Living in the 19th Century

Earlier this week I came back to the flat to discover that my laptop couldn’t see out to the internet. I put Sam to bed for her afternoon nap and then tried the few things I know how to do to debug such problems. Nothing worked.

I picked up the phone to call AC to see if he could help me troubleshoot the problem. No dial tone. The phone was dead.

I thought about looking for a payphone but of course Sam chose that afternoon to actually take a nap and not just goof off in her room.

So there I was stuck in the flat with no phone and no internet service.

I was telling a friend of mine this story the other day and he said, “Ugh. How 19th century!”

But it gets better. A little while later I heard voices outside the flat door. I recognized one of them. It was our landlord! He had been trying to phone me to ask if he could show the flat to a potential buyer. Of course I wasn’t answering the phone because it was out.

I let them in. The potential buyer looked around with a disinterested wealthy eye. I followed them around and asked them to mind the sleeping child. The landlord promised to get the phone and internet connectivity fixed, though he did lend me his mobile phone so I could call AC.

So now, thanks to my friend, I have the notion that we’re living in this little Dickensian flat, where landlords lurk in the hallways, and mysterious moneyed buyers breeze in and out.

Very 19th century.

Except for the mobile part.