Over the last couple of days I’ve been trying to get resettled as part of my annual winter migration and one thing that really occurred to me again is just how dependent I’ve become of my Internet Connection. In short I didn’t have any Internet access yesterday as I was waiting for my cable connection to be hooked up again.

I don’t have phone service any longer either so I can’t even use a modem. I tried briefly yesterday to use my cell phone, but for some reason that didn’t work here (although it did when I tried it last week in Hood River). Even the neighborhood open router connections didn’t pan out <bg>…

Long story short I got back yesterday afternoon and I just got turned on about an hour ago. 24 hours no – IP connection. I feel completely disconnected… It’s kinda scary really. I don’t really consider myself overly connected and as always having to be online and knowing the second an email arrives etc. but it’s amazing how much I’ve come to depend on an Internet Connection for work or even just everyday life.

I have a bunch of work I need to be doing so I figured, no big deal, but it’s amazing for how much of what I do even supposedly ‘offline’ requires some sort of internet access. So much so that after a few hours yesterday I just decided to call it a day and let it be <g>… So maybe an alternate activity. Go see a movie, but wait – ack - ah, no movie listings. Scratch that… Apparently a phone call is too much work and too social – talking to somebody? No way!

The Internet is the ultimate addiction. If there should be some sort of disaster that wipes out IP technology, that’ll bring everything to a halt. What’s amazing is how quickly this all pervasiveness has happened. 10 years ago we were just starting to take advantage of the Internet and IP technology in earnest – before that it was there but so small scale that it didn’t really matter much. Now – you’d drive people to suicide if you take away they’re cable modem…