I has Internet! (I would insert an image of a LOL-cat standing on a keyboard, but I am not allowed to save pictures onto this computer. Use your wonderful imaginations.) While I don't have the ability to save images on this computer to use when I blog here, it turns out that I can bring a post, with images and links, on a flash (thumb) drive and load it onto my computer-du-jour. Sweet!
Until I can afford my own connection again, I can use a computer at our local library, which I didn't know about last week. (Our state taxes at work, for useful purposes.) There are 12 computers available; I'm on #12 today. All the others are occupied and busy-busy.
We are a motley bunch, we library-loggers. Housewives, students, grandmothers older than I am, street people: even some guy in a great-looking business suit is here, typing away for all he's worth. I have a feeling there might be some sort of parental controls on the network (sorry, teen-playing-hooky-from-school - no porn for you today!), but otherwise I think the policy is to surf to your heart's content.
The young man across from me is muttering out loud (I don't think he realizes just how loud he is) about not finding what he wants to get his paper (probably due today) completed. A pretty red-haired girl to his left is trying to find something up the farthest reaches of her right nostril - oh, good, she found it. I can see that using the library computers is going to be a great opportunity to study people. All for the one-dollar price of a library card!
When I had access, I took it for granted, didn't log onto the 'Net every day. I also didn't realize how dependent I have become on having access at my fingertips (no pun, yada-yada), or how much of my daily life is tied up with accessing the Internet.
Since I no longer have a telephone, I use the Internet to contact my daughter, not the most efficient or timely method of communicating. I could use the office phone, but the practice is frowned upon, especially by The Weasel. Also, that limits my phone time to the days and office hours that I work. And to the few moments each day that I'm not actually working at my job. Still, one is grateful for what one has available, you know?
Five years ago, I swore up and down that I'd never -- NEVER! -- use the Internet for bill-paying, or shopping, or banking; anything involving my financial information that could be hacked into by some kid with nothing to do but see how far he could get with the hacking skills he just learned in school. I haven't been able to check my bank balance for over a week. (Don't know why I bother checking, though - there's nothing in the account but fond memories.)
Another reason I developed a serious Internet-withdrawal jones in the last few days is that I like to know what's going on with all of you out there. Oddly enough (or perhaps not so oddly for me), I have more of a connection with all of the people whose blogs I follow than with any of my neighbors. (The Butcher-from-Pittsburgh's dog and I have developed a rapport, of sorts, because we both like to howl at full moons, given the opportunity, but that's about as involved with his owners as I care to become.)
FLASH! This just in! The nostril-miner has donned a set of headphones and is singing (WAY off key) while bopping side to side, as if she were alone in the Universe. The Holy Smoker sitting next to me and across from the Miner has cleared her throat three times so far, each clearing progressively louder, trying to get Miner's attention in order to give her the stink-eye. (Is it kosher to yell across the table, "Shut the phucque up!"? No, probably not. That's okay, though, you know, 'cause she's providing unbelievable fodder for a character I'll kill off in the potboiler I'm going to write - someday. Writer's revenge is the sweetest of all.)
Okay, so I can't stay in here all night, surfing and posting whenever the mood (or jones) strikes me, and I can't sit here in my jammies or my all-together, and I can't bring food or drink to the table (probably ought not do that at home, either, muses she who has gone through three 'boards in the last four years), and I have to share. ("Does not play well with others," my kindergarten report read, "and doesn't share her toys. Also, little Martha runs with scissors, despite several warnings of the dangers involved.") The up side, however, is that I don't have to use my dwindling resources on Internet access.
But you can be darned sure that the first thing I purchase when things improve is my own communications network with at least fifteen satellites strategically orbiting the globe so that I'll never--As God is my witness!--be without Internet access again! (Shades of Miz Scarlet.)
(Edited, at work, on 3-28-2012. Hope it reads better now.)
8 comments:
Taking the bus on the internet freeway. Saves driving!
Ok, now I'm missing the T in Boston, so entertaining.
Actually wondered if you could get on at your library, but I figured you would know.
Oh I'm so glad you found the library computers and only wish I'd mentioned them to you myself. Then again, I had no way of knowing just how close you might be to one but they are an excellent resource when it comes down to making a choice between groceries and cable service.
It sounds as though the other patrons will provide you with a lot of material for stories (and potboilers) when you feel like writing them. Today's group sounds like an excellent setup for an Agatha Christie yarn. Who murdered the miner? Was someone driven mad by her version of a meaningful love song? btw: Are there still love songs? (I gave up listening to popular western music two decades ago and have never missed it.)
I hope the weather where you are is warming up. Then there won't be any reason for you to freeze in your jammies next time there's a full moon. I rather like the idea of seeing you and the BfP's dog sitting next to one another enjoying the night sky.
It is a pleasure to see you and your words again.
This post made me giggle, Martha. Well done. The computer bank at our library is ALWAYS full and busy with people. We also offer free Wifi to those who have laptops. Some people like to do that because we have the "no downloads" rule here too on the library's computers. They bring their own computer, but we provide the free internet. It's all good (well, except for having to deal with people like the "miner" in your post!). :-)
Funny stuff . . . so maybe there is an advantage to having no internet. Always looking for the silver lining.
I ran a proper, printed community magazine, Belmont Voice, for three years then dropped it when my retirement started to resemble the professional lifeI had retired from (ie, recurrent deadlines, pressure from advertisers). Instead I did a community website. But not everyone's got a computer, people whined (which tells you this was some time back) so I scattered instructions telling folk they could use the library's on-liners to send me comment. In fact, they couldn't. The Hereford Library Service took a rigorous view; info traffic was strictly one way. Your set up sounds much more civilised. Perhaps it's all down to Guthrie - a more likeable chap than Carnegie.
You realise there's going to be a side-effect to all this neighbour inspection. Greater eyeball flexibility. Swinging them left and then right if you're to continue your omniscience and escape being run out of town on a rail - which always seemed a cumbersome way of making one's feelings known.
Welcome back. Interesting when something normally kept private becomes a public activity, a bit like that scene in 'The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie' where they're all sitting round the table on toilets like a dinner party (then the little girl says she's hungry and the mother hushes her and takes her off to a small private room to eat).
It probably wouldn't do a lot of us any harm to have to organise our internet use differently and to have to think about it a bit more. I think about families with multiple devices and complicated subscriptions and who knows what, and how much it must all cost.
Hello, all, from Computer #4. Let's see if I can actuall post a response this time. First disappeared unexpectedly - must have hit the wrong button, or my one hour is almost up and the blank screen was my 2-second warning.
Z: My daughter refreshed my memory that my grandson (sitting two computers to my left, as I type) had told me they were available, but that knowledge had slipped my mind.
Susan: there are still love songs, just not the type we grew up listening to, unfortunately.
(Librarian just informed me she needs my computer, so I have to log off before answering the rest of the comments. Please know that I appreciate your kind thoughts. I'll try to answer the next time I can log on. Only once a day, for an hour, unless there is no need for them from other visitors. So long for today.)
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