Nothing particularly novel here, but I wnated to install Apache, Gallery, and all of that to play with on my Windows XP desktop box. Well, it says it wants Service Pack 1. Great. While I'd installed security patches, I'd apparently never done the upgrade.

Off to Microsoft Windows Update we go! They list some 29 patches my machine absolutely must have, but we have to do "Service Pack 1 (Express)" first, all by itself. I'm posting this from my laptop as my fancy desktop machine is currently sitting there unresponsive to the world, despite only 10% of its CPU in use and no measurable network usage. Still, the bar graph indicates the install is making forward progress, albeit at a glacial pace. As far as I can tell, it's scanning my entire hard drive for heaven only knows what.

Microsoft technology. At your service.