Three Layer Cake

  THE WI-FI JUNKEES

On the evening of June 23^rd, without warning, the little green light on our router, the one that indicates an internet connection, turned red.  The next day we discovered that our Internet Service Provider had chosen that moment to start the upgrade of our connection from 4MB to 7MB.  I requested the upgrade in January. 

We called to ask how long it would be, twice I called, twice my husband called.  We were given four different answers, varying from 24 hours to five days.  Intrigued by the different answers, I called again, and was told seven to nine days.  I called again and was told ten days.  I called again and was told 15 days.  I called again and was told thirty days.  And again, 20 days.  And again, definitely by the 4^th of July.  And definitely by the 11^th of July.  Well.  I’m writing this offline on 12 July.  A Saturday. 

Over the course of the past seven months, my husband has developed a serious addiction to Flickr, and I developed one to Facebook Scrabulous,  so I knew that not having internet for an indefinite period would create serious problems.  But trying to see the glass as half full, I told myself that maybe it would be a good thing. 

It wasn’t.  I had allowed myself to be optimistic because I didn't think the outage would last more than a few days.  But around 26 June, the shaking and sweating occurred.  How long is this going to take?  And why the hell can’t anyone tell us what’s going on?  my husband asked.  His usual day time hook up was behind the garbage dumpsters around the corner from his work, where there happens to be a 100% signal.  Don’t ask why.  From work, I have a firewall and can’t check email unless I go into someone else’s office. 

So that night, the 26^th, we decided maybe we should take the baby computer out to find an unlocked wifi connection.  And so we did.  Like Anton Chigurh looking for the transponder and his million dollars in No Country For Old Men, we put our electronic divining rod in the car and started cruising the streets of our small town around 10PM that evening.  I drove, he kept the child-sized Asus eee pc in his lap, repeatedly hitting refresh in hopes of finding a connection.  D-Link Wireless 30%, 45%, 52%, 60%, 67%, 78% stop stop stop stop.  Damn it.  It’s back at 30%.  I told you to stop!!!  Back up!!!  45%, 52%, 60%, 78%, 82%.  STOP.  I stopped.  Right in the middle of the street.  Get out of the street.  I tried.  We lost the connection.  Had to do a u-turn, and found it again.  For the next four days, we crept to that spot, right outside someone’s perimeter wall, and took turns snatching the computer out of each other’s hands when we thought the other had used it long enough, and until the battery ran out.  The thought of creeping up along the wall at night back and forth back and forth until the strength of the signal was right was laughable.  What must these people think?  A stake out?  Thieves?  Dunno.  Don’t care. 

And when that signal no longer produced the quality connection we needed, we moved on up the road, toward town.  We found a connection on the main drag.  90%.  WOW.  We must’ve been parked right under their window, in the only space where a car could physically stop on that busy street where parking is prohibited.  That lasted two nights. 

And we decided then we needed to go where the housing density was greater.  More opportunity, less conspicuous.  Because, after all, this is a small town where everyone stops and stares.  By then, my husband got the idea of bringing a beer with him to drink while he navigated, to re-create his little home internet connection.  And on this particular night, he got the brilliant idea of pouring it into one of his favorite beer glasses, and tasked me to drive.  Stop jerking the car, you’re going to make me spill the beer.  Maybe you should have left the beer at home.  Maybe you should mind your own business, STOP.  Abrupt halt.  In the middle of the parking lot.  In the middle of a turn.  DAMN IT, I spilled some beer, why did you stop so abruptly?  I told you you’d make me spill beer.  What are you, dumb?  No, I think you are, really.  I can’t believe that I am sitting here in the middle of a parking lot listening to you whine about spilling beer FROM YOUR GLASS.  Who the hell rides around drinking beer out of a glass?  You know what?  NO, YOU KNOW WHAT?  You can drive.  I got out of the car, leaving my flip flops on the driver side (I’d been driving barefoot) and got in the passenger side.  Why are you barefoot?  Why do you care?  (End of discussion.)  He started the car and tried to turn with the glass in his hand, and ran into the curb.  Huge sigh and eye rolling.  From both of us. 

The next night we found 95%, which with continuous refresh moved up to 100%, in the public parking lot, between the town library and the town theatre.  It was a perfect location, right under a street lamp, no worrying about someone coming with a shotgun to get us, no perils of cars smashing into us, nothing.  It was paradise.  And while he alternated between sipping his beer from the bottle and handing it to me to hold for him, I sat.  And shook, as I always do, when I have to sit idle for long periods of time.  My knees moving up and down, singing along out loud to Mariah Carey’s E=MC² until he looked over and asked if I had any idea how much the dispersion of air was every time I moved one of those thighs.  And without expression, I stuck my arm out the window, the arm holding the beer, turned my wrist and poured it out into the parking lot.  YOU JUST POURED OUT MY BEER!!!!!  Mmmm hmmm.  You said my thighs are fat.  (They are).  But, there was still like a third of a bottle left!!  That’s the worst thing you can do to a beer drinker, pour out his last bit!!!  No, there wasn’t that much left and just be glad I don’t beat you over the head with the empty bottle.  (For the record, we were laughing.  Well, he was, and I was cutting my eyes at him, but inside I was cracking up, happy I'd found an excuse to get rid of that beer!) 

The next night, he didn’t ask me to hold his beer for him.  And we couldn’t connect to the mother lode.  We couldn’t find any of our other veins, they’d all dried up.  And we went home without getting our fix.  Me thinking that we’d hit rock bottom.  Not being able to go a day without the internet.  I checked in with our ISP the next day.  They said it would be up on Thursday, 17 July.  And it was, at about 6 times slower than before they upgraded.