Passwords be crazy sometimes.

 Except for my phone, I have not had internet the past three weeks. And I missed it. It is hard to believe that I am so attached to surfing the internet. But it is not just surfing, it is the programming by netflix, hulu or discovery+ which interesting enough, I rarely use. Paying bills and checking my bank balance are other big items. 

I have always found it interesting to need a password to pay a bill. I paid a large amount to keep the electricity on for my brother's house. I sort of had to hack my way into the system to keep the bill paid. I can't see having to spend the day getting service shut off and turned back on. Plus the presentation of legal papers seem like counterfeit to the person working in the window. Obviously, I am a very suspicious woman.

It has been a chore getting his house ready to sell. I now understand why people start giving items away willy nilly after a death. Truth be told, I have not been ready to let go of my brother. I took papers to be shredded and I felt like my brother was left there. I had the mental urge to go back and get him. Ridiculous I know. It did make it easier to take the next batch.

Isn't it interesting how businesses who collect debts can't divulge private information but they will tell you the X amount of money they want to be paid. When my younger sister had a stroke, I had to piece together her life for awhile. She was out of the mental business. For some bills, I waited until the second billing to make sure she had not paid it the first time. 

I will say Verizon was very kind to reactivate my sister's phone number after the bill had gone unpaid for much too long. Some things had to slide. It is difficult keeping up with someone in the hospital or rehab. A hospital rehab insisted I spend the night in a chair to make sure she didn't fall out of bed. It was a hellish three weeks for me. I would rush home, catch a few hours sleep, take care of everyone a little bit and then return.

The worst experience was the naïve clerk at my sister's insurance wanting me to pay her premium. I would call her the idiot but that was me. I paid the bill. What were they going to do? Cancel her car insurance? The car is still unused in her driveway. 

My sister was a civil service employee and the only way to get her W-2 for taxes was to access her federal account. This is why I needed her phone reactivated. The phone had a yahoo account active which I could access. I did my sister's taxes for 2015. To get her W-2 to do the taxes; I had to access her federal email account. One benefit of being a sister, I guessed her security questions with her permission. Good thing I could guess them, at that time she could not recall the answers. They sent a temporary password to her home address. 

I've heard of people who give way off answers to security questions to foil people like me. I have tried that in the past and found myself permanently locked out of an account. There was no remembering what I had put down and I am sure there is a scratch of paper that I carelessly scribbled it on in my office somewhere. I can see myself puzzled after reading it and wadding it up to toss into the trash can. 

This brings me back to passwords. My sister had borrowed money from an annuity. They would not let me make a payment. My sister says, she will pay the penalty which turned out to be quite expensive. But at least I was able to file her taxes. I printed several years worth of W-2s in case we needed them. We didn't. 

My internet was repaired on a Tuesday. And another man came and repaired the line last Monday. Apparently, lightning had damaged the phone lines on the road where I live. The first man went a mile down the road. But as the technician said, one side was not working. Hmmm.  

My DSL has a history of working well and then slowly going downhill until it does not work. On the same day that someone bombed the AT&T, by coincidence my internet began it's latest descent into not working. Then boom, lightning must have traveled down the line to disrupt my internet. 

I know I should immediately contact AT&T when it first starts. It is always a bit of a hassle. It is a shame that getting something repaired should be as easy as they collect the bill. They ask, did you check x, y or z? Then they ask, could you check them again. I do. I know I could lie but what would that really help. By some miracle someone in India may fix my internet. My truth serum would be the potential of being embarrassed by the technician doing the suggestion to fix the problem.

I've seen on twitter where people are saying quit AT&T over their support of a right wing news channel. First, I don't boycott over politics. Second, the news channel is a business decision (They's money in them strong opinions). AT&T also owns Times Warner which includes my favorite news channel, CNN. 

I did get on Facebook via my phone. I follow several "I smell Bacon" sites which really is I like the updates on car wrecks, and gossip.  Anyway this woman was blasting a "Karen" for running her off the road. I was so relieved it was not my SUV. Can you imagine going on line and finding out your car has been outed. This post erupted into a fight and the "Karen" basher stopped comments. Those comments can be a riot. My fellow "Baconites" were not sure her story was the only story. Have you ever noticed that those that can dish it out can't take it tossed back to them. Oh well, that is another blog post.

This plant has a myriad of names. I have always heard it named Mullein. It grows well on the sides of the roadway. The plant has been used to make a tea which helps the lungs. The jury is still out as to whether this is true. The plant is not indigenous to North America but it is not considered invasive. It is a naturalized plant in that it can reproduce without human help but never to the point it disrupts the ecosystem.