When I came home from work earlier this week, my husband was waiting for me to troubleshoot the internet connection. I’m the geek in the family so therefore get to take care of technology problems. Unfortunately, it was not something I could fix.
A call to AT&T confirmed the signal was not getting to our home. I suspected the truck that had been outside earlier in the day for a neighbor left us with unforeseen consequences. They couldn’t get someone out until the next day which meant no blogging for me.
My to-do list for that evening had a lot of tasks but all required an internet connection. Something that has only been in my home a dozen years has become an important tool. Here’s a glimpse at what we use it for each day.
Banking. I have written only 87 paper checks in the past three years thanks to online banking. Not only to we pay bills online but also move money from account to account at different institutions. I only go to a brick and mortar bank when someone sends ME a paper check.
Phone Book. Do you remember getting two phone books? One for the yellow pages and the other for the residential listings. Seems quaint now. We had to call someone to get them to look up the number for the AT&T support line.
Shopping. Why limit yourself to only the inventory in your local stores? Instead of spending hours running from store to store trying to find the perfect holiday dress, I spent 30 minutes online and found it at a site that was new to me.
Watch TV. You don’t need a television to watch the programming. You can watch network and cable shows online. We used to drive to video stores to rent movies, now all we can just rent it online from Amazon or iTunes and view it on a computer.
Communicate. I can’t remember the last time I sent a letter to a friend or family member. In fact, if it wasn’t for online chat, email and texting I would almost never hear from my kids! There is still a place for hand-written letters and cards, but not on a daily basis.
Then the ability to keep up with extended family on Facebook has been wonderful. Would you really know what’s going on in the lives of your cousins, nieces and nephews without it?
Blog. Instead of collecting frogs or elephants like other family members, I write and publish it for anyone who finds it of value to read. It’s my hobby and a pretty good one too since it actually generates income instead of costing me money.
Don’t get me wrong, I like getting unconnected during vacations but those times are planned. Instead of running out to a fast food restaurant with free WiFi, I took and breath and decided to make the best of it. It wasn’t bad but thankfully the outage was only 16 hours.
What other daily tasks of yours use the internet?
photo By mac_ivan
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I’ve really only had three outages in the 7-8 years I’ve been with my carrier, and it is definitely eye opening when it happens as you get so used to it. Nowadays, we have our smart phones which uses the carrier signal so unless there’s a major power failure, we typically have some level of Internet connectivity available to us.
We used to have cable internet with Charter and just recently switched to ATT. We had outages once a week with Charter, but have not had one in 6 months with ATT. We learned to live with the outages, but online banking and blogging for me were the worst items in life affected.
Aside from the things you mentioned, I use the internet for teaching (work) and as an information source.
When I went back to school I found that some teachers required that assignments be submitted electronically. I made it my business NEVER to turn one in at the last minute, figuring that would be the time that my Internet crashed. And I bet teachers get tired of hearing that as an excuse.
Also: I make my living on the Internet: submitting assignments to MSN Money and Get Rich Slowly, communicating with potential interviewees, hearing back from editors about questions, etc. People rely on it more and more vs. phone calls. I can’t really fault them: Everyone is so busy that it’s easier to do a 15-second e-mail vs. risking a phone call that would continue for 15 minutes.
And, of course, I’m a blogger too and would be sad if inspiration struck and the Internet were down.
We use the internet constantly at our house. Ours was down one recent evening. It required great resolve to remember there was life without ‘being connected.’ Glad I didn’t have to remember that for long.
This post definitely stirred up some nostalgia. Wow, phone books. Who would have thought they would be replaced with the internet. Our life revolves around the web. It’s insane. Glad your back up and blogging!
I think I may live my life on the internet, like that 90s Sandra Bullock movie, The Net.
I can’t really think of anything I don’t use it for except eating, sleeping, and walking the dogs…
These are the moments that I wish I had a smart phone. It reminds me of the snow storm in the NE where we were without power for 4 days. I hear you loud and clear on the phonebook point.
Almost my entire life is online. Besides what you mentioned, I also use it for my part-time job, getting the news (except for my 1/2 hour a day with Brian Williams), the weather forecast, and recipes. The thought of no internet makes me sad. But I also may get some other stuff done like laundry…
I get a lot of ebooks from the web and like you I use it to look things up, communicate. I have a few power outages every winter, none of them last very long usually so I can never get too comfortable. As annoying as it is, it is probably a good reminder of all the privileges we have.
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