Since the last time I was here, Harborside has discontinued any free wireless.  They now charge $15 per day for Internet use, either wireless or through a LAN line with a discount for multiple days.  There were several things I wanted to do online:

1. Start setting up a new blog for an Internet store that I recently started.
2. Communicate with my husband via e-mail
3. Keep up with the Atlanta flood situation via Twitter and Facebook

So, since I don’t drink or gamble and didn’t have my handsome husband to take me out to a fancy dinner, I paid my money, logged onto the Internet and immediately had some problems: I could receive incoming email through Outlook but could not send; I tried to send from my Yahoo account and that didn’t work either; I could not log into Facebook and Twitter thought I was a robot.  So I called IT for help .

You Know You’re In Trouble When . . .

You know you’re in trouble when you explain your problems to the IT person and they ask “What’s Twitter?”  This is why I pointed out where I am staying.  Atlantis is one of, if not THE premiere hotel/resort properties in the Bahamas.  How can they have IT people who don’t know what Twitter is?  I was aghast, and literally sitting on the phone with my mouth open.  I told the person, “If you don’t know what it is, I can’t explain it.”

Long story short, I am able to receive incoming email through Outlook, I can log onto Facebook and Twitter but I still cannot send email through Outlook.  To communicate with my husband, I send a direct message through Facebook.  I’ve been communicating with my daughter via Twitter.

Why Is It Important for Me To Use the Internet?

1. International phone calls are very expensive
2. I am a caregiver for my god-sister.  She is 82 years old and has dementia and limited physical abilities.  I NEED a vacation from the stress and emotional drain from caregiving.  My husband stayed at home to take care of Gladys, my oldest daughter flew to Atlanta to help out the first 3 days (bathing and dressing); I hired a caregiver to bathe and dress Gladys for the next 4 days and my youngest daughter will go to the house to get her ready for bed.  But I still needed a way to communicate with them just in case.
3. I live the the Atlanta area that was most affected by the recent floods and a lot of my friends were affected.  I want to keep up with what’s going on.
4. AND It’s just hard for me to disconnect from my computer

All that said, I still can’t receive e-mail and at least one of their IT people still doesn’t know what Twitter is – INcredible.  BTW, the IT people came to my room to try to get my email straightened out – TWO of them.  Still not working.

If you vacation at Atlantis and bring your lap top, I hope you have a back-up plan.