What Would We Do If The Internet Died?

Scientists who study the sun are pretty certain that at sometime in the future there will be bursts of solar radiation much stronger than those of The Carrington Event of 1859, so strong in fact that they will disable all satellites, maybe for a few minutes, or hours, or days, or even longer….

TPOTG Solar Flare Frame 01

What would we do if the internet died?
A burst of solar radiation, all satellites fried,
Useless mobile phones, no signals detected,
Social media and Google all disconnected.

No bank transactions, no salaries paid,
No card facilities, no purchases made;
Billions of records that no one could access;
Governments and businesses in turmoil and mess.

Our dependence on the internet will then come at a terrible cost,
Because when “online” becomes “offline” we”ll be so utterly lost,
With digital connections being totally destroyed,
Old school techniques would need to be redeployed.

But those skills are forgotten, or have never been learned;
We’d have to think for ourselves, but that rulebook’s been burned.
By surrendering control to an orbiting satcom
We’ve exposed ourselves to a ticking time bomb.

I hope I’m not around to weep and lament,
Witness the chaos and mayhem of this forecast event;
Humanity in a  mess from an internet freeze,
Lost and confused in a world brought to its knees.

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Fountain Pen

I haven’t used a fountain pen for longer than I care to remember, and I forgot just how nice it feels. It is slightly more inconvenient than a ballpoint pen or a pencil, but I’m sure that I can learn to live with that; until I spill the bottle of ink, that is!

I found an old fountain pen,
Alas, it had run out of ink,
But I was lucky to find a store
Selling Parker’s famous black Quink:
Now I’m writing with that pen
And it’s oh, so much better,
Resulting in an overwhelming feeling
To write someone a letter.
I can’t remember the last time
I sent anything hand written by post,
Letters are typewritten then printed,
Although I use e-mails the most;
Not forgetting about social media,
Facebook and WhatsApp now the thing,
But the satisfaction of hand writing
Electronic communication can’t bring.

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