No More

My blogging days are over…Last Friday morning, AT&T screwed up our phone and Internet, before I could publish the weekly recipe and thought post. Thinking it would just be late, and service would be restored by evening, I wasn’t too concerned. However, it was not a moderate screw up – it was a major screw up – and Danny and I, as well as our elderly neighbors, found ourselves back in the dark ages without wireless communication.

Although we were on cell phones to AT&T all day Saturday and were assured rehooking would be in the next few hours, that never happened. The next day was Sunday, then holiday Monday. So the four of us did not see any AT&T technician until Tuesday evening. Even then, the linesman told us he had only an order for the neighbors and not us. Despite the fact that our original order for UVerse was what started all the mess and despite the fact that Danny’s business depends on the Internet, the truth was that all of our calls appeared to have been in vain due to some paperwork mixup. AT&T’s plethora of offices and wiring stations do not communicate with each other in any way. It’s too big to be efficient.

Obviously, the phone representatives you talk to are in different parts of the country, if they are in this country at all. So how would they know that we were actually out of range for UVerse? Since we moved from our total UVerse house a couple miles away to this out-of-range UVerse house in 2010, we have been told to keep checking back with them for the faster service. So I did, every six months.

Then on May 20th, a nice AT&T representative in Kansas told me that we were definitely within range at this time. So the wheels were set in motion, an order was placed for the change, and in a few days we would have faster Internet again. But on Friday, the linesman who came out was mystified by our entire exterior wiring; it was old, disrepaired, and completely unsuitable for phone/Internet combo. Plus, at 13,000-feet distance, we were NOT within the 10,000-feet maximum range for UVerse.

However, somebody at the station house flipped a switch and disconnected our regular connection and could not, would not reconnect it because he had left for the long weekend. Our soaked, empathetic linesman was out in the rain talking with his manager and supervisor to no avail until 8:00 p.m. We did not know until the next day that our neighbors were without phone and Internet, as well.

Those four days without the WWW was a real pisser. We could not access our Roku and Netflix viewing either and there was absolutely nothing on regular television. I worked on genealogy…(the phone is ringing…)

(It’s hours later now. The phone call summoned me – like the one at 1:00 a.m. this morning from my dad – for help. I needed to pick up my son and granddaughters and drive them home, while his wife Amy continued on to San Antonio. They were on their way back from Austin, where a vet had diagnosed their older dog Jackson with diabetes and cataracts. The animal hospital in  San Antonio would be better suited to deal with those issues and whatever else they found...This is my life. This is why I cannot continue blogging/posting. It is too frustrating. always starting and stopping or being unable to start.)

Our days off the Internet also solidified how much we automatically depend on it for news, information, and communication. But worse than not being able to find what movies were playing or to clarify an interesting radio article, was when on Tuesday morning, Amy’s father had a massive stroke in Houston, and I could not send out a comprehensive email to friends and family to get prayer lines going…

I’m afraid that blogging can no longer be one of my priorities. Thanks to everyone who has supported me on WordPress over the past two years. Best wishes!