Barmy Blue's Bland Blog

So. Another week of silence from me. Not unusual but not entirely my choice.
For some reason, and I still don’t know why, my internet broke (for lack of a better word) in the early hours of Tuesday morning. I didn’t do anything out of the ordinary save for one or two things. On the Monday my internet security advised me to download a patch (from what I understand, patches are usually something important) and if I didn’t choose to do it then, it would do it later on anyway. So I did. The day went on as normal. I saw a new bird in the garden and looked it up on the RSPB website. I couldn’t decide between two similar tits (If you make any remark on how that sounds then I have no respect for you) and a warbler. So I played a sample of the birdsongs and, based on that I’m pretty sure it’s a warbler. Which is lovely but kind of a shame because both breeds of tit are in decline. The first time I saw it the name warbler flashed into my mind, even though I’ve never seen one that I was aware of before, so I’m pleased about that. It has a nice song.
The only other out of the ordinary thing was that one email account wanted to update its’ security information by having backup email confirmed.
And everything went on as normal. Nothing to raise suspicion. Then quite some hours later. At the time I had two tabs with Youtube videos that I’d been binge watching and decided to take a break to play a little solitaire. Suddenly The red light of death.
This isn’t unusual. Sometimes it goes then comes back a little later. Sometimes it comes back if I go to bed and leave it be. Napoleon told me how to reset it at Christmas. So last time I did that and it worked. So I tried it again this time. Nothing. I went to bed, worrying but hopeful, like I always do.
I got up. Still the red light of death. I got depressed. First day of being unplugged. First day of Hell. It’s only when your internet is broken that you realise just how much of what you do relies on it. Also I am currently addicted to comedic Youtube videos. So I wondered if I’d used up or somehow burnt out my connection.
I’m not entirely tech savvy but I’m more savvy than mum, less than Napoleon. I hoped it would be fixed soon. Maybe some scheduled maintenance, a fault somewhere? And technicians were working on it.
Wednesday. I’ve had it. I eventually call Napoleon. He’s been off work lately because he has sciatica in his leg. Ironically mum had the same thing at her last job because there was a lot of standing. I don’t know what I expected. There are many reasons you could have the red light of death. All the other lights were green. Just the internet light was red. He told me to call my provider. That’s a bit tricky.
I was with one provider, from the beginning. But because they’re only focusing on fibrotic now they transferred me to another supplier to maintain my old connection. Apparently fibrotic isn’t available in my area anyway. But I couldn’t remember when this change was due to occur. I thought we were told about it this year. But actually it turns out we got the letter last year.
Mum had to go through all her old post (it’s in her name because I was like fourteen at the time) to find the letter. We also dug out a bank statement. The new provider has been receiving our payment, so it’s not a problem with the switch over. The reason I didn’t pay attention to the letter originally was because it said not to worry and the company would handle the entire switch over process.
So now we knew who to call.
Just one problem. How to contact them.
I called Napoleon again and asked him if he could look up a helpline for the company. He did and gave us the number and we called. Because I was still using the router from my old provider they couldn’t do much. So sent me one of their own routers free of charge. They said 2-5 working days but I registered 5 in my mind. A WHOLE WEEK. I hoped two but was prepared for five. On the Friday morning I dreamt that the router had arrived and fixed the problem and the first thing I did was check my email to settle an argument with someone on this site. Because of course that’s the kind of context I come up with. Then I went up to my room and listened to as song which ended up being a combination of two songs I’d been listening to before I went to bed (to try and cheer myself up).
So, having woken up, I lay in bed for a while letting my ears drain (that’s just what I call it). I wear earplugs to sleep now. It’s very nice but I can’t hear if someone calls. And when I take them out my ears feel wet. So I lay down for a while so they can, I don’t know. Dry I guess. Otherwise I might get a little ear ache. I was about to get up when I heard a knock at the door. I leapt out of bed. Had to put on my dressing gown and bunny slippers (even though I wear two sets of pyjamas for now, one thin then one fleecy) no one wants to see pyjamas at the door. It was our post lady (our postman is a woman) with a box. Yay. Router.

So I set it all up, It’s basically the same as my last one so I’ve done it once before. Just for safety I used only the components it came with. But the Ethernet cable is too short, and so is my power cable. There’s no room on my desk. My pc is on the floor. It works but now the router’s in a slightly different place. This is good really. It’ll force me to clean my desk.
So. All plugged in. All lights working. But oh no. The red light of death again.
I feel a little bad. If my old router wasn’t a problem I feel sorry for it. It served me well since 2011 (I found the letter they sent with it). But it is what it is. And that’s not why I had to change routers so it is what it is.
We called them back up and now I discovered a problem. My old router had very clear information detailing the make and model. It was easy to see the relevant information. But this new one was tricky. There is no clear label for a model number and I’m not familiar with the make. Also because the cables are shorter I can only look at it upside down while it’s plugged in. So when the person on the phone was asking for a make and model number I was getting annoyed (not at them, at the situation. But I’m worried that I came across as rude? Unpleasant? I tried to be very polite because these people are only doing their jobs and trying to help so best not piss them off). But I had no idea what I was looking for then my phone cut out. Which I think was for the best because I was getting frustrated. Now the person said they’d call the landline if my phone cut out. Well it did ring for like a second and stopped. A problem with the line? Or was the person just sick of me? Well I shouldn’t say that. I’m sure it was just a glitch. So We took a moment to find the number. Oddly enough it’s clearer on the box than the actual router. The model number is a tiny thing in a corner with no indication that it’s the model number. How is an idiot like me supposed to know if you don’t clearly label it?
Originally I thought it might be on the box but I was in a hurry so I didn’t notice it.
I’m thinking of putting a little sticker on the back with the model number in nice big writing in case this happens again.

So we called up again. This time on the landline. We used my phone because I have I contract I never use and it’s paid automatically. But the landline would be an extra expense. If that makes sense.
So we went through a bunch of questions and do this do that. A few long silences. Where I felt the need to hum so the person wouldn’t have to ask if I was still there.
Then to do some other stuff we switched back to my mobile because they’d need to do stuff with the landline connection and being on the phone could mess it up.
It still couldn’t be fixed. So they referred it upstairs, so to speak, for a more intense technical thing and I’d receive text updates. Now I was worried. Was some poor person stuck there overnight trying to make it work? Or did they have someone run a program or something and monitor it doing all the fiddly things. As this was Friday evening, would they be working on it on Saturday and Sunday. Was I hijacking some employee’s weekend? Or does someone have to stay there for tech support 24/7 anyway?
Could I even do anything on my Pc?
I decided to play a game. After quite some time I was startled to see all green lights. Was it fixed? Could I go online now? No notification text. Do they only text at certain times because many people take their phones to bed (because they can’t live without them) and would be unhappy to be woken up by a text at 2am? Eventually I decided to go to bed but leave my router on. I turn it off a night. It advises not to so they can update it at night. Didn’t know that before. I hate leaving things turned on.
Why do people put their TVs on standby at night? Is it because they can’t be bothered to get up and turn them off? What does this do for their energy consumption? I am one of the laziest people you’ll ever meet. I always turn it off. It may just be residual distrust from the old days of TVs before remotes. Remember those? Imagine explaining that to a child now. In the olden days we had to get up to change TV channels and there were only five, if you were lucky. Most of the time Channel 5 didn’t work. I think it would blow their minds. I was born in 1988 but I think I sound a little older than I am. Our house had always been behind most others technology wise. If it works why change it? You know we’ve never owned a blender? Not sure why I got onto this topic. Back to my internet.

So. I went to bed hopeful but worried. I woke up. Let my ears dry again. There was a phone call. Guess what. My glasses are ready a week early. I can collect them on Monday. Yay.
Additionally. My internet works again. For now. I think it’ll be a day or two of distrust between us until I slip into complacency again.
Yay. Thank you internet people. I’ve been going slowly insane this past week so thank you very much for fixing it, also sorry if I started to sound a bit grumpy on the phone. I didn’t mean to.

And that’s it. I’ve been happy, sad, happy, sad all week. Oh I want to do this. Oh I forgot I can’t. What’s that thing? I’ll look it up. Crap I can’t. Ah I want to watch this. Oh I can’t. Ah. I forgot to mention quite how insane I started feeling. I actually came close to considering some foul play. Does a signal jammer work for internet? Can your connection be stolen by hackers? Is this a conspiracy? There’s a van that was parked in my street for 2-3 days which was from my original internet provider. I think the driver must live around here somewhere. And on Friday I saw another one at the end of the street and the people were doing something. Did this just affect me or the whole street? If the whole street then why? If not then why just me? Should I go and ask my neighbours if their internet worked? But that would be a bit weird. These thoughts have been very prevalent this week.
I’m still not writing the second part of my Christmas yet though.

Bluebiird out.