There's Nothing New in the World

Yesterday one of the major internet/wireless providers in Canada had a massive outage that lasted most of the day.  Tens of millions went without cell/internet service, and multiple companies, including some banks and government agencies, came to a halt.  This even got reported on BBC and NPR, so I guess it's a really big thing.

But in the overall scheme of things, it's just another one of those "shit happens" things in life, ain't it?

As Shakespeare wrote in Hamlet:

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,

Indeed, if you consider the context, the shit that happened everyday was so much worse 400 years ago in Shakespeare's time.   Yet people lived and moved on.  They probably had different expressions for it, but essentially it comes back to "shit happens," no?

And face it, this type of thing is all around us.  One minute you are doing your thing, and next thing Russian bombs and missiles fall on you just to satisfy fucking Putin's fantasy of rebuilding the Russian Empire.

One moment you are chilling on the beach, and next thing a tsunami brings to an end everything you know and love.

Or, closer to home, one day you were living a regular day, and next thing you know the killjoy that is Covid stopped the music.

When the internet/cell outage happened, I recalled that scene in Stephen King's The Mist, when power was out and no technology worked and people had no idea what to do anymore.  Those who live by the sword, I guess, die by the sword.  Last night we went out to dinner.  The restaurant's payment system was down due to the wireless debacle.  They found this old credit card machine.  You remember the old days when they mechanically slide this gadget across your credit card and give you a carbon copy?  Like in the 70s and 80s.  Haha.  What a blast from the past!  But they couldn't figure out how to use it!  So they had to manually copy down all the credit card information from each customer, and actually write out the amount etc.  Oh what fun.  Especially when people tried to figure out how much to tip, or when they wanted to split the bill!  There is a reason why we learn arithmetic.  Fucking A.

And of course so much for a cashless society.  Stopped at a gas station, and they had a sign up, CASH ONLY.  A lot of people don't even carry $5 cash on them.  And, haha, bank machines didn't work either!

Instead, why not take it as a chance to live without the fucking cell for a day.  Detox from the shit.  We don't really to be surgically attached to the phone all day long, no?

Interesting, this attachment to and fascination with new technology is nothing else, notwithstanding each generation's fervent belief that THEIR technological advancement is the only marvel.   Some 600 years ago, noted Samuel Pepys in his famous diary, when watches first came to being, he could not stop checking his watch ALL DAY LONG.  Prior to that, of course, people didn't really care what time it was.  But once the watch was invented, telling time became a "necessity."  But is it really?  Is the cell really a necessity?  You be the judge.

Or, if it's this bad, killing oneself may help, though as Shakespeare also wrote,

But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover’d country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;

Yeah, things could be worse where you're headed.

All this is nothing new.  Step back and chill.  Life, as bad it is, goes on with or without you being happy.  So, to be or not to be?  Your choice.  Maybe better to just CARRY ON and DRINK SOME TEA.