BLOGG #21 "O THE WEB WE MORTALS WEAVE"

O the web we mortals weave when we first our computers receive.  A while ago, my computer went on the blink—I don’t think this is the proper term-but it suits me. What happened was I had emailed something that gave my computer indigestion and it refused to send or receive.  As I tried to solve this, a flag popped up-you know-those pesky little flags that speak in foreign languages telling you what to do. Well. my daughter has told me time and again to NOT click on these pesky flags unless I understand them, but as all parents know, one doesn’t listen to one’s children, so I clicked. A new incomprehensible flag popped up. I clicked on it too and so on. Soon I had a veritable” fourth-of-July” screen full of flags with lots of instructions and options-none of which I understood until at last I saw a flag that said “when unable to solve problems call your technician.” With great relief I phoned him and explained my difficulty. “First of all” he said “find your modem and disconnect it for a few minutes.” “What’s a modem I asked. “It’s a black rectangular box connected to your computer” he said. I looked under the coffee table at the wire mess and counted four black boxes! My patient technician then described it me—it has red lights and orange lights so I went down on my hands and knees –a position I haven’t been in for years dear readers- crawled under the coffee table and T.V. until I could reach the wires and tried to locate my modem.  As I groped my way through the web I murmured into the phone- here is the wire connected to my stereo set , here is the wire connected to my copier , here is the  wire connected to my T.V. here is the wire connected to my D.V.D. player and here  is---and heard myself singing” hear the word of the Lord!”  “What! What! What was that you said just now? “

exclaimed the technician.  “Nothing “I cried and quickly hung up!  I fortunately found the modem and disconnected it still chanting “this wire’s connected to the----“ and suddenly found myself humming”-- neck bone and the neck bone  connected to the collar bone, the collar bone  connected to the backbone -----.”  Startled, I quickly reconnected the modem to my computer. At this point I was completely enmeshed in my wire web and started to pray feverishly to the jealous Greek goddess to not mistake me for a presumptuous weaver and turn me into another “Arachnid!” Eventually I untangled myself and crawled out,and slowly eased my aching bones off my knees and still humming, stretched my creaking back, stretched my arms over my head, looked at my fixed computer humming along with not a pesky flag in sight and sang joyously “Dem bones ,Dem bones ,Dem dry bones—now hear the word of the Lord.”