There Has Been a Failure to Communicate

Crabby Old Lady has been in an unusually bad mood – even for her - since the nor’easter hit here in Portland, Maine on 16 April. First, her internet connection was down for two days and it hasn’t gotten much better with service available maybe ten hours a day (Crabby is guessing), but impossible know which ten hours or for how long it will last each time it returns during the day.

And even when Crabby is connected, it is slower than snailmail and impossible to get any work done. It’s damned hard running two daily blogs under these conditions.

But that’s not all that's bothering Crabby. Although each of her complaints is minor in itself, they add up – and they all seem to be about communication, or lack thereof.

ITEM: How is it that a voice message left by the doctor’s office on Thursday doesn’t arrive on Crabby’s cell phone until Sunday afternoon?

ITEM: Who at the Criminal Court in New York City is ringing Crabby's cell phone eight or ten times a day since Friday with a recorded message that she must call a non-existent number or risk arrest, and why do these calls get through when her doctor's message doesn't?

ITEM: Why does the agent for the insurance on Crabby’s condominium in New York keep calling about renewal twice a week after Crabby has explained that she sold that apartment nearly a year ago? What part of “sold” doesn’t the agent understand?

ITEM: And what fool thought Snap Shots is a good idea for blogs and websites? It is more irritating than Twitter because it is foisted on unwary users without their consent. Have you seen it yet? It hits Crabby now several times a day. It goes like this:

She’s having a fine ol’ time reading something she is enjoying when her mouse strays over a link and WHAM! A miniature, but still large pop-up of the webpage it links to covers what she’s reading.

When there are a lot of them on a page (there usually are) and Crabby tries to get her mouse away from the first pop-up, several more appear. Fair warning: Crabby never returns to a blog or website that uses Snap Shots.

ITEM: And wait until you hear this one: last week, Crabby was returning from the neighborhood deli. Yes, she will admit she crossed the street in the middle of the block, but hey – this is Portland, Maine where at the outside, 50 cars a day go down her street, and the coast was clear.

Suddenly, a car came barreling around the corner and Crabby speeded up to avoid getting hit. She didn’t see a manhole cover that is raised about two inches above the pavement. She tripped, went down hard, stunned by the pain in both knees, an elbow and her head. As she struggled to get up, the car drove around her and what do you suppose the driver was holding to his ear? If Crabby has to tell you, you've been - well, asleep at the wheel for the past decade.

The shiner on Crabby's right eye started out bright red, has been through purple and is just now turning a bilious shade of orange. And it will be a good while before she will be capable of kneeling again.

Communication is usually judged to be a good thing. Right now, Crabby Old Lady has her doubts.

[EDITORIAL NOTE: In Tapestry 1 over at The Elder Storytelling Place, Judith Taylor tells the tale of a youthful missed opportunity and its resolution half a century later.

Comments

[tamarika]

Oh dear, Ronni. {{{}}} I am sending you cyber hugs and holding you in my thoughts. I hope Ollie knows how to comfort you. This is not "Crabby," this is "Sore Ronni." I hope things get better very, very soon.

[Rhea]

I'm sorry to hear you got hurt. The phone calls can be such an invasion of privacy, though. I remember having my number confused with that of a local mental hospital and I would get the most annoying calls from relatives of the patients.

[AlwaysQuestion]

Ouch! Keeping a good thought for you, Ronni, that all of this pain and tsuris is soon behind you.

[Rain]

Goodness, you weren't kidding about a failure to communicate :( Hope your injuries heal quickly.

[Dee]

Good grief, Ronni! Sounds like a hug or two & perhaps a good, stiff drink might be the ticket. I sure hope you're feeling better very soon......Dee)))))

[Virginia]

After I called Comast to come to my house 5 times in one month because of intermittent internet service, they finally fixed it and they gave me a free month of service. Try calling them every day. (If you can get your phone to work! :) )

And, just so you know, Wordpress decided to add snap shot to my blog, it isn't my choice, and I don't see how to make it go away. Please don't boycott me.

[Crabby Old Lady]

Virginia: That makes it even worse. What gives a host the right to add a anything to your site that isn't your choice.

This calls for loud and repeated protest.

[Karen]

I hope things get better soon! You've had enough. It's no wonder Crabby is in an unusually bad mood.

[Deejay]

I feel doubly sympathetic with Crabby's recent troubles, having experienced several of them in the past year, including almost being run down by a driver on a cell phone who was making an illegal right turn. Comcast just fixed my internet problem yesterday (after several weeks of connecting me to people in the more remote regions of the planet).

Hang in there, girl.

[ronni prior]

I'd be crabby, too! I got frustrated enough to switch from DSL to cable modem, and have had very little trouble since.

I am sorry about your fall. I am about fed up with inconsiderate drivers, but, aside from cussing, what's a person to do?

If anyone starts adding things to my blog, there is going to be a total relocation of Ronni's Rants! I'm on blogger, and, while I gripe frequently about the more frustrating things about them, at least they don't go adding stuff!

[Cowtown Pattie]

Good thing Crabby isn't Catholic.

[Cowtown Pattie]

But, in all seriousness, that fall could have been really, well, serious.

Pain and bruises aside, I always get embarrassed when I trip and fall. Like an Ellen DeGeneres' skit, I try to make it appear as if the trip was intended, looking around to see who could have been a witness, all the while acting quite nonchalant and uninjured.

After I round the corner, I let fly with the tears and blue-smoke words.

[kenju]

Oh, Ronnie, I am sorry! Too bad you didn't see him coming, since he obviusly didn't see you.

[Crabby Old Lady]

Pattie: Lots of blue-smoke words at top volume is a well-known, medical remedy for pain...

[Alan G]

Virginia and other interested parties…..

To “turn off” Snap Preview on your blog follow the steps below:

*****************************

Log in to your WordPress account.

Then go to your “Dashboard”

You will then see several menu items to choose from across the top to the page.

Click on “Presentation”

Then you will see some additional menu items of choice when that window opens – click on “Extras”.

When the new window opens you will see a box which you can “check” if you want “Snap Preview” to be functional on your blog or “un-check” if you do not.

Then click on “Update Extras” and your visitors will no longer be annoyed with the Snap Previews.

*****************************

Taking the above actions should hopefully soothe Crabby Old Lady's disposition until Ronni shows back up. LOL

[Susan]

AAAARGH! What more could one say?

[Cop Car]

Sorry about your tumble, Crabby, and about your loss of communications. Although it looks like the governor of Maine will not be issuing an emergency declaration (well, that's how it looks at this point, anyway), many people are without heat and hot water in your state (or much of anything else that had been in their basements). Don't you hate it when someone tells you to...count your blessings. Good luck!

[marja-leena]

Ouch, that hurts! Hope the bruises heal quickly and all those other annoyances will go away so Crabby can be calm again. Bad drivers with cell phones make me crabby too! I'd be tempted to change my phone number if that were not a huge bother as well.

[Chancy]

Crabby
I am glad you did not break anything when you fell. I know the helpless feeling a fall can engender as I fell flat on my face on a sidewalk back in December. No fun at all. Black, blue, purple fade to yellow.
As for the telephone harassment, can you change your cell phone number and would that help any? Darn it. They need to leave you alone.

PS: Don't read Stephen King's horror novel "Cell" anytime soon.:)

From Amazon Review:
In "Cell" King taps into readers fears of technological warfare and terrorism. Mobile phones deliver the apocalypse to millions of unsuspecting humans by wiping their brains of any humanity, leaving only aggressive and destructive impulses behind. Those without cell phones, like illustrator Clayton Riddell and his small band of "normies," must fight for survival, and their journey to find Clayton's estranged wife and young son rockets the book toward resolution"

[Heidi]

The good news? Karma will eventually catch up to that obnoxious driver--in the guise of Car-ma.

[millie garfield]

One thing on top of another - not good - It's bad enougth when you have to deal with computer problems and then to fall on top of that - No wonder you are a crabby old lady.

I hope the computer and Crabby get strightened out soon.

Feel better!!!

[ian]

I had never realised how annoying the Snap Previews were until recently. It has taken me a week however to work out how to turn it off - which Crabby will be pleased to hear has now been done!

[Virginia]

Thanks to Ronni's email alert, and Alan G's directions, there's no more Snap Shot on my blog.

Wish your other sources of irritation were so easy to remove.

[Cindy]

Ronni - I'm sorry about your fall, absolutely no fun!! could've been worse, but sounds like it was a pretty hard fall.

I'm finding myself a little irritated at how ubiquitous cell phone use is. I only have a cell phone--no land line, so it's not like I'm against them. But I'm really appalled by how many people I see driving while holding a cell phone to their ear!

I can relate--as I imagine most others can, to your long string of one upsetting thing after another!! It seems like when you have those times when it's just one thing right after another, that can really get to you.

[Betsy Devine]

Dear Ronni--I'm so sorry that real life has been buggy. I'm in York tonight--would you be free for lunch and commiseration if I drive up to Portland tomorrow? Would you like me to bring chicken soup when I come? Email and phone numbers to follow, but virtual hugs right now!!!! Betsy

[Joy]

What a friggin' disasterous 10 days Ronni. Crabby? I'm surprised you're not postal. You must have a very high tolerance level. You need some TLC...quickly. I'm just glad that your fall wasn't worse than it was...which was bad enough. I can only send you ((((((((BIG WARM AND HEALING HUGS))))))))))). Can you feel them?

Maybe you got all of the bad stuff out of the way....I can only hope so. Hope you internet connection clears up...I know that's pretty frustrating when you're trying to work. Hey, I wonder if that had anything to do with the e-mail that wouldn't go through when I tried to submit a post for the Elderbloggers site. Hmmm. I'll try again sometime.

Feel better soon Ronni...CHEERS!

[Kay Dennison]

Ohhhhhhhhhhh my!!!!!!!!! You have earned the right to be crabby after all this! Sooooooooo own it & work it & above all, be good to yourself!!!!!! I find that the last is most important in times of strife and stress and we tend to forget that in our frustration. Better days are coming, my friend!

[joared]

Good heavens! What else could happen? If you're going to go down, just relax completely and roll. Whatever you do, protect your head, if possible -- better to have a broken arm than a bumped head. That advice is all a little late, and let's hope you never have another occasion to need to use it.

I fell in the house a few years ago, and am sure following above protected me from much worse. But, I must tell you, the pain and stiffness I began to experience a day or so later, for which I finally had to see the Dr., was not good. I'm no panty waist as I have a high tolerance for pain. Dr. said I had "deep tissue bruising." I don't want it ever again as it took many weeks to lessen, and hope you don't experience it. Thank heavens for a massaging chair-size heating pad, I had coincidentally given my husband as a gift, which I sometimes augmented by using with moist towels.

I can't believe all those messed up phone calls, much less that persistent Internet connection issue. Surely does give good reason for second thoughts about how we all would manage during disaster times of our own.

Of course, your errant driver stopped to help -- doesn't matter, big city or smaller one, drivers don't give a hoot any more, or pay attention; often think nothing of running stop signs and red lights.

As for the popups, I've encountered a few, which startled the heck out of me. I thought it was a rogue problem unique to my computer with which I would have to figure out how to contend. Boy, if Blogger ever pulls that stuff, bye bye to my blog, at least with them, as I won't put up with it.

I surely wish you a rapid mending, and hope the experience didn't in any way adversely affect the healing from your recent surgery.

[donna]

Ouch. Feel better - lots of ice and rest.

[knomad]

What a long list of things to be crabby about. I think you are entitled to be crabby. On another type of blog the explanation would be "Mercury must be retrograde." as in Mercury the planet somehow is related to communications.

Some of my friend started to have falls when crossing the street and they all were told to get rid of the bifocals and go to single lens glasses. Which means a pair for reading and another for distance but it sure helps to see the bumps in the path such as a manhole cover that is higher/lower than the road.

I hope your bruises heal fast.

[Maureen]

I'm so sorry you fell and were badly hurt. What with everything, I don't blame you for your unusually bad mood. You have a right to be crabby! I hope your injuries heal quickly and you will feel better very soon.

[Darlene]

There is little I can add to the comments except to wish you a speedy recovery and hope your series of bad issues are now a thing of the past.

[Darlene]

There is little I can add to the comments except to wish you a speedy recovery and hope your series of bad issues are now a thing of the past.

[Candace]

Nice to meet you Crabby!

I recently read about a "survey" some group took about whether or not one was "addicted" to the internet.

According to them, I am. It was something like tending to get online more than once a day...sheesh.

So I guess I am addicted to my phone and my truck and my fridge and my bathroom too.

We get used to communication and it is frustrating when any type of service is interrupted.

[jen]

Crabby - virtual condolences re all your 'items'. I'm with you on the Snap preview thing. I find it quite annoying too. As for people driving while talking on the phone - grrrr. It's against the law here but it doesn't stop people doing it.

[Betsy Devine]

Ronni, great to see you yesterday, and with no shiner, I'm glad to say! Now come down to Boston and crabby-old-lady with me sometime!

[Jeanne]

Oh ouch!!! It's always awful falling - surprising and painful and humiliating all at once. I'm very glad to hear you didn't break anything. But as my mom (who fell more and more frequently as her kidney disease caused her to lose feeling in her feet and with it, balance) used to say... at least you don't have to worry about osteoperosis! And I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one who is super-annoyed by SnapShots!! A pop-up by any other name remains a pop-up.