It was the first day of my job. I was scheduled to work the grave yard shift
that night and I had been awake since yesterday. I was in desperate need of a good night's
sleep, but I'm a borderline insomniac so it doesn't happen all that much. I was driving home from the woods where I had
been camping with my family for almost a week.
I was supposed to still be there with them. But, I got the job so I had to leave early in
order to make it back in time to start.
I was pulling in the driveway of my house when I saw my
neighbor tossing his laptop out of his front door. He looked like he was completely insane
cursing at it. You could see the fury in
his eyes from 20 yards away. It was as
if that thing had been unfaithful to him and now he was going to make sure it
paid, big time. It reminded me of that
guy from "Office Space" when he was beating the copier to death. While I was getting out of the car he glared
at me, like he could tell I was thinking about how stupid he looked. Then he waved and asked me if I needed a
laptop, I replied swiftly with "not after a beating like that." It was an odd way to be greeted after almost
a week away from home. But at least I
wasn't one of those guys that nobody ever noticed, no matter how much I wish I
could be. I envy guys like that and yet
all they ever seem to do is cry about it.
I guess the grass is always greener, right?
As soon as I opened my door I could tell something was
wrong. I had left my Tv on because I was
always told, it deterred burglaries.
Though it was still on it was nothing but salt & pepper which is
odd, its not like I forgot to pay that month because I steal my cable...I
forget to pay every month. Never had a
problem, I flipped through channels, every one of them the same thing.
About thirty minutes later I was laying down my head hanging
upside down off the foot of the bed throwing playing cards at the wall like
daggers. I was trying to make them stick like I had seen a magician do once on
TV. At about the same time My brother Joey burst
the door open panting form being out of breath Repeatedly saying “They crashed
it! They crashed the internet!"
My brother, Joey is a programmer and has been since he was 9
years old. In fact when he was 11 Google
called the house and asked him to come to California to work for them. They were not happy when they found out they
offered an 11 year job with 6 figures.
But I'm getting off point,
Joey is the kind of guy that can't breathe without his
computer. So, it’s no shock to see him
freaking out over the internet. (Again)
Then I thought about some of the things that had been going that
day. My neighbor killing his laptop, the
TV being out, the fact that he didn't call and that he must have drove an hour
to tell me this.
That’s when it hit me; it was a sudden strange feeling. I felt like I needed to share this
information with the world, but then I thought about how incredibly difficult
that would be now. Joey decided we
should go get Mom and Dad before things got out of control and I agreed and we
hit the road. Everywhere we looked
everyone seemed to be going about their normal business. That was until we hit downtown, it looked
like the epicenter of madness. People
weren't going to extreme violence they just looked lost. Completely and utterly lost.
It wasn't a scene of chaos and destruction like Hollywood
would have us think. It was more like
looking at an old movie. Even though m
vision is perfect and I'm not color blind everything seemed to be black and
white. People were still walking all
over town eating their stupid little bagels and drinking Starbucks. It’s funny because I thought with no internet
people would realize that star bucks is overpriced and full of elitists. But, it appeared that I was wrong about even
that.
But, it appeared that I was wrong about even that because it
was inside that coffee hole that we were informed that "IT" would all
be over soon. Some hackers had planted a
virus and the government was in the process of removing it and had already
issued a statement to let everyone know that the World Wide Web would be back
online tomorrow. Everything would be
restored to its original place, everything except Facebook.
Just kidding, I could never be so lucky
We realized very quickly that it wasn't the end of the world
and that humans are adaptive to just about anything. Yes we may be whiny little latte lovers but
we know how to overcome and band together for the greater good. Joey was still dealing with the DT's and even he
agreed that we could use this day to get to know each other better. We both agreed that we should go buy an
antenna for the next time something like this happened. After all it was a man with an old portable
TV (coat hanger and all) that was informing the masses on this day.
That’s right; the news on this day didn't come from a social
network or satellite radio or even the trusty local news crew. It came directly from the White House to 4
inch, 64 pound portable TV and its coat hanger.
Later I used that coat hanger to break into my car.
Kinda makes that old device doesn’t it.
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Twitter - @BrianKrogstad
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