Back on the internet again after two and a half days. In some ways it was a rather refreshing break and made me realize how much I rely on it. It all started during high winds at night. Being in the mountains means we rely on a rather roundabout internet connection. So when a tree across the canyon fell on a power pole in the night, it affected the relay that sends the signal to us. Fortunately our power did not go out and the weather is cool and wet enough that it couldn’t start a fire.

Looking to the next ridge for our internet signal

Later that day the power company tried to fix the line but needed a new big pole. The only way to get one to this rather remote location was by helicopter. The road in has so many curves that a truck hauling a long pole can not get there. In the afternoon I saw a huge helicopter across the canyon circle a few times, head for the side of the mountain and then swiftly leave. I did not know at the time what it was doing. I did not find out until later that it had gone in to drop the pole. Our estimated time for getting things back online was 5 p.m.

But the helicopter could not drop the pole at the exact location where it was needed. The power company had to figure out some way to transport it there. I am not sure how they did it, but the new time estimate was 11 p.m.

Dawn came and we turned on our computers. Still no connection. I called, Loren, our internet provider, again. He was once again out troubleshooting the problem. He purchases the signal for those of us in some of these rather remote mountainous areas from Comcast. It is then relayed to locations that have a direct line of sight to send the signal on to us. In this case the location was one he had secured from a homeowner who lived on the opposite ridge. The homeowner, who has solar power as well as a land line, was on vacation out of the country. For some reason when the power was restored, the solar power and the landline had not synced properly and no power was getting through to the internet transmitter.

Myth #1: One bad night drscoinc.com levitra prescription equals a problem. There seems to be a television commercial about purchasing cialis online it every two minutes. It is quite common for patients to inject insulin to maintain normal value through their bodies, especially if one takes the necessary precautions and safety measures. viagra pills from canada Considering the remedy of this specific disease, cialis viagra for women is medically proved to be an effective anti-ED capsule. Fortunately Loren had a regular door key to access the area where the transmitter is and managed to get things straightened out by evening. But we still could not bring up an internet signal so went to bed incommunicado for another night.

In the morning I contacted him again. He checked everything on his end and it seemed to be working, but he could not get a signal from our antenna. He decided he needed to come up to trouble shoot the problem.

It was a beautiful sunny day as he sat outside by our antenna checking the signal. The good news was that all seemed to be working there. So he came in to see where the problem might be on our end. In the past he has instructed me to unplug the router, wait twenty seconds, and plug it back in to let it recycle. I had done that several times during the past two days. Aha! I was the problem! I had plugged one of the cables into the wrong socket. (I thought yellow should go into yellow and blue into blue–but no!) When it was plugged in correctly, I could access the internet on my computer!

But here was the puzzle. My husband could not on his computer. More troubleshooting was called for. This one turned out to be easy. There are two cables in the router that connect each of our two computers to the internet. When he had fixed my mistake by plugging in the cables correctly,  Loren had failed to push the other cable completely into its socket. As soon as it clicked in, everything clicked in. And here I am at last able to tell you my tale.

The simple life of letters mailed with postage stamps and phone calls on party lines has passed into history. But I will take it in stride. Oh, and did I mention? Our internet provider (Loren at Hilltop Internet) lives just up the next hill over and has a vineyard and winery as well. And, most important of all, answers his own phone whenever I need to call him.