Whose Time Is It Anyway?

I'll be blunt: I wish 100% of my time outside of 9-5 Monday through Friday were my own and my family's.

Before having a baby, I was kind of a live-to-work person. I thrived on working hard and being competitive at work. Now, I'm about 50-50 work-to-live/live-to-work. I am still driven to work hard, but I like to get everything done in 40 hours a week when possible to maximize my time with my daughter, and I have no need to prove my might to anyone at work anymore. I stress out when work demands that I take calls during the two hours a day I get to play with her. I groan at calls to my blackberry on the weekends.

I have tried to make my baby schedule clear to everyone I work with, but I can't expect my colleagues to memorize my schedule and sometimes I get sheepish calls on off-hours, or non-sheepish ones. Recently I had to choose between rocking my daughter to sleep and joining a conference call. I ended up doing both, and handling it superbly if I do say so myself. I still felt consumed with mama guilt and work guilt even though I was doing both things.

Sometimes I have to put my foot down and ignore a call or refuse a conference call invitation. The underlying message is: whose time is it anyway? The idea of "company time," being paid for a service you're delivering and the hours you put in, is obsolete. White collar jobs do not disappear when we go home at 5, 6, 7. We are Blackberried and emailed to the hilt, and it's up to us to determine what we can tolerate and what we're willing to risk to draw that line.

I came across a depressing little trend piece about the "workcation" where you basically go somewhere and work, maybe hit the pool for an hour and go out to dinner.

No. Absolutely not. This is not okay with me.

This whole work-life balance issue has been on my mind a lot lately since our own vacation is behind us. I am no psychologist, but I believe that the human body needs time to rest and recharge, and I'm not just talking about going to sleep. Humans need to retreat from the workaday world for a while, hang out with family, get lost in leisure, let someone else cover a client or a project. We can reciprocate with our fellow employees when it is their turn to get lost. A slogan for the 8-hour work week was 8 hours work, 8 hours rest, and 8 hours what we will. 8 hours what we will every day! Nice, right? In reality, it's likely something like 11-hours work, 6-hours rest, 2-hours stressing about work, 2-hours commuting, 3-hours what we will (preparing and cleaning up meals, and watching a Phils game, basically).

When I go on vacation, I like to disappear. It may not be possible for the project I'm currently assigned to, so I may need to take a few calls and do a little computer work, but I say a firm "no" to the idea of going to a beautiful destination and ignoring your family and the view. It's just not for me, and I don't think it's healthy or fair. Life is too short (and childhood too precious) to spend vacations with your mind (or your parents' minds) in constant contact with work.

And it's really hard to insist on that that these days with all the ways in which employers use advances in technology to creep in on our personal time and insist that we all be accessible 24/7, and at the same time laying people off and not creating any jobs. It's a risk. It may cost me my job, but I say "no." No to "workcations." Yes to claiming my own time, determining for myself how I spend it, and hanging out with my family on my own time.

The Anti-Resolutionista

I've decided to make a grand total of ZERO New Year's Resolutions this year.

This is not because I'm lazy. It's because I'm ready to settle into something normal. The past year I worked really hard to maintain at work, adjust to a new city, support my husband in his incredibly stressful job search, conceive, deliver and care for a child, and deal with a very challenging housing situation. The year before, we moved to a new city, suffered two miscarriages, and I lost 30 lbs. The year before that, I achieved and adjusted to a promotion at work and traveled to a foreign country. I'm feeling kind of tired. I think making resolutions this year would be somewhat of a false enterprise: I would make them, not really care about them, and feel like I had no credibility with myself.

Instead I will continue trying to do all the things I have wanted to do all along - be a good wife, mother, daughter and sister, take opportunities to help people in need, live healthfully, and leave the world a better place than I found it. I know that sounds cheesy and generic. I also know I don't really have a plan to do these things.

But instead of making myself miserable by "vowing to blog more" or "losing 40 lbs" or starting off determined that "this is the year I will ...." I am going to try to treat 2011 as a continuation of my 2010, 2009, 2008-and-further-back-goals.

I accomplished a mother lode of stuff in 2010. Our family accomplished a mother lode of stuff in 2010.

2011 will just be a year of striving, as gracefully and happily as I can, to live well.

A Girl and Her Racist Dog (Part 2)

I have posted before about our dog, who has a proclivity for lashing out at non-Caucasian males. And, as when I posted about this earlier, Mike3550 is out of town doing some professional thing, so I feel a need to submit my typical low-brow contribution to this blog with an update on this burning issue.

Well, we moved about six months ago, and our new neighborhood is diverse like our previous neighborhood, but in different ways. It is mostly white/black. As I posted before, our dog was really displaying aggression towards Latinos (really men mostly). We did not encounter too many black folks in our previous neighborhood while walking the dog.

In our new neighborhood, she has displayed a fear of and aggression towards blacks. In fact, one day after a blizzard, we were walking down a very familiar sidewalk and an African-American man was walking towards us. Just as we got close, the dog executed a terrifying and sudden lunge bark. There is nothing like simultaneous fear, embarrassment, and oh-please-don't-let-us-slip-on-the-ice-and-crush-our-bones. I am sure that the man and I were both feeling all of these emotions, although his fear-to-other-emotions ratio was probably elevated, where my embarrassment-to-other-emotions ratio was. As usual, I yanked the pooch away and offered gratuitous apologies.

Well, I've had enough of it. It's humiliating, not to mention dangerous to let this go on. Yesterday, on a beautiful, sunny April afternoon, I decided to try something.

We live near a park where the neighborhood comes to play. It's really quite a utopian scene - children, adults, dogs of all races and backgrounds joining together to frolic in harmony. Playground, soccer, dog run. I walk my dog around this park nearly every day (the only day when she was really aggressive towards someone just walking on the sidewalk was that blizzardy day).

As we were walking, we approached an African-American man, woman and maybe eight- or nine-year-old child standing on the sidewalk. I wasn't sure what their relationships to one another were, but the way the man was acting with the child, I assumed they were father and son. The boy was smiling at the dog and said, "Look Daddy, a dog!"

My dog loves children. She will let them bang on her head and pull her skin and she will just take it. And she is equal-opportunity - no racism with children. But here was a situation I was not sure about. Historically: a black boy = good history with dog; a black man = bad history with dog.

I told them that she loves to be petted, that she loves kids but is a little afraid of adults. The dad, as I'll call him, encouraged his son to pet the dog. I made the dog sit. The dad started to pet her - not the way you're supposed to pet strange dogs, which I think is with a steady, gentle approach, and under the chin rather than over the head - but a little awkwardly over her head. I think my dog understood that I was endorsing this, so she didn't do anything weird except jump back. I explained, again, that she's weird with adults.

The son, as I'll call him, kept declining to pet her, and we started to walk away. When we were about 10 yards from them, the son said, "No, actually I want to try." I overheard and turned around. Yes. This was going to work.

I made her sit again and stroked her neck while the son patted her head and touched her neck. She was very calm. I said, "see, she likes you." He appeared to be very proud of himself. She also became more comfortable with the dad petting her, and even got distracted by some birds and looked around, relaxing.

I don't think we have solved her problem. But, just like with humans, I think what will help her overcome her fears of people who don't look like her "family" is repeated exposure to different people in a safe, friendly setting encouraged by her beloved masters. So, we need to be friendlier and more outgoing. This is hard for me, as I'm shy, but I am pleased with the tiny bit of progress we made.

Hopefully when Mike3550 comes back he will post about something smart/important.

Now Broadcasting from Philadelphia

It has been a couple of exciting weeks for us. I ended my previous job, we spent a week relaxing in gorgeous Ocean City, NJ, moved to Philadelphia, and I started my new job while E. started in her new office. Blogging has been short on the list of priorities as we still have boxes that need unpacking and stacks of used boxes need to be put somewhere; but, hopefully we will be back up and posting more regularly soon.

Good News

Some of you who read this blog might remember that I made two resolutions for the new year. I have made significant progress on one — I'll let you guess which one. Anyway, I have failed to post here for the past month because I have been traveling (as I mentioned) to several cities across the country. What I didn't mention is that several of those trips were for post-doc interviews bacause I didn't want to jinx anything before I started the interview process.

I found out last week that I received an offer! I am super excited and will be starting the position in the Fall. Now, all I have to do is finish this pesky dissertation.

I Just Don't Fit In

Somewhere between 23 and 30, most lefty, urban, middle-class white people have to decide whether they are going to be: 1) aging bourgeois hippies or 2) aging bourgeois yuppies. (There may be a third option - tell me.) Yesterday I decided to sample option (1) by buying Tom's of Maine deodorant. It smelled nice. The label said it had "hops" in it to fight smelly bacteria.

I put it on this morning. Usually I like the nice, not-at-all sticky feeling that I feel when I put reg'lar deodorant on. It's as though fairies have sprinkled little flakes of teflon on my armpits. This experience, unfortunately, was nothing like that. It was almost as though I hadn't put anything on at all. Or rather, like I had coated my armpits with a layer of gym sweat before going to work.

Just now I changed and took a whiff. I know it's 9:30 pm, so way past the expiration probably, but damn. Not nice.

Next time I see anything with "hops" in it, it better be a nice cold beer. Then I can rub that all over my armpits.

And seriously, someone please, please tell me if there's an option three. One and two are not working out so hot.

A Girl and Her Racist Dog

Mike3550 is out of commission this week defending his prospectus. So I thought I would attempt to insert some blog posts between last week and next, bringing the level of discourse down from politics and neighborhood effects - all the way down, in fact, to topics like our stupid dog.

We've suspected it for a long time, but the events of this evening have pushed me to state publicly: my dog is racist. Tonight Dog and I are going for a nice brisk walk in our neighborhood, and it becomes apparent that someone is walking behind us. I turn around, and it is a tall Latino. Dog looks behind her, starts barking her head off for about five barks. I apologize, man laughs. Okay, I think, he's behind us, he surprised her, fine. But then I thought, wait, we live in New York City, not the postapocalypse. These sidewalks are busy. People walk behind us all the time. Just - mostly white people. This is, by the way, at least the fifth time she has singled out a Latino for her rage.

The rest of our walk goes nicely, without any hate/harassment. We get back to our building and get into an elevator. Who comes through the door - surprise! - but our nice new white neighborman and our nice new Indian neighborwoman. NEW neighbors. Would you expect some skepticism from Dog? She has never met them before. But lo and behold, she puts on the greatest kiss-ass puppy-eyes display known to man. She is a hit, and gets her chin rubbed and ears scritched. Score.

They get out on 3. We get out on 5. A Latino who doesn't live on our floor stands before us on 5. Dog freaks out. Barks as though the man is ripping apart my body and feasting on my entrails. In fact - and I've never seen her do this before - she lunges at him.

No one was hurt, thank goodness - she didn't really get on him, just near enough to provoke deep visible fear in the man's eyes - but the man got a profuse gushing apology from me and was very gracious considering an animal apparently wanted to end his life because he was standing there. Dog got some serious yelling and alpha-domination by yours truly.

I don't get it! I never thought of myself as a racist owner, but maybe I evoke barely perceptible tension when I'm around people who are different from me and she picks up on it. Maybe she turns on Lou Dobbs when we're asleep. Maybe the other dogs in our building are a bad influence. Maybe my racism is like a dogwhistle, and only she can hear it.

Inauspicious Start

Although I tend not to make New Year's Resolutions, I have decided to try to make two this year:

1. Try to be more consistent blogging


2. Eat healthier and exercise more (I know, how cliché, right? But, since I figure that I study health, perhaps it would be wise for me to actually pay attention to some of the research and keep myself healthy)

I have made less than an auspicious start on the first. However, I am going to give myself a pass for last week and the next couple of weeks because I have spent the last five days finalizing my dissertation proposal. It's all done - submitted, in the hands of my committee to do with it what the will. I will find out what they intend to do with it this coming week when I head back to the Midwest for my defense. Then, after that, I am off to Philadelphia immediately from Michigan, then off to D.C. next week, then back to the Midwest the week after that. Needless to say, if I can find some time (and an internet connection) to catch my breath and write in the next month, I will be amazed. But, seeing as how I have made this public revelation, let's see if that will encourage me to write more!

In the meantime, here is a Wordle of my proposal. I bet you would never be able to guess what I study!

Reruns

It's funny how things have a way of repeating themselves. One year ago this week, E. and I were celebrating our marriage in Italy. And just about a year ago, Time-Warner imposed an internet quota on me, as in didn't provide me any internet service.

A year later what is happening? Well, almost to the day, E. returned to Italy and today Time-Warner has given me the run-around about how sorry they are, but they can't make my internet work. This time around, though, I am not with E. (she went for work) and my post-doc applications are all online (kind of hard to fill out an application without an internet connection). It's funny how much this feels like a really, really bad rerun.

"Back" to School!

This week marked the return of undergraduates to the university at which I work. Not all of the undergraduates—this week is just reserved for the newbies. The mixture of excitement and fear was etched into their faces. The orientation mentors, on the other hand, seemed relieved to be back at school away from their summer jobs, parents, and back with their friends. It was also interesting to watch all of the parents drop their kids off...now that is where you see panic. Honey, are you sure that she is going to be alright. I mean, this is New York City... That, combined with their attempts (mostly failed) at a) driving around campus and b) finding parking was hilarious.

It's funny, back at the university at which I am a student the end of summer was always marked by the dread of finding parking spaces anywhere within the vicinity of campus. Here in New York, the end of summer is marked by the l-o-o-o-o-o-n-g wait for the elevator because so many people are getting on and off. It's funny how the same event, with many of the same feelings is marked differently existing in different surroundings. At least it struck me that way. Perhaps it was just the physical manifestation of the various transitions that have occurred and brought me to New York and my "second-home" university.

Although school being "back" in session has very little effect on me since I am neither taking nor teaching any classes, it does mark a countdown that is fraught with excitement and nerves. I guess it's not unlike those freshman starting their first class next week. After a year of transitions, this year is going to be pretty intense given the goals that I have laid out for myself. At this time next year—if all goes well—I will hopefully be Dr. Mike and be marking another pretty big transition to the the next phase of my career, hopefully with a job/post-doc in hand. I guess it's t-minus two days and counting...^[1]

^[1] That reminds me that I need: a) an advisor voodoo doll, b) committee member voodoo dolls, c) application reviewer voodoo dolls, and d) graduate college voodoo dolls. I'll put them on my birthday wishlist.

Five Years

Seeing the front page on one of the New York free dailies handed out at subway stations today reminded me that it was five years to the day that I showed up to grad school. How do I know? I showed up to grad school the day that the lights went out from the Great Lakes all the way to the East Coast. I tried to make sure that I didn't take it as a sign from somewhere that I shouldn't start grad school. Instead, I unpacked my car, slept in the dark for a night woke up the next morning to drive to Maryland and visited E. Who knew four and a half years later we would be married and I would be within a year of finishing grad school (hopefully)? I guess life has a way of working out really well.

I Want a Vacation -

- so I'll take one!

I returned from ASA in one piece. I wish that I had more time to find people and meet them. But, I was so nervous about my first experience as a discussant, that I missed the opportunity^[1]. Next year in SF, I'm meeting everyone at the Scatterplot party though! And, hopefully, I'll meet some of you before then.

However, before the real intensity of applying for post-docs and buckling down on dissertation research starts, E. and I are off for vacation to be tanned, rested, and ready for the craziness that is going to be the upcoming year!

[1] Talk about impostor syndrome; I can't believe people actually wanted to hear what I had to say! I benefited from a lot of really good advice from people regarding being a discussant, so maybe I will post some of it when I return.

Recipe du Jour

In my ongoing quest to find more fulfillment, I have decided to try and cook more at home and avoid eating out so much. This is motivated by two things. Eating out is both expensive and very unhealthy in the long run, particularly the kind of eating out that I do which consists of a rotation of Chinese food, pizza and going out to a Mexican restaurant. Alright, not all of those are expensive, but they are bad for my health. The second, loftier, reason is that I enjoy cooking and want to learn how to do it better and E. enjoys the food I make (usually, especially if it doesn't contain red onions).

Tonight, I made a very "interesting" dish. When I was in architecture school as an undergrad, our professors would come around and look at our work. Often, the first words out of their mouth when they would approach my desk would be something like, "This is...um...interesting." Basically, it meant that it was somehow unusual and somehow less than successful. I felt that way about what I made tonight. The dish, from The Joy of Cooking, was "Baked Acorn Squash with Pear and Apple" (p. 425).

Basically, I think that I would have liked it if it weren't squash...which, I realize, I should have recognized before I made it. I was trying it because we are having some vegetarian friends over for dinner this weekend and we wanted to attempt it before making it for them. Although I have never really liked squash, I have recently acquired an appreciation for it -- and it was in season. Let's say that taste was not acquired for this squash. I'm not sure if it is because I messed it up or I just really don't like squash. I'm hoping its the former, especially since E. really liked it. The filling was great, though and the idea of serving a dish in what looks like a pumpkin is kind of cool.

Anyway, for those of you who like squash and might want to try it, here you go:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Butter a baking pan. Place cut side sown in the baking pan
  2 medium acorn squash, halved and seeded
Add ¼ inch hot water to the pan. Bake for 45 minutes. Meanwhile, mix in a medium bowl:
  2 large apples, peeled, cored, and diced
  1 ripe pear, peeled, cored, and diced
  ¼ cup dried raisins
  2 tablespoons packed dark brown sugar
  Grated zest of 1 small orange
  ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
  ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
Heat in a large skillet over medium heat until melted:
  2 tablespoons butter
Add the apple mixture and cook until the fruit is golden brown, about 5 minutes. Stir in:
  ¼ cup apple cider or orange juice
Simmer, stirring often, until the fruit is tender, about 8 minutes. Remove the squash from the oven: pour off the water from the pan and turn the squash cut side up. Fill the squash with the apple mixture. Bake until the squash is tender, about 15 minutes more.

Page 425, Rombauer, IS; Becker, MR; and Becker, E. 1997. The Joy of Cooking. New York:Scribner.

Farewell for Now

Although I am sure that there will not be much difference from my relative lack of posting recently, but tonight I am off to Maryland for the last preparations for getting hitched so there will be no posts until my return. There are three more days to the wedding and I am hoping that the weather holds out for the ceremony. I can feel the butterflies in my stomach already. Then, it is off to Italia, where I am sure that I will find much to report and maybe some pictures to share when I get back. In the meantime, here is one to tide you over (link) to tide you over.

I hope everyone has a great couple of weeks!!!

Good News

It turns out that when I tried to transfer my university account e-mail to my GMail account last time, I did not anticipate that all of the 3000+ e-mails sitting in my inbox would come with it. Not realizing this until after my GMail account was flooded with hundreds of e-mails, I set up a filter to send all of the e-mails from my university e-mail account to the trash. Well, I had forgotten about this particular filter when I sent my e-mails over this time. The good news is that I found all of them in the trash and recovered all of my e-mails. The internet gods must be appeased.

In other good news, I found out this week that the paper I mentioned earlier this week got accepted! I am so excited, and my nightmares that I made some mistake in the analysis or used the wrong file for the output can finally come to an end (I've checked, double checked and triple checked and, absent one scare where I pulled up the wrong file but didn't realize it for a while, everything seems to be in order). Now I can actually put a line in my CV that says "Publications". Good news all around, particularly before the really good news of getting married to E. and having a week and a half to relax in Italy!

Cautiously out of Purgatory

My exile to internet purgatory has been (at least temporarily) lifted by Time-Warner. I believe that, after spending three hours on the phone with them, being woken up by one of their service technicians on Saturday morning at 7:00am^[1], a visit from a technician on Sunday two hours before my scheduled appointment time where this service technician told me that he couldn't get into the control room necessary, so I have the apartment's maintenance people call him. He never comes back or informs me that he is not coming back, prompting a call to the customer "service" agent who informs me that it is my fault that the technician could not service my cable because "They can't be chasing people all over the place" and "they can't be expected to call you if you can't be there when they are going to be there" and "they can't call you to let you know, you only get one chance or you have to reschedule, would you like to reschedule for Thursday(!!!!)?" I lost it. I lost my cool. I was so angry. I would have to wait for an entire week and a half and this person didn't seem to give one damn! I told her that I rely on my internet to telecommute and work - her response "Well, you have residential service, so you have to be on the residential service schedule. If you want to pay more for commercial service, then you can pay for that" desperate, I say fine, can you connect me? "No, this is residential, you'll have to call commercial back to connect to them." And, I might add, wait another 20 minutes to speak to someone. E. (who is always much cooler about these things as they happen) told me that what I should have told the woman is why would I pay more when you can't even provide what I am already paying good money for? She's so smart.

Luckily, the problem was building-wide so they sent a technician out this afternoon and, at least for now, it is working alright. I'm not giving up the appointment that I have tomorrow from 10am-2pm just in case it goes out again. But, damn! I can't believe that it takes this much trouble to get my internet connection working again. But, I now am way behind on my work so hopefully I will be reconnecting to all of you my dear readers, even if it is sporadic for the next while before my paper deadline.

The kicker had to be, though, there is a story in this week's New York Magazine about Dick Parson, the chairman of Time Warner, and how he wishes that he could be Rupert Murdoch and "indulge in thinking long term" while he enjoys his villa in Tuscany and smokes his expensive cigars. And, he wishes that people wouldn't talk to him about fixing their cable or their AOL service. Ah, I feel so bad for the guy...he has to listen to complaints and worry about the here-and-now of his company. Maybe that's why Time-Warner is tanking!

^[1]Now, I didn't have an appointment with a service technician for Saturday. I did have one for Sunday at 2pm.

Blogological Silence

This silence is not self imposed or because I am trying to ignore the fascination of online procrastination (though this would probably be good for me). No, no, no, this silence is imposed on me by the fact that Time Warner cable can't get their shit together to provide a service for which I am paying. My apartment is without cable television and teh internets (again). Although this time, it is really gone. The version of cable that I currently get is a bunch of tiled images on the screen - it looks like I am playing Tetris while trying to watch anything. Sometimes they move, sometimes they don't. And, my internet just simply doesn't work.

The best part? Time Warner's phones are so backed up that I get a busy signal!!! I thought of the possibility that their service is so f*ed up that their phones, theoretically run on the same cable through which I am trying to receive my television and internet connection, are down and that they can't get any phone service, either. That thought amused me until I realized that it's my problem that I can't get to them, not theirs that they can't receive any calls.

On the plus side, E. and I spent a great TV-free evening together last night and I am due for a refund on the days of service that I couldn't get my internet connection. Of course that refund might pay for half of the cost of going to coffee shops in order to work.

Half Full or Half Empty?

I have spent the last two and half weeks trying to write the introduction to this paper. The eight pages that describe what I am doing, which, at least theoretically, should be the easiest to do.

But, to frustrate me further, I came across an article tonight that is a major review of the literature that describes some of the fault lines and problems in the field. I have been doing the research for this paper fo six months and I found this paper tonight! One can look at this discovery as a good thing—most of the introduction to my paper actually outlines the fault lines described in this review. And, finding this paper (it was based on an editorial comment co-authored by the same person a couple years earlier) has definitely pointed out some interesting readings to go to when I write the next one of these infernal things. On the negative side, though, what the hell is so wrong with my research skills that I didn't find this paper until tonight!!! Six months!!! Ah, now I feel better.

But, then again, there is glass all the way full news.

Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

Once again, you will notice my prolonged absence from teh internets. Luckily, this time it was self-imposed as E. was back in town for the weekend. She has been temporarily reassigned to live in Las Vegas for the month (alright, not really "reassigned" but it sure as hell feels that way) and was here this weekend. Although we maintained her Pacific timezone sleeping schedule, it was nice to actually be in the same place again. Damn, and we thought we had already put in our time doing it last year. Alas, like all good things, it came to an end and E. is now sleeping in Vegas and I am in the Big Apple...

My opinions on the viability of any social movement or organization that expects total dedication and cares so little about the quality of life of its members (paid or not) aside, it has been a frustrating experience overall. On the one hand, I have been busy with ASA and got to have three really good friends stay over. On the other, I moved to NYC to be with E. and it is frustrating that she was informed that she would be leaving across the country for a month. My one hope is that I can actually use this time productively in order to get things accomplished, like "finishing" one paper and getting another project moving.

But, just for the record, I want to say: this sucks.

Teh Internets

I am having all kinds of problems with my internet connection today. I called Time Warner and, after getting caught in automated menu hell ("If you would like service, please say 'service'" ["Service"] "Thank you. You chose service. Would you like to find out information about your service" ["YES!!!"] "Okay, then. Are you having a problem with your cable. If so, say 'cable'. If you are having a problem with your internet connection, say 'internet connection'. ["Internet Connection"] "Good. Now, would you like service, if so say 'service.'" - You get the idea].

But, I never realized how much I relied on the internet connection. Part of it is that many of my files are on the internet. This is obviously a problem and something that I got myself into by placing them on the internet. Given my need to be mobile, and often using several different computers, it is still - even with temporary service discontinuities - the best bet. But, what is even more frustrating is that I don't feel like I can do anything until I figure out how to get back onto the internet reliably. It is like realizing that you don't have your keys before leaving the house. You could take the spare set, but you really don't want to leave until you find your set of keys because, well, you want to know where they are. Of course, then you are probably late and/or frazzled by the time you get to wherever it was that you were going when you realized that you lost your keys.

Anyway, that is going to be my excuse for getting nothing done today... Maybe it will start working soon and I can actually get something done before the end of the day.