7 things to do when your internet connection is down

Last weekend, the Bhatia family experienced a weekend without internet. Boop! nothing worked and we were offline except for a little help from the mobile GPRS connections. Which helped me tweet and update facebook. But that’s about it.

And suddenly I felt stranded with nothing much to do, which sucks because I thought there has to be a lot more to do and so I thought of a couple of things which can help keep boredom away when the internet is down.

1. Open up a notepad and put down the things you need to attend to, once you are online. Memories are short, and you don’t want to miss out on sending that important email.
2. Clean up your PC. Sort files/folders, get them organised so that you can find data easily and faster.
3. Backup your data. It’s important. Imagine having a virus attack or hard disk failure and losing all those photos you love and that music collection you made after several overnight downloads. Burn DVDs, move data to an external hard disk.
4. Read. Yes, something which is printed on paper. Is there  a stock of magazines which remain unread on your side-table? Or a book which you haven’t read more than 20 pages? Go get it.
5. Write. Pen & paper is writing you know. So chuck that document editor and see if you can pen down some thoughts & ideas or better still send a hand-written note to a loved one [trust me he/she will cherish it].
6. Take a walk. If it’s the right time of the day/night, take your music player and get out for a walk. You’ll see something interesting, meet an old friend and come back fresh.
7. Watch TV. Are you spending too much time watching only DVDRips/ YouTube vids on your computer. Switch on the TV [although most of it is crap] you might just see feel entertained for watching something different from your regular stuff.

And of course, if you are one of those addicts – then you seriously need to get out of your room and try spending more time offline in the real world. Cheers!