Can You Hear Me Now? Iz Anybody Out There!

I don’t think anyone is gonna hear me or see what I’ve written this morning.   We have no Internet.

 This time the outage has lasted for more than a few seconds as is customary on rare occasions when the Internet gods have changed servers or tinkered with something,  causing a temporary interruption of service.

I thought this morning was one of those times until I’d tried opening both my Outlook mail and our web server Mozilla Firefox off and on for more than five minutes.

With no luck, I went outside to see if something was wrong with the dish.  The half dozen or so drops of rain certainly would not shut down service. 

After all, our service has continued remarkably this past winter and spring through record amounts of snow, sleet, hail, wind and rain.

I turned off my computer.   I unplugged the cord.  I checked the connections.  Everything seemed to be just fine.

During that time, I took breaks to lead the horses to pasture---earlier than usual, which made them happy----and to read the newspaper.  I flipped on the TV to see if there were any streaming headlines telling of a  major satellite failure somewhere.

At this point, I still have no clue as to what the problem is. 

The break from my usual morning routine has pushed me into some different patterns and has aroused my curiosity as to what life would be like if my Internet were never coming back.

Somewhat work-related concerns for today would include the story I sent to the Appaloosa Journal and a speech I wrote this week.  A few days ago, the Journal editor said she’d get back to me soon after giving the story a quick skim.  If it’s today and I have no Internet, a problem could arise.

I asked Jeralyn (who’s presenting the speech) to send it back to me after she’d added her two cents.  The speech is about Woman of Wisdom Myrt Burnett, and her family would like printed copies to take home with them after Saturday’s gala. 

Hope the Internet returns so I can take care of that request.

Of the unprofessional nature, I will be missing a lot of my morning news from emails, from Facebook, from other blogs I read, from Twitter and the general news headlines. 

Almost every morning after “playing Internet” with my first cup of coffee, I come downstairs with something of significance to report to Bill, who’s still eating his breakfast.

Today I came downstairs with one big headline:  No Internet.

If this were to go on for very long, life would change dramatically for me.  I’d have to go back to using the telephone for my journalistic work.  I’d have to find some other morning wake-up activity to go along with that first cup of coffee.

Throughout the day, rather than those quick checks at the computer,  I’d have to flip on the TV set several times, to keep my nose for news satisfied. 

And, with the few times I do flip on the TV during the day to see what’s hot in the news, the commercials are usually on. 

As an aside:  does anyone else out there ever find that you could pick virtually any moment of the day to turn on the tube, only to find commercials rather than the programming. 

It’s almost like the TV gods know you’re coming, so they yell, “Hurry up . . . start up those commercials cuz this viewer stays on only long enough to lace up her shoes.”

Yup, that’s how much time I usually spend watching TV during the day.  When I change from my barn boots to my lace-up tennis shoes or maybe while chomping on a piece of cheese for lunch, I’ll flip on one of the news channels, only to be greeted by commercials.  And, they always last much longer than my lacing or chomping.

Well, it’s now 7:03 on this Thursday morning.  I have called the local satellite company and left a message about our outage.  Maybe somebody comes to work at 7 a.m., and maybe they can flip a switch and turn us back on to the outside world.

Maybe I’ll have to wait until 8 a.m. for that to happen.  I’m thinking if the Internet has come this far after this many years of operation, and it goes off when someone’s asleep at the wheel, we’ve got a problem. 

I like my Internet.  I’ll admit to being an obsessed “instant gratification news junkie.” 

And I certainly don’t want to go back to the dark ages when morning wake-up time included KSPT radio station announcers stumbling through the local news, which back in those days included obituaries where “entertainment” of the deceased would occur at Pinecrest Cemetery. 

Postscript:  This blog posting  will appear on “Slight Detour” when and if  the Internet ever returns to the Lovestead.  And when that happens, you’ll know I’m back to being a happy computer camper.  Also, maybe I’ll know why we were cut off from the World and its Wide Web for so darned long.

Joel, my Internet technology wizard and owner of Laser Image/Sandpoint Satellite,  told me to pull this cord or pull that cord, let'em sit for ten minutes, then plug 'em back in AND wait for the satellite to beam itself.  As you can see, it worked.  Back online and happy.