I have reason to believe that the gods of technology hate me. Paranoia? Perhaps. But the evidence is mounting every day.
Last week our telephone (yes, we still have a land line) did not ring for about six days. In a way, this was quite lovely. I do not answer the phone, anyway, because it is always for Chris. For a while we could make outgoing calls. Then, nothing. Nothing in, nothing out.
Although I loooved the quiet, I began to realize that sometimes a phone is necessary. You can’t order pizza delivery without one. And, of course, you really need one in an emergency. Fortunately, we did not need to call an ambulance or the fire department last week.
After several calls from my husband’s cell phone, the telephone company agreed to pay us a visit. They arrived four days after the promised date. In spite of the fact that they insisted the problem was with our phone, they found that a bit of re-routing to a different box on the pole miraculously repaired the phones inside our home.
Then there was the computer rebellion. My personal computer is only a few months old. However, it is as cranky as an arthritic goat. It has completely crashed three times since we bought it. Once, we had to replace the hard drive, and twice the new hard drive froze up and got stuck on the “blue screen of death.” Thank heavens for Kyle at Columbus Computers for saving my documents.
(Special note to anyone who has sent me an email in the month of July: I did not get any email. I am not ignoring you. Please try again.)
We have revolting appliances in the kitchen, as well. Periodically, the ice maker goes on strike. Sometimes we have ice. Sometimes we do not. We have gotten in the habit of picking up a bag of ice when we shop for groceries. This (I believe) is an insult to the ice maker, and she begins to make ice until it overflows the bin. This works for a week or so, then she once again just refuses to do her job.
The ice maker has recruited the stove in her master plan of domination over the humans. We have two burners that work. The broiler works, however, the oven only gets slightly warm. This creates problems when trying to reheat that cold pizza.
Well, we had such wonderful luck last week with the instructions for a Native American rain dance. (Special note to those who tried it: Enough already! You can stop dancing now.) I decided this sort of approach might help with my computer issues, so I researched computer gods.
In astrology Mercury is the god of communications and travel. The Romans named the planet for the messenger god, because it moves across the sky faster than any other planet. When we have problems with our car or email, that can usually be blamed on Mercury.
In Vodou he is called Simbi and is depicted as a silver serpent. He is associated with the element of mercury, again silver. Simbi rules communications, especially those which move at the speed of light.
I found it quite amazing that two such different cultures would have similar deities. I searched my jewelry box and found a silver ring shaped like a snake. It now sits curled on my keyboard. This is my totem for protection from more computer woes. With any luck we will not visit Kyle for a very long time.
But now, I am shopping for more silver snakes or images of Mercury. I need one for the stove, ice maker and telephone land line. Please let me know if you see any around the Columbus area. I may just buy a plastic snake at the dollar store and paint it silver. That should work, right?
Adele Elliott, a New Orleans native, moved to Columbus after Hurricane Katrina. Email reaches her at [email protected]
Adele Elliott, a New Orleans native, moved to Columbus after Hurricane Katrina.
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