One week and a handful of days ago, I was knocked offline by the cable company, because they put my connection on a four-way splitter in the cable companies box. I am finally back online.

It took them one week after I called to get someone out here. It took that someone five minutes to fix.

Added to the fact that I correctly diagnosed the problem (adding someone else to the splitter) based on my TV signal behavior, this has been quite exasperating. The fact is that I could have fixed it myself if I could have gotten to the box...

Hence the unusual, even for me, silence. I'm still catching up, since I had only marginal access to the Internet for the last week. (I really only had it while I was supposed to be at work. Not a problem, but it did prevent my normal reading habits.)

Once again it is demonstrated that the main reason I hate losing net access is the ability to look things up easily and swiftly when I want them, both technical and otherwise. For all I enjoy email, weblogging, and reading all the stuff online I read, I can take it or leave it. The only thing I truly miss is the Digital Library aspect of the Internet.

It did give me time to re-focus on what is now called "The Ethics of Modern Communication", which is coming along nicely after stalling for several months. I now feel confident I will actually finish it (or at least release it) at some point. It is the culmination and fulfillment of this site, a (large) essay that represents the understanding I've developed over the past 2.5 years running this weblog. The fact that the 'blog will turn into a book may intrigue some people.

Hopefully, we'll see that sometime this year. I'm enjoying writing it.