I’m sitting at my computer when a link refuses to load, leaving me with a white screen. I click on several of the 37 other windows I have open. None of them loads. I go and find my wife in front of her computer.
“Are you having trouble with the internet?” I say.
“Why yes,” she says. “I am.” She doesn’t seem as put out by the situation as I am.
I go and look at the wifi router, which is pulsing with an eerie blue light – a sign that all is not well. I unplug it briefly, and let it reset itself. After shifting through many different shades, the blue light returns.
“That ain’t good,” I say.
It’s not good because my internet provider’s customer service is rated among the worst in the nation. If the problem proves to be their fault, I am in for a difficult day, or days.
Also, I have work to do. I cannot afford to get obsessed with my lack of internet. My wife appears behind me, holding a shopping bag.
“Where are you going?” I say.
“Out,” she says.
“You mean you’re leaving me here to deal with this?” I say.
“Yes,” she says. “I am.”
Using my phone, I access my internet provider’s unloved troubleshooting guide. First, it checks to see if I have paid my bill.
“Typical,” I say.
The troubleshooter then checks for outages in my postcode. Then it shows me illustrations of wifi routers flashing different colours, and asks me to choose. I click on blue, only to look up and see the box is now flashing red.
The procedure ends with the problem unresolved, and the opportunity to book a visit from an engineer. The first available slot is for the following morning. This seems rash – the internet has been down for 20 minutes – but there is no less rash option, so I click.
When I look up again, the box is giving off a steady white light.
“Are you kidding?” I say.
My wife returns an hour later to find me still hovering over the router.
“There was a man out there messing with the junction box,” she says.
“Where?” I say. “What kind of man?”
“A human man,” she says.
“I mean, like a cable engineer, or a vandal?”
“He said he was installing the wifi for next door,” she says. “I asked him if he had anything to do with ours going down, and he said no.”
“He would,” I say.
It is possible to access the internet by linking my laptop to my phone, but it’s deeply unsatisfactory. That evening I try to tell my wife what a frustrating day I’ve had, but she refuses to engage with the technical details that bring the story to life.
“Periodically the wifi would come back on,” I say. “Just long enough to reconnect to everything and break the 5G link,” I say.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she says, sitting down and grabbing the TV remote. The television displays a blank blue screen with a box in the middle saying No Signal.
“Wait, does this mean we can’t watch telly?” my wife says.
“I’m afraid so,” I say.
“Do something!” she says.
The next morning I’m in the kitchen waiting for the engineers. At 9am the internet starts working, like a rash clearing up on the morning of your GP appointment. At 9.15 the signal quits again, much to my relief. At 10 I check to see if my time slot has narrowed. I receive a message that says “You do not have an engineer appointment.”
“What?” I say.
“Would you like to book an appointment?” the message says.
“This is why you are the most hated service provider in the entire …”
The doorbell rings. I open the door to find two uniformed engineers on the step.
“This is weird,” I say.
“Is it?” says one.
“Come in,” I say.
The two men are unfailingly polite and helpful. They quickly trace the problem to outside. One of them shows me the spot where the door between the front and back gardens has rubbed the insulation off the cable.
“So it’s my fault,” I say. He smiles.
“We can fix that for you no problem,” he says. And they do, in about half an hour. One of them gives me his mobile number, in case I encounter any difficulties while they’re working in the area.
“It was amazing,” I tell my wife later. “They even put these slippers on in the house to protect the floors.”
“It’s enough to restore your faith in humanity,” she says.
I think: steady on.