Lately the Internet here at my house has been out- I tried everything I could think of to fix it, of course, but seeing as how "everything I could think of" basically just entails my turning everything off, waiting a couple minutes, and then turning everything back on again, I was unable to restore it. So! Looks like probably what I ought to do was call Time-Warner! Off to the phone! The number to call? Mmm, okay, I don't got any phone books of course.... Time-Warner's not on my speed dial these days... kay, I'll just look it up on the Interne- oh.

Surely they put their number on the bill, but as bills don't make very memorable keepsakes, I don't generally keep them handy. After much searching, I did manage to track one down- a bill retained only because I had jotted a note down on the back of the envelope- and called and (after punching a bunch of phone menu buttons, telling the Time-Warner Phone Computer all the details of the nature of my problem) I got through to Beth, a very nice young customer service representative, to whom I had to tell all the details of the nature of my problem.

"Okay!" Beth said, "What I want you to do is turn everything off, wait a couple minutes, and turn everything back on!" Perhaps unsurprisingly, this worked no better then when I had tried it before. "Okay... " says Beth, never at a loss for ideas, "this time turn everything off.... and unplug the coax cable, wait a couple minutes, plug it back in, and turn everything back on again."

This time it worked like a charm! No no, just kidding, of course! Beth was clearly at her wits' end by this time. After all, we had turned everything off and on several times now, to no effect whatsoever. "Um, I think we're going to have to send someone round...."

In unrelated news, I've found the time recently to do the dishes, sweep the apartment, clean the cat-box, read a book, do three loads of laundry, mop the floors, do some more dishes, fix something to eat, do the dishes resulting from fixing something to eat, clean the bathroom, start another book, take a nap, and generally tidy things up a bit.