On Failure and a Saviour.

I had another of those days again today. My internet dropped out at around a quarter to eleven and all the usual ploys to get it back failed. I tried four times, but to no avail. And so I called my ISP.

That is, I tried to call my ISP. (Oh dear, I think I’d better make this brief. The whole story would take until tomorrow to type and would be extremely boring.)

Suffice it to say that two hours later I was none the wiser and the internet was still comatose, so I went out for a belated walk without having spoken to anybody. Speaking to somebody is the old fashioned way, of course, and that’s what I’d tried first. It is, after all, the primary means by which humans have communicated ever since we’ve been on this planet, but it’s fallen out of favour now with just about everybody who controls our lives. And I had also tried to jump through their new hoops via text and automated reply, but that hadn’t worked either.

In consequence, the walk was not a pleasant one, being heavily polluted with frustration and no small sense of anxiety over the question of how one might manage to navigate even the simplest of lifestyles these days (and I do live a very simple lifestyle) without access to the internet. When I got back the internet had woken up, so I tried to put the whole thing behind me. The only problem now is that I’m constantly on edge waiting for the same thing to happen again. But let’s move on.

*  *  *

I turned on the TV news at midday, just in time to see a reporter asking a man standing in a field and wearing a funny hat how he felt about the Queen’s-death-and-funeral business. I didn’t wait for his reply. The whole media treatment of this event has now become so trite and absurd that I can’t stand it any longer.

*  *  *

The afternoon’s strenuous garden work laid me fairly low because I’m not as fit or strong or supple as I used to be. And it isn’t going to get any better.

*  *  *

This evening I braved the sudden, and fairly extreme, drop in temperature to sally forth in search of a horse which might appreciate an apple and a carrot. They’re in short supply these days, you know. (Horses, that is, not apples and carrots.) I haven’t seen Rosie for several weeks, the little white pony at the end of Mill Lane has definitely gone, and the two strapping geldings which have appeared in a field a little way down my lane are never there when I have comestibles to bestow. But Millie was. Dear Millie was in her field and close enough to the school fence to recognise who was approaching. Millie got the goods, so let’s hear it for dearest Millie who saved the day.