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Arrested Developments
Aug. 28th, 2006 08:45 pmDon't panic; that's metaphoric, at least for me. It's mainly been our broadband connection that's been under arrest around here the past few days. The daily annoying occurrence of the Under-the-Desk Light Show turned into nearly an hourly occurrence- sometimes more, and the modem was taking, if anything, even more of its sweet time to reset after each one of its little senior moments.
Frustrated as all getout, I disconnected the thing after returning here from court today and took it back to the TIME WET WARNER PAINT ADELPHIA CABLE retail location and asked for advice. No problem, the nice lady said. We'll just switch it out with this brand-spankin-new modem.
And for the second time in three months, an identical replacement part (my printer-fax being the last one) proved utterly frustrating to my computer once I set forth in my plugging-and-playing. Four hours later- after working through most of the positions in the Kama Sutra in the course of unentangling wires, process-of-eliminating various ethernet/USBs/power cords/installation CDs, and worst of all having to dive under my desk every time I reset the modem- we seem to have achieved contact with the mother ship. Oh, and the modem is on top of my desk now- replacing the inbasket I'd planned to move anyway since Biggsy's been taking a bit too much of a liking to it ifyaknowhaImean ::ewwwwwww::
At least now when it resets, the new one is much faster. Only trouble is, when it DOES go out, about a third of the time the rest of the assembly line appears to be going along with the program but the browser still refuses to browse. If this keeps up much more, I'm going to start taking my hate out on Verizon and dump the whole Time Warner menu for DSL/DirecTV.
----
On the other hand, "arrest" was anything but a metaphor for a remarkable writer I discovered last week. And sad to say, if it hadn't been for a Friend (or perhaps it was one once removed) linking to this series of blog entries about her misadventures, I might never have discovered just how remarkable.
In the same week that JonBenet Ramsey's (apparently not) killer flew home from Thailand treated to business-class excess, this woman was pulled over, arrested, mugshotted and put in the Georgia version of the Alabama Slammer for,.... NOT HAVING CHANGED HER NAME ON HER SOCIAL SECURITY CARD AFTER SHE GOT MARRIED.
The charge, as you'll see, was pure fabrication, for unlike about half the female clients I escort to court hearings with their cards in hand, this law-abiding citizen actually did fill out the proper freakin' forms for DMV, which, being DMV, completely managed to lose all trace of the transaction.
Supposedly this was all done to deter terrorism. I'm sorry, Joshilyn, but while I am terrified at something in this situation, it sure as hell ain't you.
I am glad, however, that it led me to your work. In less than 36 hours, gods in Alabama lay devoured on the back of the sofa, in need of a good cleaning from the number of spit-takes it brought on. It is an utterly surprising yet completely at-home experience of (mostly) two people and (mostly) one's family, who were nothing like, and yet completely like, my own nutfarm of dysfunctional blood relatives. Anyone who does not run to the nearest bookshop for a copy is nuttier than Lena's family, and that, trust me, takes doing.
There's also a second novel, which may take some locating in these parts, but I am definitely with the program.
And there's a blog, which has been on the sidebar ever since I got the lady's kind permission to put it there, and which I would also recommend as a source of daily takes on life.
Frustrated as all getout, I disconnected the thing after returning here from court today and took it back to the TIME WET WARNER PAINT ADELPHIA CABLE retail location and asked for advice. No problem, the nice lady said. We'll just switch it out with this brand-spankin-new modem.
And for the second time in three months, an identical replacement part (my printer-fax being the last one) proved utterly frustrating to my computer once I set forth in my plugging-and-playing. Four hours later- after working through most of the positions in the Kama Sutra in the course of unentangling wires, process-of-eliminating various ethernet/USBs/power cords/installation CDs, and worst of all having to dive under my desk every time I reset the modem- we seem to have achieved contact with the mother ship. Oh, and the modem is on top of my desk now- replacing the inbasket I'd planned to move anyway since Biggsy's been taking a bit too much of a liking to it ifyaknowhaImean ::ewwwwwww::
At least now when it resets, the new one is much faster. Only trouble is, when it DOES go out, about a third of the time the rest of the assembly line appears to be going along with the program but the browser still refuses to browse. If this keeps up much more, I'm going to start taking my hate out on Verizon and dump the whole Time Warner menu for DSL/DirecTV.
----
On the other hand, "arrest" was anything but a metaphor for a remarkable writer I discovered last week. And sad to say, if it hadn't been for a Friend (or perhaps it was one once removed) linking to this series of blog entries about her misadventures, I might never have discovered just how remarkable.
In the same week that JonBenet Ramsey's (apparently not) killer flew home from Thailand treated to business-class excess, this woman was pulled over, arrested, mugshotted and put in the Georgia version of the Alabama Slammer for,.... NOT HAVING CHANGED HER NAME ON HER SOCIAL SECURITY CARD AFTER SHE GOT MARRIED.
The charge, as you'll see, was pure fabrication, for unlike about half the female clients I escort to court hearings with their cards in hand, this law-abiding citizen actually did fill out the proper freakin' forms for DMV, which, being DMV, completely managed to lose all trace of the transaction.
Supposedly this was all done to deter terrorism. I'm sorry, Joshilyn, but while I am terrified at something in this situation, it sure as hell ain't you.
I am glad, however, that it led me to your work. In less than 36 hours, gods in Alabama lay devoured on the back of the sofa, in need of a good cleaning from the number of spit-takes it brought on. It is an utterly surprising yet completely at-home experience of (mostly) two people and (mostly) one's family, who were nothing like, and yet completely like, my own nutfarm of dysfunctional blood relatives. Anyone who does not run to the nearest bookshop for a copy is nuttier than Lena's family, and that, trust me, takes doing.
There's also a second novel, which may take some locating in these parts, but I am definitely with the program.
And there's a blog, which has been on the sidebar ever since I got the lady's kind permission to put it there, and which I would also recommend as a source of daily takes on life.