It's f-ing 2015 and we shouldn't have to write this post, but we don't live a "normal" life so...
The internet has come to River City Marina! It's such a glorious thing, this connectivity. The ability to live like everyone else in modern society is splendid. You see, for the last year we've been living without internet. Sure the management company told us we could use the wifi that was in the marina but we couldn't really get a good signal, and when we did it was about as fast as a snail on a tortoise's shell. Sometimes it was too slow to even check email.
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| Another beautiful night |
When we moved in we knew the internet was an issue so Kevin had Comcast, AT&T, and RCN all come out to run internet to our slip. None of them would do it, they said it was too far for them to go (about 300 feet total) or they couldn't get access to the building so they just wouldn't do it. Basically all three services sent their guys out to do a regular install without giving them the information that we had given the agents on the phone, that they would be installing in a marina and needed to send 2 techs or at least clear one's schedule for the day. All the techs that arrived knew nothing about what the install would entail and all simply said no. It was too much work for them to do in their 2 hour install window.
Fast forward about nine months and the management company was finally able to get Comcast to make a simple connection so we could split the cable from the CCTV cameras in the marina to also provide internet. A 500 foot cable was run to the north wall, where Cygnet resides and Kevin was able to pull it as far as we needed to hook up. Three weeks ago we hooked up a new TRENDnet router to the cable and had blazing internet. We are getting very fast speeds and we passed out the wifi password for the neighbors to use. Of course the TRENDnet router turned out to be a POS, so we've had to call tech support a couple times and are getting a new router shipped as we speak to replace the one we have now which works spotty at best.
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| Plug 'n Play |
Tuesday night Kevin worked with another year-round resident and one of River City's winter residents to get the cables run to all the power pedestals on the north wall. The three guys worked hard for seven hours to run eight new lines down the dock, install the lines with plugs in the pedestals, and install a box with a powered switcher to ensure it all works correctly. It was all masterminded by winter resident Tim. He thought it through very well and Mark and Kevin worked hard to get it all up and running.
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| Custom switcher box |
Colette helped with a couple things, but she was mostly working on installing the new air conditioning pump. Last week it was hot, so we decided to crank up the AC in our bedroom for the evening. Well, the air never got cold, so we troubleshooted and found that the AC pump was running but not pumping. Kevin ordered a new one and started the swap before he began working on the internet. When Colette came home from a 12 hour day she jumped right in and picked up where Kevin had stopped. She made great progress but it became too late to work and she stopped for bedtime. Kevin finished it up the next day and realized the pump wasn't the problem! The front and center ACs work fine, they blow cold air, but the rear still doesn't. Nuts!
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| So many pumps, the new one is the one on the bottom |
So water we thinking about summer aboard? Well, our house didn't have AC, just a couple window units and we survived. We'll get on the problem soon and hopefully sort out the AC issue in our bedroom to live in comfort as the months heat up. The internet is amazing. We had almost gotten used to not having it, but now we do and it's wonderful. Time to catch up on the shows we've missed for the last year. On the list: House of Cards, Orange is the New Black (seasons 2 & 3), catching up on Chicago Fire and Chicago PD, and the end of Empire from last season before the new season starts, Community, and more.... it almost seems like work!
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