A life without Internet.

I like online shopping. I like gossip websites. I like twitter. I like blogging. I like watching TV shows online before they are aired in the UK. I like YouTube. Basically I like the internet, a lot. So imagine my absolute despair when a few weeks ago I rushed home from work excited to watch the new Gossip Girl episode online only to be greeted with the news that my Internet was broken.

I spent over two hours rebooting, unplugging, reconnecting, configuring and sobbing to myself before it sunk in that I was Internet-less. I felt like I’d lost my left arm. I sat there in silence, by myself, staring at my laptop hoping that if I stared at it for long enough it would miraculously connect. It didn’t, so I rang Sky. I was greeted by a friendly voice. This wound me up even more. I restrained myself from growling at the poor unsuspecting girl on the other end of the phone. After doing all the boring confirming who you are gobbledegook I told her my issue. The conversation went a little bit like this:

“Basically I can’t watch Gossip Girl because my Internet has broken and now I want to cry.” “It’s on itv2 tonight?” “I’ve already seen that one. I NEED to see the latest one from America.” “Wow. What website do you use?... Oops I mean sorry Miss Jamieson. Let’s try and fix this for you.”

After this exchange the anger in my voice subsided and I warmed to my new “friend” Helen. She asked if I’d rebooted and unplugged the box. Of course I bloomin’ had. She then told me to go and get a screw-driver… Errrrm yeah ok then, let me just grab my tool box? WTF, as if I’d have a screw driver that’s something my dad has, not me! Alas seeing as I no longer live at home I subsequently don’t own a screw driver so I had to improvise and used a nail file. BOOM. I opened up the little box and tried the wire in another hole. Still nothing. After all my efforts there was no reward. Helen then told me that she’d send an engineer out, any week day either between 8am-1pm or 1pm-6pm. And this is where we hit another brick wall. I live with one other person, her name is Kayleigh and she’s lovely. However Kayleigh and I both work full time. No one else is in the flat apart from a hamster named Winston (who wouldn’t be able to open the door to host the engineer.) Also I was heading back home for a week for my birthday and then the week after Kayleigh was on holiday. I asked whether engineers could come at the weekends. “No” was the blunt response. Helen and I were about to fall out… and we were getting on so well! So anyway, I had to book an engineer in for 2 weeks time. How convenient. Not. I hung up and found myself absolute seething inside. I was furious. How was I meant to live without the Internet? I had a good 5 days left in the flat before heading home. To make my story even more tragic there were no “open” connections that I could connect to. None. Nada. Zilch. It was like a kick in the teeth. Long gone are the days when you slyly connected to your next door neighbours without them knowing, that ain’t happening anymore.

Now of course I’m obviously over exaggerating a little bit because I wasn’t totally Internet less as I had the use of my phone, so my twitter and facebook use was carried out as normal. It was more the fact that I couldn’t watch Gossip Girl and people were tweeting about how good it was that was winding me up. Thankfully I have friends with the Internet so I basically invited myself round to watch it. Having watched it I felt a lot better and more positive about life. But it really got me to thinking about what we did 10 or so years ago when we didn’t have the Internet?

The Internet is an everyday part of life for most people now. As of 2011, more than 2.2 billion people (which is nearly a third of Earth’s population) use services provided by the Internet. Even my Grandma uses it to email her grandchildren, google-ing art exhibitions and she once YouTubed ‘dancing dogs’ (with my help obviously!) When you think about how much you use the Internet it’s kind of scary. How often do you check twitter? Update your facebook status? Browse shops online? Read online articles from newspapers? Email someone? Watch catch-up TV on your iPad? Do online banking? I remember the days when broadband wasn’t invented and we used dial-up. Hearing that funny buzzing noise followed by a few beeps and a dialling tone which meant it was connecting to the internet and that people could no longer call your home phone. Hilarious! But before that I also remember a time when I didn’t use the internet at all. My young childhood was internet-free (to my knowledge), where as kids these days have iPads and facebook accounts. Crazy!

The rise in Internet use mainly occurred around the mid-1990s, when the Internet had a drastic impact on culture and communication, especially with the use and increase of emailing. It’s very easy to see that that the Internet has made communication so much quicker and easier, which is brilliant. It’s also made everything so much more accessible for everyone. Being a Uni graduate I honestly don’t think I would have been able to achieve my degree without the Internet, which I’m sure is a point fellow students and ex students will back me up on. The Internet, for a student, is an absolute god-send!

But even now I’m not a student I find the services that the Internet offers invaluable. I for one use it every day, without fail and I wouldn’t have it any other way. The Internet is one of my best friends: it’s a source of knowledge, a place for breaking news, also a place for making friends and exchanging gossip. In my eyes a life without Internet isn’t even worth contemplating (which I’m sure you’ll agree with because without the Internet you wouldn’t have been able to just read this fabulous blog. See - point proven!)

Long live the Internet and God forbid any more connection problems. *touches wood*