Thursday night, I couldn't connect to the internet. Picked up the landline phone --no dial tone. Went out to the junction box to bypass any house-snafus and got no tone out there either. I called our phone company, Frontier Communications. Frontier is a Scandinavian outfit but I was able to get an American dispatcher. She was in Indiana. I told her my problem and was assured someone would be over in the morning. I opened the front gate at 7 a.m.
At 8 a.m. a white truck drove in. Guy got out, said "Morning! I'm Jay." We shook hands.
"I'm Geo."
He said, "I know." and followed me indoors. He told us he'd found a problem with the relay station down by the bridge and jury-rigged it before coming over --but also found our modem and router outdated and replaced them with a new device with wi-fi built-in. Then told us he didn't work weekends but would return to the relay station Monday to make adjustments. He handed me his card and said "Call me if anything else goes haywire."
"Impressive name."
"That much is certain. I never dreamed Frontier had that kind of pull!
Monday, we drove into San Francisco by this bridge:
We booked our favorite room at The Great Highway Inn. As E.M. Forster would say, it has a "view":
It is also within strolling distance of our son's place, where he and his mother speculated on the activities of helicopters over the area, followed by fire engine sirens. I assisted in these observations whenever my sight-seeing pursuits permitted:
Next morning, Tuesday --today, Norma and he took a hike up to Lands End and saw evidence of recent crisis --a 36-foot sailboat ruining in the surf:
Helicopters, Fire Department, and Rangers managed to rescue both men from the boat, and their dog. Miracles sometimes take a lot of concerted effort. When we drove out of San Francisco, Norma took a photo as we emerged from a tunnel ahead of the Golden Gate. I have added a few stars to make it look like we were en route to a lovely blue planet.
My thoughts were on the internet and whether or not Jay had been able to fix the problem down by the little bridge on our road. Norma thought he would. I was pretty certain. As evidenced by this post appearing at all, it would seem our faith was justified.
I'd like to thank anybody in the congregation for remaining in their pews since Sunday. Your regular pastor will return after dealing with possible boat-theft charges.Until then, go thou and do likewise.