At the office where the papers grow she takes a break

[austin_dern]

So, some post-storm coverage from my family: they've got power back, and have since the weekend. So that's covered the most important thing. My parents' Internet has gone out, but there's no clear way to tell whether that's because the cable modem is screwed up or because Verizon is Verizon. I did try helping her out some, but I barely know what's going on with that as it is, and the notes I left in Post-It form on the inside of the kitchen cabinet usually only help me get to where I can meet Verizon's technical support with, ``Yes, I logged in to 192.whatever.whatever.whatever'', and the phone number they gave us for Mac-aware tech support hasn't worked in months. It's not even that it doesn't got to the right department anymore; it isn't even in service. Running out of numbers, Verizon? So I confessed ignorance and my parents, I hope, are working through it with them and using the Internet at Starbucks.

My mother, by the way, showing the sort of tenacity which --- well, that's an astounding family secret maybe not Google's business --- went to her office the first day power was back, although absolutely none of her clients showed up, possibly because twelve-ninths of the state was out of power, gas rationing was being put on, and there was a 7-to-7 curfew. But she got to her post.

My father potentially has a fair bit of work in fixing up the homes of people whose homes he fixes up per need. It's hard to say, since most of them live near the Shore and they're really, really socked. He got a bit of ill-wind business after Hurricane Irene last year, including the lugging around of sacks of Quikrete that convinced his doctor there was no need for a stress test on his heart, mere weeks before he had his emergency heart surgery. Anyway, he's more busy making sure they're OK than whether they need a new basement or maybe the house floated back to their neighborhood.

My sister-in-law is apparently distressed that her child has missed a week of school, due to the closures. My father says she's worried about my niece falling behind, although he and I can't figure out of whom. Possibly it's related to the stress of finding power and Internet while mostly alone with a five-year-old while her husband lives up to the transit agency's demands.

Trivia: On 23 April 1922 the Toms River, New Jersey, beach patrol reported seeing a fireball fall into Barnegat Bay; huge waves washed ashore minutes later. Source: Rain of Iron and Ice, John S Lewis.

Currently Reading: The Silicon Man, Charles Platt. I find it wholly credible that the people working a fairly secret military-funded research project into uploading brains to computers would, when they find an FBI agent getting too close to their little illegal arms manufacturing sideline, choose to kill him whilst uploading his brain into their computer system and then throw his corpse (presumably sans brain) into his car and drive it off the freeway like a 70s cop show. Also that after an uploaded mind/virus hybrid ensures that no networked computer anywhere can be used by any government agency for anything but any corporation computer can do whatever it wants there's going to be a near-utopian ideal of freedom and equality and of course people in space, especially now that people can choose to kill themselves in favor of their brain-uploads into computers where their thoughts and feelings can be easily manipulated by their super-users. This is a book I recall reading with mild fondness in the early 90s but either I missed the hard Analog loopiness or the Suck Fairy's been lightly dusting it, which happens.

Comments

[moxie_man]

My sister-in-law is apparently distressed that her child has missed a week of school, due to the closures.

Back in '98 Northern New England (and Quebec) was hit with an ice storm that left behind a coating of 2 to 6 inches of ice in the middle of January. My neighborhood joined the 100 hour club (100+ hrs with no power). My uncle nine miles away in the countryside went 3 full weeks without power. Most of the school systems were shut down a week or more around here.

The legislature at the urging of the governor passed an emergency measure waiving all school systems from having to make up the lost class time (Maine State law is that the school year must be X number of days long). Many teachers did what they could to make-up for the lost time as best they could so that the students still received most of the education they would have if there had been no time lost. Maybe something similar will happen in Jersey/southern New York.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

New Jersey has a similar rule; I'm pretty sure it's 180 days minimum. There's some snow days built into the system, naturally, although I'd think a week without power might well gobble them all up (and I don't know how bad the Nor'easter Wednesday proved to be, though my parents lost power for a while again).

I'd expect the legislature to put in a waiver for the lost class time too, as the least traumatic way of dealing with the situation.

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

I like your sister-in-law (wait, what is your sister-in-law to me? Is she also my sister-in-law? My sister-in-law-in-law?), but she does serve to remind me why I don't have children.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure what her proper relation to you is. I'd be inclined to dub you sisters-in-law, but I'm notoriously loose about these kinds of appellations.

I do appreciate that as merely the uncle I can just leave when my niece is getting to be too much, but, I'd have to expect that days without power makes any child, however extremely well-behaved, trying. I'd be pretty bad as a kid, and all I wanted to do was be left alone so I could read. And putter on the computer.

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

I meant more the excessive anxiety over the possibility that missing one week of school might set her back in some catastrophic fashion. I missed at least that much for the flu more than once.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes, that I can't figure. I don't think I ever missed that much school, but even if one had ... after all, everybody in the school district, probably the state, is set back by the same amount. In thirteen years of schooling one week just doesn't matter.