Monitor fade to black

This week I have done A LOT! Sold my old faithful 1982 Chevy caprice classic, and a few other items on Craig's list. Yeah for Craig's list! Then when I was fixin to list some more items my 10 year old computer monitor faded to black and burned, well almost, it started crackelin, popin and smellin like burnin plastic! I was throwin things out of the way to get to the surge protector to get it unplugged and turned off before it burst into flames! It must have been a funny site.
My computer has been a good one! I had her built in 1999 by Compaq. This model was not released to the public until Sept 2000. I had her built so she could be upgraded many times before I had to get another whole computer. Since that time she had been upgraded 3-4 times. My friend from church Travis helped fix it twice or 3 times when it got sick and needed repair. Then when it needed and up grade or 3 he did those for me, too. He does great work but moved back out west for graduate school when he finished college here. I found them (Travis, April and their brood) on Facebook a few months back. I was happy to see how well they were doing, even though we miss them at church here.
Thankfully this new monitor is compatible with my trusty computer. And the graphics card was large enough to handle, so far, this wonderful 19 inch flat HD wide screen monitor. MAN does this look good. Better than my old monitor even when it was new. Course this one is a wide screen and a 19 inch vs a 17 inch. And the space this one doesn't take up vs how MUCH space the other on did! I am very very pleased with this new one. Gratefully we had sold the car so we could get this really nice one. It is so much brighter and clearer than I imagine the old one was. Even lookin at the old one was a strain. Unfortunately the old speakers don't work so I'll have to get some of the plug into the surge protector kind. The old speakers were powered by the monitor and this new one is not designed that way. I don't like a silent computer. They make me nervous. I like one that makes sounds and I programed mine to make all kinds of conversational noise with me with all sorts of different types of sounds. Not just those Microsoft goofy sounds. For example, I have Radar from the old MASH TV show tell me when I have emails by saying Mail Call! It's fun.
It sorta was an emergency to get a monitor right now since I still have items listed on Craig's list. And on Freecycle, too. By the way, if you want to keep items out of the landfill, Freecycle is definitely the way to go. It gives you a place to share what you have and don't want and get other peoples trash for your treasure. FREE!
I was 'green' long before that was the word for it and way before it was cool to be that way. Back then we that did as I have always done were called weird and strange and sometimes hippy, cheap, old fashioned and a lot more, Now it is just cool.
More about that later. Right now, I gotta go list the old monitor on Freecycle , speakers and all.
See ya'll on the Internet!