Ship's Blog: January, 2008

Two days ago, our house phone stopped working: no dial tone, no nothing. That meant that Kathy's DSL was down, too. Predictably, I was expecting a call from a doctor and she had lots of work to do, but we were out of luck.

So, I immediately used another phone to call the AT&T repair line, which, you'll be happy to learn, is automated for my convenience. Those AT&T guys are always thinking of me. Knowing that it would slow me down to actually talk to someone about the problem, they removed the option from their menus. All I could do was schedule someone to come out and fix the line...in four days.

Four days without our main phone is a big problem. Four days without DSL is a crisis. Not to mention, we actually use that phone as an intercom all the time, which meant that we had to get up and walk into another room to talk to each other. Gasp! Well, not really...we figured out our cell phones would work for that. I mean, there's no need to get all crazy-like.

I changed our outgoing message to say something snide about AT&T and tell people how to reach us. But I kept picking up the phone and trying to dial out anyway, because I am as trainable as a lab mouse.

This morning, I went upstairs to make myself some breakfast (appropriately clad in blue-green pajamas with accompanying wild hair) when I saw someone in an orange vest walking uphill in the rain, with some purpose to his step. Oooh, was he coming to our house? Or maybe a neighbor's house?  Read more »

I have been a bit behind on things of late. Like, writing in my blog, cooking food that humans are intended to eat, and...doing laundry.

The last issue led to an absolutely panicked moment this morning (okay, well, perhaps it was a half hour before noon) as I upended the last bits of clean laundry from my laundry basket onto the bed and began desperately sorting through the clothes to find a clean pair of underwear. I had already opened both drawers in the dresser to find them empty, so you can imagine how my heart was pounding as my hands skittered through the pile of clean-but-too-wrinkled-to-wear shirts and pants, finding plenty of socks but no underpants.

I tried not to get dizzy. I mean, omigod, what if I actually had no clean underwear?!? Do you know what this would mean? Even if I stayed at home all day and no one saw me, everyone would know, psychically, that I am the worst human being EVER! WITH NO CLEAN UNDERWEAR!

Frankly, the thought of me, Alix North of the Many Pairs of Underwear, running out-yes me, who bought those many packages in the soul-shriveling trip to the Store That Shall Remain Nameless-is sobering. Just think of how much laundry I must have stacked up. Like, maybe enough so that I can't vacuum the rug in the bedroom because of it!  Read more »