I am definitely a techno-geek. If it’s smaller, faster, cooler, cuter, I’m interested. I’ve been a card carrying member of the iPod nation since Apple first gave birth to the little white wonder. (Now mine is even littler, and a very cute shade of pink. In this case, cute trumps smaller. Nano’s are adorable, but where are the colors, man?) What? Me, superficial and shallow?

Possibly.

And then the mother of all cool inventions came along, especially for us square-eyes. (My mother’s term for my sisters and I when she thought we were watching too much television. She told us it would make our eyes square like the tv screen.) Hmm…I wonder if they make really cute square glasses to match? Anyway, TiVo was born and all was right in the land. So, okay, I don’t actually have TiVo, I have TiFaux, which means I own the cool DVR unit that my satellite dish company so lovingly gave me as my free sign up gift. They are forever on my Christmas card list for that one. Oh – and satellite dishes. Ahhh. Another square-eyed gift from the space gods. Really, it’s all just an embarrassment of riches when you think about how spoiled we are. I like spoiled. Life is hard. We all deserve a little spoiling, right? I just choose to take mine in the form of techno hardware instead of Manolos and Mischkas.

So, naturally, when DSL was finally introduced into my town, I had to have it. Finally, no more dial up. Finally, no more dedicated phone line. So we had the Verizon gods install it. And life was good. A year has passed, and that second dedicated phone line was now a waste of money that could be spent downloading more music from iTunes (or something equally earth shatteringly important.) But, of course, I’d had the DSL installed on that second, now useless line. Our main number, the one listed with schools, friends, family, and every other person we’ve given it out to in the past ten years…the number I wanted to keep, was DSL free.

So the Verizon gods informed me I had to merely open a new account with the main number, and once the DSL was installed and running (cheaper and faster, too – why did I wait so long?) then they’d simply disconnect service to the other line. How hard could that be? Last Friday was D Day. Or DSL Day anyway. And all went smoothly. Shocking, I know. But true.

And life, once again, was good. And cheaper. So even better.

Then yesterday afternoon at about 4 pm, they disconnected my old phone line and cut off the old DSL service. And nothing has worked right since. We’d already disconnected the line inside the house, took down the DSL modem, all of it. So why this could have any affect, we don’t know, and neither did the DSL God, Greg, who was charming, but eventually no help whatsoever, despite the fact that we spent a very long two and a half hours in each others company and his wife is getting one of my books as a surprise present. He eventually surmised it was my router. My brand new, $150 router that has given me zero problems until 4 pm yesterday when they pulled the plug on my old DSL account. Funny, that was just a coincidence. So I talked to Gupta, the Linksys goddess, for another hour, and she decided they should just send me a new router. I’m still convinced that little piece of hardware works just fine, but Goddess Gupta had done all she could do.

So, here I sit, willing slave to technology that I am, in a bookstore, bumming WiFi service (ah yes, wireless…we haven’t even talked about that little slice of forever connected heaven…spoiled indeed) so I can dutifully submit my blog…and get my email. And, okay, a hot chocolate grande with whipped cream and sprinkles. Hey, it’s cold outside. And I had to drive. My commute is usually down the hall and my mode of transportation is bunny slippers. (No, not technologically advanced at all, but sometimes throwbacks can’t be beat.) And they get great gas mileage.

I have no idea how long I will be internet impaired. Or how many grande hot chocolates are in my immediate future. And yet, though I’m frustrated by technology spitting in my eye, when I’ve been nothing but an adoring acolyte, I patiently wait for my router replacement and sit in bookstore café’s. Because, in the end, it’s still better than dial up.

Yes. I have been assimilated.

Happy Hump Day everyone!

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