Showing posts with label DSL. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DSL. Show all posts

Saturday, April 28, 2007

Plan "B" From Outer Space... And Other Observations!

"Plans get you into things, but you have to work your way out."

-Will Rogers

It's a plan "B" life, a plan "B" life... for me! Yes, I can sing about it. LOL. I am learning not to sweat the petty stuff, but to rather pet the sweaty stuff... and so on and so forth. LOL. Yesterday, Friday, was supposed to be Elvis's big day... I will get to the reason as to why we will be celebrating it today, instead, in a little bit... just read on. :) See... I am smiling, and yes I am aware of my over use of the under appreciated punctuation... ellipsis. See, I used it just then, to indicate a brief pause, which you will understand as you read on...

The Girl From The Wrong Side Of The Street...

It all started when I called AT and T/Yahoo, to order my new service of DSL, which they had assured me by snail mail, that I was more than qualified for. Tee Hee. Okay, so I called the nice representative, her name was Marge I think, and she took all my information, and explained every plan available to mankind even some plans that AT and T doesn't offer. :) Smirk. Anyway, the very last bit of information that Marge needed, was my existing phone number. "Ooooops," said Marge, "Ms. Gordon, it seems that we cannot provide you with the exceptional service of AT and T, together with Yahoo DSL at this time." "What?" Asked the shocked consumer. "Why not?" "Because, unfortunately, at this time, it is not available to customers in your area."

"Ummmm... yes it is," I said. "I have seen my good neighbor Midge, enjoying your excellent service, Marge." "Where does she live, Ms. Gordon?" UT-OH! Had I just got my good neighbor Midge in trouble for stealing DSL? Panic! "She lives across the street, and down the way. Why?" "That's the sticky-wicket Ms. Gordon, she is on the right side of the street." "No, I think she is on the left side of the street if you are coming up the hill." I informed her. "ROFLHAO, actually ma'am I meant, we only offer DSL on the side of the street that Midge lives on." "HUH?!" It was all so surreal. Madge was telling me, I couldn't order DSL, because the line doesn't cross the street. I repeat... "HUH!?" "I am sorry Ms. Gordon, how else may I provide you with excellent service?" Long pause on my end of the call...

"Ms. Gordon... ma'am? Hello? "Yes Madge, I am still here... you have a nice day!" CLICK! I know, it wasn't Madge's fault, but really now... I was living on the wrong side of the street? How earthy of me. ;) With my nerves completely fried, I took a nice long nap, and decided to check other ISP companies later in the day. As of this morning, I am a proud Earthlink customer, with DSL coming in about 8-10 days. Yeah, I know, although it comes with everything I need to install the gadgets all by myself, I am already preparing for the inevitable plan "B" that is sure to follow. :)

And Then The Next Day...

Thursday, Alan woke me a little before 9:00 AM, so I could tune-in to see Regis Philbin return to his show, after having been gone for 6 weeks, while he recovered from a Triple-Bypass. I like that show. It touches on topics, but it isn't all stressful about things. You know? Just a little talk show. Nice. It's a pleasant show to eat your breakfast to, although lately I have really gotten into downloading the Rocky & Bullwinkle show from AOL Video. Tee Hee.

I love the thought of a squirrel and moose making friends, solving crimes, and otherwise assisting humanity. :) It's deep. LOL. But on occasion I do also watch Live with Regis and Kelly. So it was good to see him back up and running. Afterwards, Alan and I watched The View, debated a little, and then he talked me into keeping my word about going on our date to the Marina Green, to fly our kite. My Fibromyalgia was telling me to, "go back to bed," but it was a warm day, really clear, and a good bit of wind, so the conditions were just right. So, I got up, it took me a couple hours to get dressed, man I was tired, but my spirits were high, so off we went, across the bay to San Francisco.

We decided to head to Golden Gate Park first. It would be nice and windy there, and I could drop by the gardens and look for life. I found lots of life, see above. The California poppies were in lovely full bloom, and dancing about them, were some enormous bumble bees. Happy bees. I had a blast stalking them. It was kind of fun to realize my fear of them is completely gone. :) I was hurting really bad, so I had to sit down a couple times to work through the pain, but I got back up, and waited patiently, until I got the picture I had in my mind, a bumble bee in flight. :) I did pretty good I think. :) With the photo achieved, it was time to go down to the beach to fly the kite, there's always wind at the beach!

Okay, well, we realized that it was a little too windy to be able to photograph the kite flying. I didn't want to get sand in my digital camera... I like my camera, so the beach was out. What to do? Where to go? "I know... Crissy Field would do!" Silly me, I had forgotten that there is a large wind break at Crissy Field, in the form of rather tall eucalyptus trees. Sigh."Well, shall we try the Marina Green?" Said Alan. "Yes, why didn't we just go there to begin with?" I asked him. "Well, when you said "lets try the beach," I thought you had moved on to a Plan "B." LOL.

Poor Alan, he has gotten so used to life throwing us curves, he just rolls along, and loves me while we go. :) As it turned out, it was a fabulous day to fly a kite, and he did all the work getting it into the air. We laughed, and we made others laugh. He had no idea what kind of kite I had purchased last winter. I let it be a surprise. (Insert evil laugh here). Tune into my blog next Wednesday, to see our kite. Alan is currently looking for a kite of his own, he say the one I chose is just too, "out there!" LOL.

There Are Other Things On My Mind, But...

I had some other topics I wanted to talk a little about, but this entry went a little longer than I had planned, so I decided to just let it flow. :) I am glad I did, it was a little bit of levity, and I needed that because we had to postpone Elvis's 10th birthday party, from yesterday, until later today, and it made me a little sad.We had a bit of drama last evening, when we went to put his balloons and streamers into place. Alan noticed that sitting up under the table umbrella, was a rather large wasp nest! YIKES! It took a while to deal with that.

Sigh. We had everything wrapped, and the balloons ready, and we even got a Lemon Supreme pie, then had to cancel everything. It is the first time since 2001, that we haven't celebrated his birthday on time. In 2001, we were just moving in to our current little place, and everything was just crazy... including me. :( It will be a special party tomorrow, we will make it special. Cross your fingers that the balloons survive overnight. Plan "B" has been activated yet again! If nothing else, this week has given me a chance to pause here and there, choose and unplanned path. There must be a message in there somewhere. :) Why even this entry is a plan "B." It seems Blogger doesn't recognize the very important, yet under appreciated punctuation character that is known as the **Ampersand**. LOL. I had to take two stabs at saving this entry. :) The adventure continues! Check back tomorrow, Sunday, to see Elvis's birthday party photos! :)

-OndineMonet
"Happy Bumble"
Golden Gate Park
San Francisco, California
April 26th, 2007
Afternoon

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

18 Cat Years

"Procrastination gives you something to look forward to."

-Unknown

It's been a year and a half, since Black Tuesday over on AOL. At that time I was ready for a change, in both blogging places, and ISP's. Sigh. I hate change, so I have dragged my feet, hemmed, hawed, fretted, and otherwise found every excuse in the world to do nothing at all. See, I hate change, lol, bet you didn't know that about me. It's so strange, and such a contradiction, because there are so many things I would like to see change. Lots of stuff in the world, issues much more important than who is my current Internet Service Provider, and so I spend my time considering and pondering what would happen if those other changes took place, rather than how much better off I would be without AOL. Finally, the time to stop fighting the inevitable has come. In a little over a week, I will be making the big switch to Yahoo, with a lovely little DSL connection.

What made me finally come to terms with leaving AOL? Well, it was my latest bout of Fibromyalgia. I have been experiencing one of my worst times since being diagnosed 18 months ago. I am just so tired, and so very achy, that it is painful to sit here and type this, but before you ask why I am here typing and not taking care of myself, consider the healthy trade-off. I feel good emotionally. I am in a good mood, despite feeling like the walking dead. I feel happy that I am making the switch, and being proactive. It's a simple matter of listening to my body, I don't have the energy to sit and wait for AOL to load a page for me, sometimes taking up to 10 minutes, because all their ads don't play nicely with my dial-up connection. It puts me in a bad mood, and makes me tense, which in turn, exacerbates all the other symptoms I have. I need to do what my doctor said, and do what I advise others to do, which is to simplify life a bit.

I have been a complete schmuck for paying $25.00 and some change, over the last 18 months, for services which don't really work for me. I am usually smarter than that. Oh well, rather than continue to beat myself up over not making the switch sooner, because of my dislike of change, I am going to do what Sarah says to do when I have to endure something unpleasant... look for the lesson... and be happy in my new found smartness. Sometimes, it takes a lot for me to write an entry on Ellipsis. Tonight, for example, my hands are hurting pretty bad, and are swollen. I am tired, not sleepy, tired, which is a completely different thing from sleepy. I have little pin point aches from head to foot, and I can't get enough sleep. I go to say one thing, and something completely different comes out of my mouth, and not in a cute, interesting way like... say if ... David Duchovny were in the room. :)

But OK, I feel smarter. :) That's a good feeling, so I am going to celebrate. I have a new magazine, and a big bottle of bubble bath waiting for me in the bathroom. Chocolate/Strawberry scented bubble bath. YUM. I love bubble baths. Ahhhh. All in all, life is going pretty well. I am going to try to go kite flying tomorrow afternoon, Alan thinks the sunshine will be good for me. LOL. We'll see about that one! :) And soon, I will be able to snazzy up Ellipsis with some YouTube videos, I think that will be fun.

No, not videos of me in my bubble bath, naughty people! LOL. No something much more interesting then that! I have always wanted to upload a video of Elvis, you won't believe how much cuter he is in video. He has a neat little meow, and can be quite talkative. Maybe I will make a video of one of our nightly rituals, like the one where he forgets he already has food in his bowl, and I have to walk him into his closet to show him he has crunchies. I have to warn you up front, he can say a bad word/meow from time to time. I don't know where he picks up that kind of language from. LOL. Those entries might have to be rated PG-13!

Stay Tuned :)

-OndineMonet
"Ghost Party"
Carson City, Nevada
October 28th, 2006
Late Morning