Dial-up sucks

Everyone in the world gets a quicker connect speed on their computers than I do. (You think I'm joking? About a month ago, I tried to sign online, and the connect speed was 9.somthing!) About the best I can ever get is 36.something, and that'a rare occasion. 24 or 26.4 is pretty much it for me.

Years ago, I didn't care. I didn't spend much time on the Net, so it didn't matter how slow everything was. I still don't spend much time on the Net, but I have discovered a couple of things that make me dream wistfully of high-speed connections: iTunes and pictures.

I LOVE iTunes. Love getting to pick only songs I like instead of having to buy entire CDs. Love being able to find older songs when my cassette tapes (hey, I said "older") have worn out. But downloading one average-length song takes 15-20 minutes. And I can't do anything else on the computer but wait.

And photos . . . I've got this cool little digital camera that takes incredible pictures that I want to share with everyone. In fact, Monday I decided to load some pictures from our RWI meeting into a Yahoo photo album to share with everyone who was there. Three HOURS to load THREE pictures! I know, I can resize them, make them lower resolution, blah blah, but all that takes time, and then it still takes forever to load. With the connections I get, I might as well be chiseling stuff in stone and sending it via Pony Express.

But I WANTED to live in the country. I was willing to give up amenities for privacy, woods, and no close neighbors. I don't mind the spiders, snakes, and scorpions; I can live with the deer, the coyotes and the occasional ostrich sighting. I can even bear the dirt road that means our house is NEVER dust-free.

But I sure would love a cable Internet connection. Rachel8:28 AM