I just spent a weeks' vacation in Fairfield, Iowa, an odd little
town about two hours from Cedar Rapids. My parents and three little
sisters moved out there about a year ago, because Silver Spring, Maryland
(a suburb of our nation's capitol) just ain't a real good place to raise
kids (I should know -- I was raised there. *grin*)
Not sure which shocked me more, though -- the fact that the town
actually did have an ISP (Dome Systems/fairfield.com), or the fact that
this one ISP was muddling along with just a 56K line.
(I know, I know, I'm spoiled -- when I have to wait more than half
a second for my keystrokes to show up, I usually go into BOFH mode and
kill(9) whoever's grepping that two-megabyte file.)
And, he /is/ growing -- in his words, he'll soon "have a T1 right
into the backbone." (By "backbone" he meant MCI.) Truth is, looks like
they've got a pretty nice little ISP there in Fairfield; if you're ever
out there and need connectivity, I highly suggest Dome Systems. Not that
it matters, of course -- he's the only one in town. *grin*
But now I'm back, with the kind of shift I like. Midnight to 8
AM, nothing happening, two 2-liter bottles of Mountain Dew awaiting my
pleasure, a big box of Pop Tarts to munch on, the chance to start playing
with strange mailing list stuff, and (best of all) it's relaxed enough
that I can get through all my mail and news.
One of these days I should go on a vacation that I'd actually
consider a vacation, instead of a family thing. Not that I dislike my
family, of course -- it really was a kind of a fun trip -- but I'd like to
take some time off to sit around on the porch of some cabin someplace,
probably by a lake, alternate between birdsong and mind-numbingly loud
music, have the leisure to log in and hack headers (one of my favorite
activities, believe it or not) whenever I damned well feel like it instead
of whenever I can find the time or whenever something breaks, imbibe a
whole bunch of different brands of beer, and just generally relax.
You know, that really does sound good. Anybody got a cabin
somewhere within a ten-hour drive of D.C. that they'd be willing to rent
out come Spring or early Summer? Dedicated 56K optional, but it's got to
have a quality phone line. *grin*
