INTERNET IS ON!!!

Yay! We finally have Internet at home!

Here's the story: the landlords got fed up with waiting for the company to send someone out to fix our Internet, so they said forget it to the first company and called in Telefonica, who sent someone out this afternoon to set it up for us. When I got home this afternoon a little after 4pm, all three of them (the landlords and the technician) were standing in the living room. In the next few minutes, the modem was plugged in and switched on. The technician said (in Spanish of course), "You should have Internet now." So I unpacked my computer and switched it on, but the only wireless networks available all belonged to the neighbors. I tried turning AirPort off & on several times, but no change. Then the technician said, "What kind of computer is that?" "A Mac," I answered. And he reached over and pushed the power button on my computer and shut the lid. "What are you doing??" I could NOT BELIEVE he had just touched my computer! That he'd tried to shut it down without following the shut down procedures! "It's not gonna work with a Mac," he said. A "conversation" ensued wherein I insisted that my computer picks up all kinds of networks and that it must be the router and he insisted that the router was fine and my computer was the problem. He even called home base and somebody there confirmed that their service would not work with a Mac even if I used an ethernet cable. I was almost in tears (so much trouble and waiting for what?) but I still suspected that the router wasn't working properly. So I went and got Shannon's computer out of her room and booted it up. Lo and behold, no new network connections showed up there, either. HAH!! I plugged one end of the ethernet cable into the router and the other into my computer and voila! I had Internet. DOUBLE HAH! But of course the technician left still swearing up & down that there's nothing wrong with the router. Bastard. So the landlords are calling in their son for us AGAIN to see if he can get the wireless part to work. If not, we'll just buy a couple more ethernet cables & call it good. Better wired Internet than no Internet.

Kind of funny though. With the first company we had a wireless network but no Internet, and now we have Internet but no wireless. Ah, Spain.