Search for Speedy Internet Service: A Saga

January's not over yet, so I figure I still have time to squeak in another one of those retrospective type posts, right?

I already mentioned the best thing for me in my professional writing life in 2009. What about the second best thing? That has to be Getting High Speed Internet Service. Yes, complete with capitals and italics. Why was this such a big deal?

Um, imagine trying to blog, set up and maintain a website, work with an editor at a book packager to send and retrieve photo selections, send manuscripts, send and receive documents with tracked changes, and download pdfs for final editing all on DIALUP! And I should mention that all that needs to be done while SHARING a single telephone and internet line with your hubby who also runs a business out of the home. !!!

Okay, so I mostly didn't do all that on dialup. I left the building, so long as I could work around the family schedule, and made use of public libraries and the local coffee house and the rec centre which all offered free WiFi. Thank god for their existence and may they be handsomely patronized and thrive forever and ever amen is all I have to say on that.

The ability to do all I need to do to keep up and keep on from my own home work space has made my life a whole lot easier. I count myself very, very fortunate. But you can be forgiven for wondering why I'm going on and on about this. Couldn't I just sign up for better internet?

Nope.

I tried for years, like at least 5 of them, to get better than dialup service. The answer was always no, sorry, you're not in an area where we can offer that service.

This didn't make any sense whatsoever to me. I had people who had highspeed internet to the left of me, people who had highspeed internet to the right of me. And yet I, apparently, was not eligible. I was not worthy. But I could not wrap my head around that, especially when there is only one wire that GOES RIGHT BY MY HOUSE?!

Okay, so I have no real leg to stand on when it comes to technological know-how. It just seemed bizarre. Yes, I live in the boonies, but I'm a main road boony resident not a backroad boony resident. And it was the way I was being denied when my neighbours were not that irked me so much.

So I called every 6 months to ask, politely, if I could sign up. I'd get a junkmail flyer proudly announcing some new internet service or package available NOW in my area. I'd call or I'd fill out the form on the internet with my details. I always got the same result: Nope, sorry, enjoy your dialup.

But one day...

Well, this is getting rather long, isn't it? In fact, it's a pretty long story overall. It's a Saga, I'm not kidding. But I promise it's pretty entertaining, especially if you've ever tried to talk to a big Corporate Conglomerate about anything.

I'll start the installments tomorrow.

[Go directly to Installment One]