3-Day Weekend

This morning wasn’t the usual Monday routine ….. not because Trainer took a day off — he never takes a day off, not even holidays, but because I had to stay home, once again wait for the cable company’s technician.

It wasn’t the TV this time, and it wasn’t something idiotic on my part … like when I’d not realized the cable box was turned off. This time it was the internet network.

On Saturday, we’d experienced two back-to-back complete power outages in the area. The outages didn’t last long as coverage was restored within 15 minutes each time, but I surmise the outages screwed up my network because, everything seemed fine that evening, but when I tried to log-into the laptop on Sunday, the message was "cannot connect" to the network.

No amount of rebooting the network from my end, or the cable provider sending a reprovision signal from their end, cured what ailed the network so, when given an 11:00 - 12:00 time for a technician, interfering with my 11 am workout time, it wasn’t even a difficult decision. Much as I like and need my workouts, I like and need the internet even more.

I might as well have worked out and then returned to wait for the technician, because he didn’t show up until close to 2:00 pm.

From there it was showing me how to do all the things logic had already prompted me do to get the network restarted and, just as when I previously ran through all those avenues, they didn’t work ……… the laptop continued to display "no connection" to the network.

Technician then pronounced the problem was not the network. That because my phone still connected to the network, the problem had to be the laptop, and he couldn’t help me because the laptop was not in his wheelhouse.

I disagreed.

I’m no expert but, being a logical thinker, I’d considered that possibility and had checked the other two laptops.

Yes, I have three laptops.

Why?

Because I’m lazy, don’t want to move laptops from room to room. So, instead, I have one on the coffee table for when I’m lounging on the couch, one in the bedroom for browsing the internet and Tik Toking when in bed, and one on the work table in the main area, attached to the printer.

So, anyway, when technician tried to blow me off/end the visit because the network was "working fine", I pointed out his conclusion wasn’t logical because it wasn’t just this laptop I was unable to connect to, but the other two as well.

"It has to be a network problem. Maybe I should disconnect altogether from the network, set it up again, but I don't know how to do that", said I.

He looked nonplussed. Didn't shrug his shoulders like oh well, but might as well have.

So assuming he just didn't want to be bothered I said perhaps the solution is to switch from his company’s internet to an internet provider that’s offered me $30 off.

Guess he didn’t want me to call the company and discontinue service because the network was in my estimation broken, with him being the technician on the call. So, without further ado, he gave me a different network. Went down to his truck, came back with a new router and all.

Surprise surprise, internet connection restored.

He looked shitfaced when it turned out it was as I’d surmised ……… the power outages had fried the network.

He also looked exhausted, because it had taken him over an hour to set up the new network.

So, anyway, I’m back up and running.

I’ve since learned, from the resident I refer to as Big Friendly Guy, that the outages fried his roomba.

While waiting for the technician, the Baker called to say the Community Room has reopened, but she and the other organizers would no longer be hosting bingo (insert happy dance here).

Reasons being she herself is ill and Red Light is moving.

The Baker said she’d been experiencing pain and tests show she has cirrhosis of the liver ………… non-alcoholic cirrohosis, because she doesn’t drink, has never touched alcohol.

I suggested it might be the result of certain medications. "That’s what my daughter thinks" said she.

As for Red Light, she wasn’t joking about getting out of here. She’s found a place (don't yet know where) and will be out by April.

It’s looking like Not Dead Nancy may also be gone, but no one know the meaning of "gone" with her ....... if she’s gone for good, like crossed over the rainbow bridge, or living with a relative or placed in a facility or temporarily gone/hospitalized and will return.

Her next-door neighbor tells me Nancy had an issue with one of her legs that caused her to be hospitalized, and that her daughters are now removing items from Nancy’s unit. Neighbor says she’s not sure if Nancy knows the daughters, who never visited or cared for Nancy when she needed help, are taking things out of the unit.

That has happened before. Shortly after I moved in, we had a resident who’d been hospitalized, returned to find her family had jumped the gun — cleared out her unit, thinking she’d not make it back from the hospital.

Unless Nancy returns, we may never find out what’s actually happened to her. She'll be another unsolved mystery, like what's happened to Greedy Grabby's husband who has not been seen for almost two years.