Net Results/Karlin Lillington: I was working away over the weekend, catching up on reading some weblogs and a backlog of emails, when I went into my front hallway. I can't remember why.
But while there, I noticed - as I do about once every six months - all the loose wires from the ancient burglar alarm that came with the house, long since removed.
All that is left are the wires, some at floor level and some hanging from the ceiling, ghost life of security systems past.
It occurred to me - as it does twice a year when I notice the wires - that I should really trim them back flush to floor and ceiling and then fill the holes.
Obviously I should do this. I should have done this a few years ago. We all have those kinds of tasks hovering in the background, the things you get so used to that you stop noticing them, and which, if you handle your life wisely, you can quietly avoid ever doing.
Except this time, I foolishly decided to go get a wire cutter and snip the darn things out of my life.
Oh to reverse time. The problem is, I also snipped the doorbell, which rang once with enthusiasm during its decapitation, then fell silent.
I'd never noticed before how the doorbell wire snaked downwards and ended up near the floor in a jumble with the old alarm wires.
Fine, one can live life without a doorbell, at least until one gets around to splicing the wires back together the following day, which I duly did (no girl should ever be without a little roll of black electrician's tape).
But as with almost all things involving wires and very old technology and decisions made without any forethought, it got worse.
By the next morning, I realised I had also snipped right through my phone line.
But I am slow. I only figured this out well after I'd found my DSL connection to be as dead as a dotcom IPO, and phoned Eircom, via mobile (thank goodness for wireless technology) to report a line fault.
To Eircom's credit, a man arrived a bit later in one of those orange, white and blue vans and faffed around with the telephone pole across the street.
Then he drove away. At about the same time he disappeared around the corner, I remembered the silenced doorbell, and put two and two together.
Well, I tried to, anyway. I got up on a chair and gazed at the aged little Telecom Éireann box up at the top of the front door frame (complete with old Telecom Éireann logo; how quaint it looked, from the good old pre-share-buying days).
I'd never even noticed it before.
Nor had I ever noticed the wire that came out of it, the wire exactly identical to the half-a-dozen Cretaceous-era burglar alarm wires hanging from the ceiling. Among them must be the other half of my phone line.
All the wires had four more wires inside. All the snipped ends looked exactly the same, and all fitted together as if a perfect match, though only one wire could be the Telecom Éireann's box's mate.
So I did what any geek wannabe would do. I phoned Eircom again. I explained that I thought I had cut the wire. I felt stupid. I asked if they could inform the Eircom guy. They said I should tell him myself. I said, but he's driven away. They said, but he should be back.
If the line tested OK, however, he might not be back. Can't you let him know I think I need the line repaired inside the house, I asked.
No, Eircom replied, it would be better to tell him yourself. But he's not there any more, says I.
But you can tell him when he gets back, says Eircom.
I just thought you'd have some way of conveying a message, I say politely, given that you are the phone company. I hung up.
In the meantime, I found the Eircom guy had phoned my mobile to say there was no fault on the line.
I called him and explained the burglar alarm fiasco. You'll have to get that looked at inside the house, he said. I'll have to put in another report.
Then, someone will come look at it.
At this moment, many issues regarding broadband became clear in my mind.
The limbo years, when nothing seemed to happen, and well, I don't want to bring back painful memories, now that they've discovered there is a market for broadband after all.
So up I went onto a ladder and started splicing all those sets of four wires together to see if I could resurrect my internet connection and landline.
Meanwhile, my mother, who had flown especially from California that day and suffered jetlag for this purpose, lifted the receiver after I tried each wire, to see if there was a signal. Nyet.
So back to Eircom. A nice woman said she'd see if she could get me an appointment with another Eircom guy in the morning.
She went away for a long time. Eventually she came back, apologetically. Something's wrong with the system and I can't check tomorrow's schedules, she said. Can I call you in the morning?
I thought about how every encounter I have with Eircom goes like this. Everyone is generally so well-meaning, but the communication systems of this 21st century telecom, which might help all these employees keep track of customer issues, seem of the same era as my defunct burglar alarm.
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