There is nothing I would like more than to be able to completely recapture all the technological angst of the last five days. But honestly so much time and Valium have passed since then, I’m not sure I can remember all the details. However, I will do my best.
(You know this isn’t going to be brief.)
Last Friday started off like any normal day, except Caroline is in this new phase where she wants to bring her lunch to school and I had to start off my morning heating up Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup in the microwave (gag) while she repeatedly reminded me “DON’T FORGET TO CUT OUT THE BOX TOP! I NEED THE BOX TOP!” because we are in the midst of a box top obsession since the class with the most box tops gets a free pizza party. At this point I would just buy them a pizza if it meant I could get all the labels back on my canned goods and not waste any more time opening up Cream of Mushroom when what I wanted was Chicken and Stars.
Anyway, I spent most of the day at home since the temperatures were only in the twenties and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to don my white Michelin Man coat which is the only coat I own that is warm enough for that kind of weather because PMS + looking like a giant marshmallow = Insecurity. But I finally got a little stir crazy around noon and decided to venture to Hobby Lobby to look at some fabric Holly suggested for pillows.
While I was waiting in line at Hobby Lobby (I had to buy 1/2 yard of fabric to have enough to tell if it was going to work because the lady cut a sample for me that was smaller than my thumbnail) I checked Twitter and saw that someone tweeted that she couldn’t access my blog. And I thought, BLESS HER HEART something is wrong with that poor girl’s computer because my blog is working fine.
I was on my way to pick up Caroline from Brownies when Sophie called me and asked if I knew my blog was down. And, also, that it said ACCOUNT SUSPENDED DUE TO BILLING ISSUES. Like it wasn’t bad enough that the internet had unceremoniously dumped me, it was also trying to shame me.
I didn’t even know the internet and I were having problems.
Apparently the internet was afraid of confrontation and just decided to SHUT DOWN the blog instead of talking to me and explaining where it all went wrong. It was all very reminiscent of a break up I had in college, except that it didn’t end with me eating a one pound bag of M&M’s while I sang along with Sinead O’Connor as she sang “Nothing Compares 2 U”.
Although I did put a sizable dent in P’s inventory of Peppermint Bark.
Anyway, the short version of the technological side of things (as best I understand it) is that the flux capacitor got overloaded and caused the server to crash. Then the people in charge of my old server decided that I needed a different server. So I called the new people to find out about getting on a new server and they wanted to ask me questions about my bandwidth usage and the circumference of the moon and if Venus is in retrograde. And I don’t know any of those things because I went to high school back when we learned how to write DOS code and then majored in Speech Communications which isn’t really even a real thing because it’s just about talking. I majored in talking and made it through my FIVE YEARS of undergraduate work without ever having to turn on a computer, although I totally rocked at the Brother word processor. So don’t ask me about bandwidth and EPP codes because I DON’T KNOW.
By the time Monday morning rolled around, my frustration was at an all-time high. Then to make matters worse, I realized the new hosting company had attempted to send me several emails to update me on the situation and my personal email had blocked them all causing further delays. So now the internet had broken up with me, shamed me and is now just MOCKING me. Hateful.
On Monday afternoon I got off the phone with my new friend Larry from tech support and he’d just informed me that I may have to blah, blah, blah and that it might be another 72 hours to FIVE DAYS before things got up and running again. P walked in the kitchen and I started to cry. Like real tears. Because after three days, I’d reached my limit of not understanding one word that anyone was trying to say to me. I said, “It’s not even about the blog being broken. I’m just tired of dealing with it all.”
All of a sudden I heard Caroline say “OH MAMA, IS THE BLOG BROKEN?” as she started to cry. And poor P just stared at both of us and probably never wished more that he was sitting in a tripod somewhere, covered in doe urine and waiting for a buck to walk out.
The good news is that everything ultimately worked out okay. According to the tech support experts, the blog may still need to propagate for about twenty-four hours, but let’s not even pretend that I understand what that means. Basically, the internet and I have reunited and, if I may quote Peaches ‘N Herb, it feels so good.
And thanks for all the emails and the twitters and the emails to Sophie about my whereabouts. It made me feel a little warm and fuzzy to know that I was missed. I promise I will never just up and leave without telling you where I’m going because that would be rude. Do you hear me, internet? RUDE.
Also, if you’re ever trying to access this site and there seems to be a problem and you wonder if it’s you or if it’s me?
Always put your money on me.