Welcome to SamiLand!

[samidodamage]

A story:
Part 1
Where life is always full of sunshine and flowers! Sami went to live in the back of beyond (near where she grew up) almost 15yrs ago. There were challenges as Sami had gotten accustomed to the benefits of modern conveniences in 'city living' and access to those conveniences was severely curtailed.
There was no more starting a late dinner, realizing she had missing ingredients and popping over to the local grocery store and back in less than 15min. Now, a one way trip to a grocery store is a 20min drive; it closes at 10pm during the week and 9pm on weekends. For one that is open 24hrs, it's 30min one way driving.
There is no 'cable' company with lines run out this far. Sami substituted satellite services (like DishNetwork/DirecTV), but learned those services (while as expensive as cable subscriptions) are nowhere near as reliable as cable. They are vulnerable to completely losing service when it rains. The most reliable and fastest internet available was a DSL line which was installed as well. It was early 2008 and Sami got a Netflix subscription; that was the early days when you received DVD's in the mail and returned them the same way. Sami and family learned to order DVD's they'd like to see and hold off watching until there was a 'loss of service' event. After each event, DVD's were returned and a new set ordered. Cellphone service was spotty at best. None of the household cellphones could get a signal without going outside and walking around the yard to find a 'good spot'. Sami covered this with having a landline bundled with her DSL internet service 'in case of emergency' and for incoming calls. Two 'good spots' in the yard had outdoor seating provided; though it was still annoying when it rained.
Over the years, things have improved. All cellphones can now get one bar of service inside the house, and the towers have been upgraded to 4G. That's sufficient for talk and text. A few years ago, Sami's ISP began upgrading to fiber optic lines and offered speeds of 100Mbps. Sami signed up right away. In the intervening years, Sami's daughter had grown up and Sami was a grandmother as well. Her daughter and grandson live with Sami and Mr. Sami. It was getting hard to keep all devices running on a DSL line (and the lines themselves were old and had their own issues). When they first installed the fiber optic, they were unable to deliver 100Mbps, but they could deliver 75 at a slightly reduced rate. That speed was sufficient for her needs then and remains so today.
Sunshine and flowers left SamiLand on August 13th. Internet service was unable to be delivered over the fiber optic lines. On August 20th, the ISP appeared to have repaired the issue, but service remained unreliable off and on. Then, it went completely away on Sept 23rd. The first available appointment for a tech to come to the residence was Oct 3rd. On 9/29 Sami received a marketing text from her ISP: Great news: We've just upgraded your internet speed to 100Mbps at no additional charge. Sami still had no access to said internet at any speed...
In the subsequent weeks, there were at least 3 more 'at residence' tech appts as the support ticket was escalated, including the last one on 10/18. As of October 18th, internet has appeared to return, though Sami is not convinced it will remain. The internet speed is now in the range of 'up to' 75Mbps, not 100. Download speed test is hitting in the high 60's for the tower that's connected via ethernet line to the modem.
Sami learned something new over the last several weeks: it takes 2 bars of service to run a hotspot that a computer can log into (otherwise it's too slow to connect). There is one spot in a north window of the house right next to the window latch where a cell will reach that 2 bars. (Imagine the calisthenics gone through by the members of her household figuring that one out!). Even then, it was not enough speed for her old (iphone 10) to load Elvenar on her phone, though she regularly does her daily neighbor visits via that phone (when it's connected to the household wifi). Since Sami knew her challenges here and had fiber optic internet, she elected a 'limited data' cell plan (4GB/line) for the family. If a line used all its data, additional data would be automatically added at a cost of $10/2GB until the account reset for the next month. That was 'insurance' for when there were issues with the ISP delivering service. Historically, no outages had lasted more than 4-5 days, so that cost seemed acceptable. Never in a million years did Sami think she'd be without ISP service completely for 6 out of the last 8 weeks...

 

[samidodamage]

A story:
Part 2: Elvenar
Due to the above issues, Sami had little time for the forum. Her first day truly back on the forums was Oct 19th. Reading to get 'caught up'. Well, that's never going to happen, lol! Hopefully she didn't miss much, but here is what she found after a long absence:
Helya is gone. Gone. She gave a bit of notice, everyone got to say their goodbyes, she's still around under her game name. If she's still able to get @helya tags: You were absolutely the best CM ever; the forum will not be the same without you. I'll miss you; best wishes on your next adventure in your journey through life.
Reviewing threads, it looks like the obligatory 'fair trades' discussion veered into philosophical territory addressing the question of 'is it the journey or the destination'. Then, of course, it went back to trying to define 'fair'. And discussing whether cross trades are ever 'fair'. Seriously guys: We don't have any debate when a player has a 'catering' vs a 'fighting' city as to which is the best. That obviously impacts individual play much less than trading, but I've decided to give the same slack to players who enjoy the 'economy game' as to those who prefer the 'catering game'. Even though I'm still pretty sure the best way to play is to have a 'fighting game' city.
The event that was ongoing on 9/23 ended while I was having the internet issues. Considering the limited log-ins and time in-game, I didn't do too badly. One city got an extra evo bldg; the other was one artifact short (8) of a lvl 10.
The FA that came after the event: That's where all my data went, lol! One city (with the extra evolve bldg) was in FS doing one path/stage to the flag, done. That didn't take long. The other FS (where I'm AM), I'm the FA Mage. I had some help with tracking inventory and spent badges up until Aug when the mage that helped left the game due to rl. Members don't want to use a spreadsheet themselves; so inventory is reported in msg system and tracked by spreadsheet along with badges spent on the paths. No tracking of anything once we hit the pits. We go for rank...sort of. We want to absolutely place in the top 20, but will fight to a top 10 if we have the chance. We placed 9th this time. AT&T thanks all the members of my FS for their help in generating sales 2GB at a time!
My cities still had their FA farms when I got back online this week. Last weekend, I set WS to all of the production cycles except toolboxes; dividing it up amongst the ones I had out. Same thing for the lvl 1 factories: some to 3hr and some to 9hr. Without looking at a quest list, ended up hitting the locked quests this morning in both cities. So, I now have time to relax and piddle around in my cities for the next few weeks.
And, I need to do some more research on Starlink. Mr. Sami's business is construction: specializes in residential repairs, retrofitting, rehabs, and renovations. He can handle the physical installation of the kit. I need to see if I can handle the digital set-up as I'm the one who manages our home network. Financially, the ongoing access charge will be about the same as we have now. The kit itself costs $500. We will be taking on personal responsibility for the installation, maintenance and repairs of the system. I truly don't see how we can do a worse job at that than our current ISP, so I consider the purchase of the system a down payment on reliable service mental health! Grandson is now 5 and in kindergarten. I still have an earwig from 'Rio'!

 

[crackie]

You sound so busy right now that we can probably sneak a short-armed pink dragon and Banshee into your house without you knowing and be spared the bloodshed!

Sami received a marketing text from her ISP: Great news: We've just upgraded your internet speed to 100Mbps at no additional charge.

This is a bit of a scam and widely practiced by ISPs. They are essentially giving you nothing, claiming they are, and then charging you a higher price later for it. The average household is not going to come anywhere near using 100Mbps at this time. For example, if you're only ever going to hit 25, does it matter if they're offering you 50 or 5000 for free? You can't tap into it if you don't need it. It doesn't rollover. You can't hoard it (I know, I know). Let's take Netflix as an example since you also mentioned it. Streaming video is one of the most bandwidth intense activities you can do on the Internet. Email, surfing the web, streaming music, and all that other activity pales in comparison and require pretty low bandwidth. Even if you're downloading large files, the speed is usually dictated by the server on the other end and the server usually places a cap on speed. Currently, if they let you download at 5Mbps, it's a very generous allotment. And unless you're collaborating on a feature film or something, most downloads are short bursts of bandwidth usage and done, but not long sustaining downloads. Ok, back to streaming video...a standard def stream may only hit 1Mbps. Then your HD and FHD might take you up to 3Mpbs and 5Mbps. Going full 4k is only going to hit 15Mbps. Despite your full house, what are the chances like 7 people are simultaneously going to be streaming their own individual Netflix content all at 4k at the same time? And might I add, if you're giving away 4k TVs and computers to everyone in the household, then we might all consider a relocation to the boonies to all move in too. There will be Aunty, Uncle, and Cousin Samis to go around.

Anyway, the ISP knows you're not going to reach that tier, but it looks good on paper that they've given you "more", even though you'll never use it to tax their infrastructure. Then when the promo honeymoon period is over, they justify jacking up your price because they are offering you a higher tier service. You can't then subscribe to a lower tier at a lower price so you've now been strung along to pay more for something you're not using. This stuff aggravates me because the speeds we have now is probably what Europe and Asia had 20 years ago. That's how behind we are, and yet, most of the country may not have anything faster than DSL still. ISPs generally relish in the comfort of local monopolies for the regions they serve. They have no incentive to build/invest in infrastructure and their business plan is mostly string customers along while providing them the same service essentially.

Same for tethering on the phone. Even if you have an "unlimited" phone plan, you don't have "unlimited" tethering, at least not in the U.S. Over in Europe, they supposedly don't mind. Here, you have to pay for additional bandwidth to supplement your "unlimited" plan to tether to other devices for long periods.

 

[samidodamage]

They have no incentive to build/invest in infrastructure and their business plan is mostly string customers along while providing them the same service essentially.

^^This!! There is no competition out here for my ISP. What I *think* they've done is: came out and installed and/or upgraded some network switches. That allowed my line to deliver in the mid 90's on a speed test. I ran this while I had ISP service in Aug before it went out for good in Sept. Mr. Sami's tower wasn't getting any speed, but I knew right away that was an internal problem, ordered a new network adapter and then he was getting speeds close to the one my wired tower was getting. Now, they're both getting speeds in the mid-high 60's. I have a cursory understanding of the speeds of delivering streaming, etc, but I just want things to work when we want to use them. Yes, I'm willing to pay to make them work.
We're a family of folks who all grew up with TV. TV sets in the living room, den and kitchen in the early days. We raised our daughter the same way, but TV's were also added to every bedroom then, lol! For us, it just sounds normal to have TV as background noise. At least 2 of the 4 TV's we have now are 4K.
As for how many screens on at the same time? At least one per adult that is physically in the house. Right now, Mr. Sami and I are the only ones here and there are 3 going: me on here, my TV streaming a show I'm sorta watching while I play and type, and he's streaming a youtube news video on his computer. Daughter is usually on her phone and the TV is streaming in her room when she's home. They're at the fair right now.
Then, there's the 5y/o...
While his 'screen time' is limited, the number of screens he can watch during 'screen time' isn't, lol. His school computer doesn't count against him for screen time. Since his mom's figured out he does better (or maybe it's she that does better, but I don't say that to her, lol!) with 'background noise' he likes while she and he go over the homework, she streams on TV while they do that. Then, he brings his PC and his ipad into the living room. He streams disney/netflix kids/whatever on the TV, he streams his youtube stuff (like FreddyFazbear's 'Believer' video: he's trying to learn all the words, lol!) on his PC and he plays Roblox on his ipad. While he developed these 'multi-tasking' abilities between age 4-5, daughter was a bit concerned about her approach. She's seen so much about how bad screen time is for kids and thought maybe she should do more to limit him. Especially since he never went to pre-school/pre-k, was taught solely at home until he entered kindergarten this year, etc. Teacher conferences were this week in his school. Teachers described him to daughter as 'top of the class' in all areas; best in reading and math, helps other students with math, and his behavior is appropriate. He is described by them as 'outgoing' socially and a pleasure to have in their class. He got his picture in the paper for 2 awards he won: one for reading and one for being a helpful part of his 'community' (his class, I think?) Daughter has decided to relax and go with what's working, and change it if it stops working, lol!
The point is: yes, I can see multiple screens streaming individual content here at the same time, lol! Do I think it's enough to overwhelm the system? Not with the current household members. But, I'm not taking on any aunties, uncles or cousins!

 

[ajqtrz]

I get 22Mbps here. Tops. I have few problems with Elvenar except when I spend a lot of time re-arranging things. So 22Mbps is probably about the lowest level you have if you expect to play. Now if you decide then, to divide that minimum amongst any number of devices you will naturally have problems. My suggestion is that you figure out how many you really need and then turn the rest off. If you need the "background noise" (I hate to say it but study after study has shown that background noise hurts studying, even if the student likes it), you could record a bunch of it on a CD and play it, which would mean you wouldn't be streaming anything and all that bandwidth could be dedicated to what you actually need.

Just a thought.

AJ

 

[crackie]

The point is: yes, I can see multiple screens streaming individual content here at the same time, lol! Do I think it's enough to overwhelm the system?

Remember, just because the TV or computer is 4K capable, does not mean the content consumed is necessarily at 4k resolution. Again, using Netflix as an example, not all of its available content is in UHD format.

Like 20yrs ago, my cable company had a dispute with FOX. There were a lot of negative ads blaming each other running at the time, but in the end, they couldn't reach an agreement so my cable company blacked out FOX. It was during the World Series and the team I was rooting for was in it. I was incredulous. HOW DO YOU BLOCK A CHANNEL THAT YOU CAN RECEIVE FREE OVER THE AIR!? What am I paying $130+ for? So I had to unplug my cable (that I'm paying for!) and plug in an antenna to get FOX over the air without issues. It was the dumbest. thing. ever. I cancelled my cable and haven't looked back since.

At the time, the networks were required by law to switch over to broadcasting in digital and shelved the analog broadcasts. That means if you get a signal, it's crystal clear and in full HD. Not only that, but you get the signal before cable/satellite. We'd watch the games live and then like a minute later, we'd hear the people in the rowdy bar across the street erupt in cheers or jeers to a play we already saw several plays ago. Mildly intriguing. Then if I go over my friend's place, it's also weird to get used to watching TV at their place sometimes because even if they have cable subscription and big screen TV, they're not always watching content in FHD. Everything looks and sounds so much worse. I don't know if they all do it, but I can tell the cable companies are down-converting and recompressing some of the content to redistribute at a lower quality bandwidth. It reinforced that I made the right decision to tell the cable company to smell you later. There are less stuff in SD now, but UHD was what full HD was back then. Not everything is filmed/made in that resolution yet. And if you are watching 4K content but don't have the Internet bandwidth to support it, it'll stutter and pixelate.

 

[samidodamage]

Those kinds of company machinations behind the scenes is very irritating. Behind my ISP's situation is also a bankruptcy that they were released from about a year ago. They are currently owned and managed by one company who was one of their creditors and *I think* other creditors are also involved in managing the ISP now. I figure they're cutting corners wherever they can since their primary objective would likely be to recoup their investment. They're probably doing as little as possible to keep up with customer demand. Like maybe adding and/or upgrading network equipment just enough to boost internet speeds (and not spending any more than absolutely necessary on labor costs so likely shabby installation). Customer service and employee retention are 2 of the first things that go in this scenario. I don't think they can keep technicians. Those also can't be too easy to find/hire/train in these rural areas. Most of customer service has been outsourced exclusively to call centers.
The tech that came the first time (10/3) after the internet had gone out completely had been working for the company less than a month at that time. I knew I was in for a long day (never dreamed it would turn into long weeks!) when, after returning from 'rewiring the network switch' and finding my neighbor called me because now she had no service said: That couldn't have been anything I did; I didn't touch anyone's service but yours. (paraphrased). I *could* have looked at it like: Gee, my ISP has an entire network switch dedicated to just my service line. But, occam's razor: he probably didn't understand what a network switch is or what it does. While I couldn't fix it or even explain it to anyone, I have a vague idea that it basically serves as an access point to the internet for a defined group of users. >>sami starts whining again: but's it's not my job to know that stuff, it's his!!<<
Over the course of that day, he reached a high of 142 customers out of service. At the end of that first day, I and 13 other customers (who had service when he arrived at my house) remained out of service...He also was assigned every 'escalated' ticket from that point forward until finally on 10/18 they gave it to a more experienced tech. It took him 5hrs, but I've got internet. Slower, occasionally goes out for less than 5min, last known incident of that was yesterday. My regular ticket had a 10day wait for a tech appt. The escalated tech generated tickets both had a 7day wait for a tech appt. That's outrageous!! Past history: It is the back of beyond out here; there were times the issue was hard to track down (once: underground moles chewed an old line that wasn't installed in conduit, but it wasn't a 'clean break'. When it rained, it would go out; you'd have thought it was like satellite TV, but by that time I'd cut that cord, lol!) but they had techs out here every day or 2 and still didn't take a week to finalize the repair including replacing an underground line! It took them 25 days to finalize this repair and no lines were replaced!!
**I think I've used up my allotment of !'s for the day in this paragraph alone, lol)
But, it's cheaper to take a small (to the company, even if it's a couple months worth of service) amount of money off customer bills than invest in a sufficient and competent workforce; let whoever buys it out after they get theirs worry about that...

 

[StarLoad]

Very interesting read, and thank you Sami for sharing, as it brings back the memories of the early days of the internet, and the fights between DSL based isp and the Cable companies I lived thru for several years. I am glad not to have to deal with the issues anymore. I am seeing a lot more competition now with the rollout of Home 5G internet even in the suburban San Diego area. I wish you luck

Ed

 

[crackie]

Since I talk to almost everyone, I generally get the techs to sing like canaries when they're out here and share all their trade secrets. You just gotta make it seem like they're doing important work and you're interested. People will talk your ear off! Well, as I am not in the boonies, I do have three ISP options here, BUT I have learned the techs are mostly independent contractors and they usually work for all the ISPs. They might be out on site helping you with ISP A, but tomorrow, they’re driving a different truck and installing things for ISP B. Therefore, you can ask them about the competition and they don’t care to divulge trade secrets because they aren’t really loyal to any one company. Only if you have a highly escalated ticket will you get a tech that only works for that one particular ISP.

We also had a situation where someone was moving out who held the cable account. We wanted to just switch the name on the account to someone else and keep existing services. Apparently, the bureaucracy doth not allow it. You’d have to cancel the old account completely and create a new one. That also means returning all existing equipment to get issued new ones. Very efficient business practice. This time, the tech told us so long as the previous account is closed, you will always be considered a new customer when you create a new account and therefore, subject to promotional rates. Even though it’s a slight inconvenience, it’s actually a better option. The tech told us to essentially cancel our account when the promo period is over and sign up again and you will always be locked to promotional prices. He said to buy out the equipment outright and then they wouldn’t even need to send out techs like him when you activate a new account because you already have the wiring and just need the ISP to flip the switch on their end and register your equipment. So now we now have all the modems for all 3 ISPs and just round robin their services. Just gotta learn to play their games

Also, if you buy your equipment second hand off eBay or Craigslist, some people advertise they are selling Verizon modem/routers, but it could be a Frontier model. Physically, it’s the same device, but with different firmware installed. In theory, it will work but you won’t be able to get firmware updates if you have firmware for one on the machine, but using it with the service of the other ISP. That one happened to a friend. I tried flashing the firmware to the previous version hoping to get an old Verizon version but no luck and still got Frontier.

I am seeing a lot more competition now with the rollout of Home 5G internet even in the suburban San Diego area.

My concern is 5G is a very high frequency band, which means it’s not really good at penetrating walls, and obviously one’s home will have many walls and other barriers. I would be curious how they plan to solve the issue of bolstering the signal. If they’re gonna surround my house with access points, it will be a hard no for me.

 

[muffy.]

Hey Sami …sorry to hear these issues. Brings back memories of the late 90s for me . I lived in La Jolla… one would of thought in that area the internet services would be dependable … but that was far fetched . I then moved to the rural area of San Diego and the service was minimal to none. I worked online and each day was iffy. In 99 I moved to NY in a secluded lil cabin out in the sticks for bout a year…..service was excellent….that was the beginning of my frustrations simply because to me I didn’t understand so it didn’t make sense. Finally moving back to civilization and cows I ended up in Idaho . First I lived in the main city ….every single internet service was crap if it worked at all . I moved to the country side but there was only one service provided there so you work stuck with them. You were lucky if it worked 20 days out of the month. Now twenty years later they just dug up our streets for some fiber optic company which will only cost one arm and a leg.
While it all still baffles me …. I can go in the mountains here and use my phone (tracphone $35 a month) with a hotspot and play Elvenar all night with zero issues . It just makes no sense to me.
I feel for you . Good luck with it all. Hopefully it will get better soon .
In the meantime we will all be here …
We’ll leave the light on for you …
<3

 

[StarLoad]

...
My concern is 5G is a very high frequency band, which means it’s not really good at penetrating walls, and obviously one’s home will have many walls and other barriers. I would be curious how they plan to solve the issue of bolstering the signal. If they’re gonna surround my house with access points, it will be a hard no for me.

I have had the T-mobile 5g home internet now for a year, and the signal in is the 5G with minimal playing around moving and testing, I was able to get it at a strong and consistent signal. From there, it is wired to my Mesh router system and no dead spots. I generally get 150Mbps Down and 12Mbps Up, which runs 9 security cams 24/7, 3 4K tv's just a few hours a week, 6 IoT's 24/7, 6 possible desktops, 3 usually on, 5 laptops 2 usually on, 3 iPads 1 usually on, 4 iPhones 24/7.
I am still on a promotional rate my cable internet at half off so I still have Gigabit service that runs my desktop PC, and with 1 wire swap I can fallback\switchover for either service.

Ed

 

[samidodamage]

Brings back memories of the late 90s

Absolutely what I thought about was our original dial-up services. That was around the same time that our cell phone was the size of an office desk phone and kept in it's own bag (we still have the same phone number from that bag phone on Mr. Sami's current cell). It's like we time traveled back 25yrs or so. This was kinda cute 15yrs ago when we first moved out here. It was fun overcoming the challenges then; now not so much. The end of last week I wondered if you could buy carbon paper and ledger books on Amazon nowadays. (Answer: yes you can) Lack of internet service doesn't impede Mr. Sami continuing to run his business. He uses sub-contractors instead of direct employees so there's been no 'payroll' to handle. Here's the thing: I keep the books for the business here. I use a cloud service. The only thing I have copies stored directly on my computer for are invoices. Everything else is in the cloud with no copies stored locally. And I really don't want to invest in the software to keep everything on a machine that can fail. I'd need cloud back-up regardless; much more efficient to just use the cloud service. I'm still not sure I've got a good handle on Receivables even after updating stuff for the last few days. The range of customer payment type is from those who pay via modern services like Venmo to the local small scale landlord with several rental units that insists on mailing a check. Finally got him to accept invoices over email the beginning of this year! It's usually easy and takes up very little of my time when I check on/record things every couple days. Going back and recreating weeks worth of stuff: not fun. Also, Mr. Sami is very ADD and hasn't been giving me work order/sub-contractor/invoice info in the usual dribs and drabs I'm used to throughout this ordeal. Now, it's going to be like pulling teeth without novocaine to get him caught up.
I did the same things you did @crackie with the cable providers years ago, preferring to own my own equipment. I also did the 'back and forth' as a new customer for the two satellite providers out here before I finally cut that cord completely. Maybe I'm just getting old. None of those things are any fun anymore; they're just aggravating. I think that's why Starlink looks like a promising solution for us. At least it will be new and different challenges.
I don't care if I don't need it, I want @ed1960's setup! AT&T has their 5G home service available 6 miles east of me. But, it could take a decade for them to cover the rest of that distance if the past is any predictor. I'm not only in the boonies, but in a little area that is truly the back of beyond!

 

[Silver Lady]

@samidodamage Have you seceded from the Union yet?

 

[crackie]

@ed1960 I have a few people unhappy with ISP and can't find alternatives that I have told about T-Mobile's 5G home service, but every time they've looked it up, it didn't service their area so I've had no direct feedback to their service. Glad it's working out for you though.

Finally moving back to civilization and cows

A sentence I did not expect to read today. Do cows equate to civilization? Or is that an unrelated use of “and”? I'm very confused. Feels like I need a philologist…

@samidodamage Have you seceded from the Union yet?

 

[StarLoad]

I have told about T-Mobile's 5G home service, but every time they've looked it up, it didn't service their area

Also look at Verizon's Home 5G it all depends on the area.

AT&T has their 5G home service available 6 miles east of me

5g and the equivalent 4G is best when the line of sight is clear. Cant hurt to ask them about it. Also if you have 5G capable phones you can see what service and how good it is around you. Just thinking out of the box.

Ed

 

[muffy.]

A sentence I did not expect to read today. Do cows equate to civilization? Or is that an unrelated use of “and”? I'm very confused. Feels like I need a philologist…

…. Well I have to be nice an proper so I’ll just say there’s some serious cowage here . Big cows, lil cows, black cows, white cows, brown cows, spotted cows, solid cows . Cows and Tater fields for miles !!

 

[crackie]

…. Well I have to be nice an proper so I’ll just say there’s some serious cowage here . Big cows, lil cows, black cows, white cows, brown cows, spotted cows, solid cows . Cows and Tater fields for miles !!

I commend your respect for the bovine family, but on behalf of humanity, I'm wondering if cows equates to civilization in your book?

 

[muffy.]

I commend your respect for the bovine family, but on behalf of humanity, I'm wondering if cows equates to civilization in your book?

Pretty much …. But less drama lolol
You ever been cow-tippin ?

 

[crackie]

Pretty much …. But less drama lolol
You ever been cow-tippin ?

No, I don't live in the boonies as I clearly have a whole gamut of THREE different ISPs to choose from! I thought I posted this in your pet squirrel thread but I guess I was sparing you then. I'll now post it in Sami's boonies thread...

I went to visit my brother last year around Halloween time. My niece and nephew are still young so they do the Halloween decoration thing for the house (like cutesy kiddy Halloween and not @Lady Dastardly's house of terror). I'm walking up the driveway and observing the decor, but my eyes fixate on this seemingly out of place prop in the middle of the front lawn. I'm thinking...well, that's odd...what a weird place to place a giant eagle. Is it an eagle or a hawk? Eh, I don't know my wildlife. But, why eagle? Wouldn't a crow be more appropriate for Halloween? This thing is also strangely massive in scale compared to the little pumpkins and other props around the yard. The strangest part was it was turned to face the main road instead of the street so it's kinda rotated weird and not facing forward. My sister-in-law came out to greet me so I asked, "How come you put the giant eagle in the middle of the yard?" She asks, "What eagle?" I pointed to the difficult to miss large bird of prey in the middle of the lawn. And. Then. It. Turned. Its. Head... Holy $#&!#&$@#*&^ That thing is real?!?! Just then, my 3yo niece walks out of the door towards me, but then her eyes followed my fingers pointed at the giant bird so she changes direction and heads towards the eagle with a book in tow, ready to show it something interesting within its pages. Both me and her mom raced after her to pull her back. The eagle parted its wings to show its impressive wingspan and then took off towards the light pole...with a decapitated squirrel in its claws. We interrupted his supper dinner.

So you see, I'm so removed from nature that I sometimes cannot identify wildlife even when I stumble onto it. My default setting is to think it's not real because it shouldn't be here. I was standing like 6ft away and thought it was fake the whole time. Also, how did we humans manage to survive as a species? We clearly come with zero survival instincts as my niece's reaction is to walk towards a giant prey to read it a book, which is obviously is worse than my instinct to think it's just a fake Halloween prop.

 

[muffy.]

Also, how did we humans manage to survive as a species?

Well ….. We watch Naked and Afraid to learn …0f course


So I’m assuming you don’t …camp …not glamp… just camp and fish and go on nature adventures …campfires…roasted marshmellows etc …