I No Can Has Interwebs at Home?

So I woke up this morning and switched on the wireless router and the little DSL light was all blinky-blinky and teh Intarwebnets lights wasn't lit at all and I was like WTF, mate? So I called Verizon and they were like, "haha, we were just kidding. No home interwebs for you until end of month, maybe." and then I was sad, 'cause I have these awesome pictures to share and I can't. Boo hiss.



And while I'm on the "angry wet cat" theme, here's a brief rant:
In addition to my full-time job, I volunteer part-time as the assistant Director of Development for a nonprofit (basically, it's my job to write letters that will persuade large corporations and philanthropic individuals to make significant cash donations). I'm the Director's right hand/admin, so I also field/screen her phone calls and take messages. The past week has been nutso with board meetings and traveling and meet-and-greets and such, so she's been out of the office a lot.

Today, she went home sick (mostly exhaustion, I think). One of her contacts called, and after I explained that she had gone home for the day, the caller said, "Oh, I'll try her cell phone." On Monday, when I said "She's in a board meeting," another caller said, "Oh, I'll call her cell, then." This is not the first time this has happened.

It annoys me that people assume that when they are told someone is unavailable, they have carte blanche to call them on their cell phone. Just because you have someone's cell phone number doesn't mean you have 24/7 rights to them. It's the same as you saying (to someone you wouldn't want in your bathroom with you), "I'm in the shower," and they respond, "Well, then I'll just stand here on the other side of the curtain and talk to you!" It's on my pet-peeve level with people talking on cell phones in restaurants.

I think there are a lot of people who confuse the accessibility that technology makes possible with accessibility to a person -- thinking that since you can reach someone wherever and whenever, you have an intrinsic right to do so. I was raised with the "10 to 10" rule of phone calls: don't call people before 10AM or after 10PM (of course, a good way to circumvent rudeness on the part of others is to turn your phone off when you go to bed and turn it on when you wake up, hoping that no emergency will happen in the meantime). Certainly there are jobs and situations where a person needs to be in constant contact with others... but for most things in life, constant contact is not necessary.