My palms perspired profusely as I cradled in my palm the business envelope, 4 1/8 by 9 1/2 inches of paper anxiety. It was from our Internet/cable provider, Mediacom, and my apartment-mates and I were in big trouble.
We received our first strike last month, when the company caught my roommate, Dylan, torrenting “Marley & Me III: Revenge of the Sith.” The first punishment: a downgrade to dial-up Internet.
We had to deal with the old “BRRGWAHWAHHRRRTHE90SCACAWCACAWBRRRR” every time we wanted to Ask Jeeves something, so needless to say, it was rather frustrating. But nothing was going to come between my roomie and “Patton: The Squeakuel.” After that nine-hour torrent sesh (“Dylan, I need to use the fax machine!”), I knew that we were headed for Strike Two, and two weeks later we got another letter.
Strike Two, by the way, is another downgrade, this time to wireless Morse code. Now, that doesn’t sound too awful, but here’s the catch: _no nights and weekends_! Still, three million dots and dashes later, Dylan had his copy of “Bridget Jones’s Diary, based on the novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire” And let’s be honest, there’s no way they weren’t gonna catch that one.
Sure enough, the letter was in my hand, and I finally slit the seal. With trepidation, I removed the folded letter and gradually directed my eyes toward the first line…
“We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.”
After pitching my junk mail, I decided I could wait no longer and tore open the Mediacom letter, ripping it off like a Band-Aid.
It read, “We are not-so-pleased to inform you that we will no longer provide your apartment with Internet services. To really get our point across, we will also be removing all electricity from your apartment. We hope you enjoy your legally mandated Amish lifestyle.”
As I take a break from plowing my fields with Ezekiel this here morning to carve this column into stone (we weren’t sure if paper was allowed, so we decided to err on the side of caution), I warn you: don’t torrent! (And with Mediafire, Dropbox and Kazaa, why would you?)
Every morning, my roommates and I would wake up at the crack of dawn to update our MySpaces and Friendsters. But now, we have nothing else to do so we just plow corn. In our apartment. That’s how bored we are. There is agriculture in our freaking apartment. What’s next, doing our homework?
You may be wondering where this is all going, why I’m rambling on endlessly about our Bye-Bye Wi-Fi blues. Well first off, I have no Internet. What else am I supposed to do? Second, apparently I don’t have to limit this column to strictly music-related topics, so you know dang well I’mma take full advantage of that. Third, the world must know the havoc that this wireless-lessness has wrought.
Amish to God, we’re using my iPad as a frisbee. (An un-aerodynamic, overweight frisbee at that). We’re playing dominos with iPod touches. (There’s no app for that). Hell, we’ve got four laptops functioning as oversized chip clips right now. (iKnow, right?).
But srsly, we has no Interwebz, and it sux.
