & rehabilitation center. So don't scream when you see something dusty crawling out of the dumpster, singing show tunes, behind your local library. It's probably just me.

As for Rollyo. Love the name (sounds like candy), love the concept, found it boring.

http://www.rollyo.com/

Here is the link if you want to try it out. Really, it's not that bad I just found it well, boring.

Not much of an endorsement but hey, it is, what it is.

Week 4 bloglines news feeder

I had fun looking at all the news feeds available. It was different than I expected. I guess I thought I would see more feeds like Reuters AP and BBC but as it is a blog to create blogs I should not have been so surprised to see so many, well, blogs. I wish I could have just directly linked the news feeds to my current blog from the blog line. I will go back and work on that some more after the 23 things assignment is over. Worth looking at though. A lot of specialty blogs out there. A lot of weird stuff too.

Week 3 tech thought:
It is all moving very fast. First you finally let go of your Betamax (let us not even discuss the laser disc) because everything, everything is VHS . Then, you have to get a DVD player if you want to watch any movies because they have stopped releasing them on VHS but you keep the VCR because you might want to tape something on TV. Something educational of course off of PBS. But times grind forward and just as you begin to consider a recordable DVD or Tivo (you know, for that special on sharks on PBS for the kids, certainly not to record America's got Talent" or anything so mundane ) along comes Blue ray which seems to me to be just a glorified DVD putting on airs.
f that change threw you off for awhile you are lucky because now, forget the Betae, forget the VHS, the DVD, the RDVD, the Tivo and the Blue ray that is all old hat stone age technology that is. No, you don't want all that old stuff. What you want is downloadable media. ...
I guess they figure I have spent enough on hardware and it's time for me to buy software because I don't have the right programs on my PC. Then you find out that you 2 year old computer is really pretty out of date and don't you want a nice power book with Wifi instead? Of course, if you really want to enjoy this download properly, what you really need is a new home entertainment center with wireless surround sound and a touch screen remote with security camera options so you can see what Xbox video game the kids are watching while you tape that PBS special on sharks ... at least I think it was sharks ... I was distracted by the credit card and electrical bills and think I might have passed out for a moment.