Blame me. Blame me. I don’t care. Blame me. Just stop blaming each other. Give me all of your blame. Oh, wait. You already have. Fuck you, then.
I’ve been absent. I had a really bad cold, but more importantly, posting has been a near impossibility because I’ve had no Internet at home basically since I got here. (By home, of course, I mean the lumpy single bed in which I sleep, under sheets printed with hula girls, a million years old, still inexplicably rough. Anyway.)
I found a house with wifi that wasn’t password protected. I found the sweet spot between their truck and front door. Hidden, in rubber boots and pajamas, an Internet Interloper. There is only daylight, and I’m sure the people on this stretch of road think of me as the weird, forgetful white lady. The routine looks a little like this: walk a couple hundred feet from front door, stand and fiddle with wifi device until email uploads, “remember something incredibly important”, turn on rubber booted heel and hustle pajama-clad ass home. Showtimes: midnight, 3:30, and 7:00.
It was like that for 6 weeks. Week 7, I was able to steal a feeble signal from my room, so long as I was on my stomach, back hooked like a comma, facing the door, laptop perched on two pillows and a book, the book necessary to maintain a steady and specific angle. No moving. When I got sick, it wasn’t until I started coughing that I realized I had a cold. I’d just assumed that all my stiffness and immobile neck were the result of my nightly Internet poaching position.
Who is to blame? WHO IS TO BLAME? I'll tell you. Fucking ravens. The ravens up here are big, nearly the size of the Chihuahuan Raven (the largest in the world. and no, i didn't look that up. i just know that. which is why i can't do long division anymore. moving on).
The technician finally came to sort us out last week. A Finn with a dry sense of humour and unusual dental arrangement, he arrived in a bright yellow jacket, flood pants and athletic sandals on his bare feet. I was so excited that he'd actually shown up that I gave him my dessert. He ate it very slowly, while boring me with a complete and detailed list of all the antique cars he owned but didn't drive. To say that he was peculiar would be an understatement, but I nodded and smiled. I needed the Internet. Once he finished his (MY) dessert, he (LEISURELY) climbed a very tall ladder to inspect the dish. He spent so long at the top of the ladder that eventually I gave up and retired to my room.
The next morning, he gave me the full report. Rolling his Rs with a gleeful flourish that had to be at least a partial exaggeration, he provided a definitive cause for our long-standing internet issues. At the top of the ladder, on the shelf built to hold the dish, he found a couple of pounds of caribou bones and fur, dropped by ravens. "Don't worrrrrry," he said. "Those rrrrrrravenssss, they arrrrrrrn't going to be a prrrrroblm for you now." They had eaten the "rrrrrrreceiiiiivrrrr", he said. It was "verrrrry rrrrrradioactive". A crooked (and maybe demented?) smile stretched across his teeth. "The rrrravennnnssss. They arrrrn't a prrrrroblm ennymorrrrr."
So now I have internet. I also have nightmares about clutches of glowing green eggs. Soon-to-be Superravens, HulkHawks, blue-feathered monster birds. They will perch on the roof of the Northern Store, shoot laser beams from their eyes and read my thoughts.
What I'm saying is, I love you, Raven Overlords. I know where all the good garbage in town is, and I'll save all my dryer lint and showerdrainhair for your nests. I think we can make this work. Please don't kill me. I have a lot to live for.
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