Beowulf vs The Internet
I've been without internet since sometime Tuesday/Wednesday night--it's probably been less than 48 hours, but I think that's been the longest 48 hours I've experienced in a while. I was actually forced to leave my room and deal with the family. (It was horrible.) The old wireless router died, and I, stupidly, thought I could hook up the new one. There were a total of four directions and I thought, "hey I can read and follow directions. This won't be too bad." Lies. I followed all four directions, I unplugged the internet, unplugged the old router, plugged the internet thing into the new router, plugged the new router in, and I followed the CD setup directions. All the blue lights lit up on the new router. My computer said I was hooked up to the internet. I opened Firefox. And nothing happened. Alright, that's fine, new router means it'll run a little slower at first. Still nothing happened. I wasn't even getting the message that the webpages I requested weren't available. So I restarted my computer (a computer guru once told me a lot of things could be fixed if I restarted the computer). Now my computer wasn't even lying to me about having internet access. So I went and checked the family computer--all blue lights are go. So I check my computer again. Nothing. I troubleshoot. I try everything I can think of. And then I go through the whole process again. For two hours. It has now become personal. The fight with the router is reaching epic proportions. Beowulf fighting Grendel looks like lyrical poetry compared to this epic battle. Still nothing. It's late and my parents have decided I need to give up for the night. Fine. So I mull over possible solutions to try after class. Class ends (woohoo Spring Break!) I try. Nothing. Now my mom decides I'm just missing a step and she decides she's going to fix it. WARNING: my mom knows less about computers than I do. Nothing. (HAH! I'm not stupid! You think The Big Bang Theory is a cute little show and only get half the jokes; you don't get to be the one who fixes the internet! Not that I'm competitive or anything.) So we leave it for the night. This morning we finally do the sensible thing and pay someone who is self-dubbed "the geek" to do it for us. Beowulf would not have stood for this. Beowulf would not have paid someone to fight Grendel for him. Can now feel internet mocking me. On the other hand, I at least have internet capable of mocking me.