Internet, Television, and other Magic
Staying connected on Matinicus can mean timing Internet use to coincide the out-going tide.
Eva Murray
We were watching a program on Maine Public Television that showed footage of a hydroelectric dam on the Saco River. My television-watching buddy, who had once been a Central Maine Power Company substation repairman, recognized it. “Cataract,” he said. “You can't make power at high tide. The tail race fills up.”
“It's tidal that far up?” I asked, this being typical of the sort of idle conversation in my kitchen.
“It's tidal that far up.”
Then, a moment later: “It's just like that Internet. You can't do nothing at high tide.”
It has become the very latest in Matinicus Island Mystique humor, of the “You Just Can't Make This Stuff Up” variety. The Internet (or at least my Internet) is sort of...tidal. For years I have been spoiled entirely rotten by the super-fast wireless Internet provided by the good folks at Midcoast Internet Solutions (using, originally, Page Burr's old ham radio tower, bracketed to the side of my house, and involving a pile of electrical equipment stowed under the table. We paid the power bill for the whole works, in exchange for unmetered high-speed Internet. The money seemed to be a wash, the deal was easy, the service was great, and it was the only Internet I'd ever known anyway.) Lately, some of the equipment has been replaced and upgraded, which is generally a good thing, except that somewhere in the improvements to all this, the signal got too improved. Now, when the tide is high, there is some kind of reflection effect which causes the signal to interfere with itself. I may
have the details wrong, the description a bit loose, but the result is slow Internet.
There's a site where you can look at a graph and see the signal strength, and notice the roughly twice-daily dip. The “signal-to-noise ratio,” so-called, is way too low. Too much noise, not enough signal.
I think that sounds like a metaphor. Some of us spend a lot of time and effort trying to explain the realities of this place to people who cannot or will not sort out the facts of the island from their pre-existing notions, simple-life romances, do-gooder agendas, and vacationland mythology. The problem is signal-to-noise ratio. The signal doesn't get through for all the romantic hash, like the electrical noise. I love that expression.
The guys from Midcoast have promised us they'll get out here and fix it, so good chance that by time you read this, the tidal Internet will just be another piece of Matinicus folklore.
We've also been giving some thought to what to do when the big digital television fiasco (I mean, change) happens next year. Being at present a marginal TV watcher and a decided cheapskate, I am given serious pause upon discovering the reality of something like 500 bucks a year for “the dish,” or any satellite service. The alternative might be to buy a new big-array metal antenna that's going to get rim-racked every year. We are currently using a boat antenna, the little plastic job that looks like a radar dome and takes the gales OK. That won't do, I hear, for the digital. Being as we are right out on the edge of the signal, according to the website, as we are on the edge in so many other ways tangible and intangible, we have to do something. My husband and I are giving some thought to no television at all as a real choice, but that's fairly radical for Matinicus. We could make believe it was an ethical decision, let the kids just shake their heads and roll their eyes, but we'd miss Charles Osgood, that guy on “Wired Science” who shows you what's inside your non-dairy whipped topping, watching the Portland weathermen panic over a two-inch snowfall, and the Red Green Show. Having the best signal is not the issue... I am so used to crummy signal, getting only weather-dependent local broadcast at this point anyway, with my one and only somewhat broken Samsung.
That's why I couldn't host the Super Bowl party.
A lot of these guys are pretty serious television watchers (hey, it can be a long winter.) One fisherman with a 42” flat-screen made the comment that if he wanted to be able to watch TV while out to haul, he'd darned well be able to. Even with all the plasma TVs, there wasn't any Super Bowl party on Matinicus this year. Wanda had a postal authority person coming Monday morning, so she didn't need the extra clean-up. Marty wasn't home, and most everybody else either had little kids who are hard
enough to put to bed, or a muddy driveway that didn't need the ruts, or some good reason. I have a crappy television, sort of by choice. We tried to impose on Anne to host it, as she's renting a nice place, all newly renovated and roomy. ''But I don't even have a television!” “That's OK,” I explained, “Most of us just come for the refreshments anyway.”
Oddly enough, we did manage to watch part of the 2004 World Series game where the Red Sox won for the first time, although just by accident. It was broadcast on channel 74. I don't get channel 74, but (jokes aside about how my house guest was the minister from the Sunbeam,) the atmospheric conditions conspired in our favor. “On the skip,” as they say.
I'd be content with MPBN and one network news channel. I hate to even think about the money for the satellite, as you can't seem to subscribe to only MythBusters and Modern Marvels, which is why I watch cable TV if I am staying in a motel. The first time I ever saw that show, a couple of years ago, they were doing a whole program on the building of the
Mackinac Straits Bridge. “Hey, look at this! There's a program about the building of the Mackinaw Bridge!” This was my kind of mindless entertainment. Industry Lite. When Robin, Emily and I were staying on the mainland to go to the Emergency Medical Services convention, we found ourselves sitting on the end of the bed, passing around a half-gallon of Edy's Espresso Chip ice cream and watching an entire program about the history of glue. Everything you ever wanted to know about the invention of Loc-tite adhesive.
Like I said before, you can't make this stuff up.
At any rate, I wouldn't pay ten cents for most of what's on, but not because I have superior tastes...I most assuredly do not. I just would rather watch the History of Dump Trucks than catty women, slutty singers, bumbling moronic parents, stupid pet tricks, college basketball, or people repainting the living room. No offense.
Eva Murray writes from Matinicus Island, where there are still a fair number of dial telephones.
Views expressed in blogs such as Media Mutt and others published on Down East.com reflect neither Down East's editorial stance nor the views of Down East Enterprise.
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