I am a bit of geek. I work in IT. I was part of the first pilot of ADSL Broadband in the UK back in 1999. I display all the classic symptons of internet addiction (well, aside from the whole 'obese, lives with parents, never had a girlfriend' thing)
Which is why, when my DSL went down last week and stayed down, I felt like someone had cut my arm off. I was snappy to coworkers and downright rude to engineers. And pity the poor guy who tried to blind me with science:
"Ah, Mr Single. We've checked your line and its fine. No problems. Must be your Windows configuration."
"Really? How did you check?"
"Oh well, we were able to connect to your router and get a LCP and VCI reponse. Therefore the line must be up."
"My router is switched off and unplugged."
(silence)
"You haven't tested anything, have you?"
"no... sorry..."
"Right. Either this line is up by the time I get home tonight, or I'll rip your legs off and beat you to death with the bloody stumps."
Ok. I didn't really say that. I thought it. And thankfully, the short-circuit didn't cut in. At least I don't think so.
Although the line was restored that very night. Hmmm.
