There was so much I wanted to say yesterday about the internet, but for some reason I didn’t include it. After wondering if I’d just started it and then left it dangling, I saw that I hadn’t, so started it again today.
Our internet was Very Slow on Monday, and while I wasn’t affected at all by the major cloud outage, I do wonder now if it had a knock-on effect. I was so worried about the speeds, or lack of, that I contacted our new provider to see if there was a known issue.
She checked everything, but I was getting speeds of 12mbps and 180mbps when they should both be around the 500mbps mark, upload and download. We reset the box, but that didn’t work either. And then I realised that not only did I have the ethernet cable in but my wifi was still on. And not only that, the old Sky box is still on too while we run them both parallel.
Oh, but before I called her, I had other issues with the telephone. We still have a separate land line, but it wasn’t connected, and when I went to check, the old Sky box was turned off as well. At least I now knew that the old Sky box wasn’t interfering with the new signals.
We had a power cut on Sunday evening. It was banging down with rain, we were all snug and cosy in front of the telly, when everything went off. A quick peep out of the window told us it was just us. So then we had to find a torch so we could check the fuse box. And yes, the master had blown out, or popped up.
Twice the poet flicked it back down again, and both times it popped back up. So we had to turn all the fuses off, switch on the master, and turn on each of the fuses individually. And it turned out that the garage circuit was where the issue was. We have a second fridge-freezer in the garage and 2 security lights are powered from there. Plus, of course, the usual lights and sockets.
Obviously, we could tide ourselves over until morning with the garage circuit turned off. But when we had a look in the daylight, one of the security lights had blown in the rain and shorted the entire house.
The poet made it safe and we reported it, and the garage circuit is back on again, but the security lights aren’t.
But the internet was still slow. After a few more tweaks at the head office end, it did start to speed up. It didn’t quite reach the dizzying heights of 500mbps, but it did get close to the 300s, so that was an improvement. And we decided that the power cut and resetting the box might have some impact and perhaps we should give it some time. Not one of us considered the major cloud outage.
Grand-doggy #1 went home again, but we found out he’s coming back again today, and this time he’s staying with us for good. (Long story, not my story, respecting others’ privacy, etc, etc.)
On Tuesday I was back on it, but I didn’t get any work done. I wrote yesterday’s blog post and went to fetch a picture, but there was Pixabay gone. I tried several browsers, and I couldn’t get it working on the Mac, but it did work on the phone, which uses the same internet but via wifi. So I tried switching to wifi to see if that worked. It didn’t.
I did a search to see if Pixabay was down, and all the sites were saying it was up and it was just me who couldn’t get on. Which meant it must be something to do with the Mac. There’s been an update sitting there since mid-September that I’ve resisted so far, but I wondered if it might be that. So I caved and did the update, which took about 30 minutes, all in.
While that was chugging along, I had another look at Pixabay, and this time all the sites were saying it was down and not just me after all. So perhaps it was down and I didn’t have to upgrade my Mac…I did a speed test as well, while I thought about it, and we’re getting closer to the 500s now for download, but still struggling at the 200-mark for uploads. I will monitor and schedule a time slot when I can speak to them for longer.
At 4:45pm, I gave up for the day. The poet was on his way home and we wanted to nip out to get some pet supplies for our new family member.
Today should be better, but a roofing contractor is coming to look at a leak in the conservatory, and the gas man is coming to test our boiler. And then, of course, the dog will be here.
Oh, how frustrating! I hope it all gets sorted out soon.
Do you have an AI data center in your region? They are causing all kinds of grid issues on this side of the pond. They need to be on their own grids (which they fully pay for) and not ruining everyone else’s lives.
I had a thought about the knees I meant to post yesterday — do you have any kneeling mats for when you work in the garden? I’ve started using mine inside, and I also use the anti-fatigue mat, whenver I have to do something on the floor. It helps! The old knees ain’t what they used to be!
Hope today is better.
I hadn’t thought about a data centre, AI or otherwise. At the last but one house, yes, that’s very likely. Here, it’s a bit more remote and industry is only just discovering us (and wanting to cover great swathes of fields with solar panels).
I have a kneeler/seat for the garden, but it hasn’t come out yet. I rarely get on my knees in the house, but I could probably do with one of those foam kneelers, keep it under the desk.