To Quote Mark Twain.......

........."Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated."

OK....I know.......that line is pretty trite, but I needed a quick opening. Can you find it in your heart, you forgive me?

No........I'm not dead, nor have I been driven to ground, as one dear friend surmised. I'm afraid the explanation is much more mundane............internet problems. It seems that my trusty old wireless modem, that connected to the internet so gloriously fast for over a week, just kicked the bucket, but what did I expect? It was seriously out of shape. For two and one half years, it was connecting a cumbersome desktop to the web. A good hard pull to be sure, but never the aerobic workout it was designed for.

Wireless modems are marathon runners, not weight lifters, and my poor modem had become out of shape and muscle bound. When suddenly it was tasked with connecting the speedy laptop that it was originally designed for, it gave its all, and sent me surfing the web at blistering speeds! Then suddenly it faltered. It began to disconnect every five minutes, as if to say, "Slow down.....pant, pant......I can't keep up!" But being the cruel misstress that I am, I would dimiss its complaints, and instantly reconnect. Time and again it would try to do its duty, only to disconnect once more, then ultimately it collapsed. Presumably of heart failure. No attempts at resuscitation, could bring it back to life. Rest in peace, kind and faithful modem. You rescued me from the hell of dial-up, and for that I will be forever grateful.

We never realize how dependent we have become on our modern devices, until they are no longer available to us. For two and half days, I had no internet access at all, and I felt totally isolated from the world! No email, no internet news, no Wikipedia, no Blogger, but worst of all, I was faced with the prospect of actually writing and mailing checks to pay my bills! Imagine the horror! Now, that was just too much! Something had to be done, and it had to be done fast, so today I made the long trek into Richmond to visit my wireless provider's store, and get a new wireless USB modem.


The speed with which technology progresses never ceases to amaze me. The modem I bought to replace my nearly 3 year old modem with, was only a quarter of its size, and required no CD to to install it, because its driver was built in. It's hard to figue out the pricing of some of this communications stuff. The modem had a list price of$189.00, but was on sale for $50.00, with a $50.00 mail in rebate, making it essentially free with a new two year contract. I'm sure that at the end of two years, I will have paid far more than the actual cost of the modem, but C'est la vie!

Now that I'm back, I hope that all of the ridiculous carping over "is you is, or is you ain't a real lady" is finally over. Since there is no exact science concerning gender identity, and in spite of all of the pseudo-intellectual tripe that has been offered as science concerning transsexualism, essentially transsexualism remains a self-diagnosis. How absolutely absurd, to tell anyone you have never even met, and haven't spent any time with, that the way they self-identify is bogus! Hang in there sisters! You are who you say you are! And don't worry for one second about how pretty you are. Pettiness is not a requirement for womanhood. If you don't believe that, just take a look at all of the women around you.

I've been watching a really good documentary series on PBS, called Circus. Here are some videos from that series. If you get a chance, check it out. It's well worth the watch.

Melissa XX