Our old cable modem gave out last week. After going up and down over the last several weeks, it stopped resolving to the Comcast ISP, so we couldn’t get online. It was, as cable modems go, an antique: more than 7 years old. A very nice tech, Noel, came today to help us out. After checking the line at the pole across the street, he hooked up the new modem, ran the installer on Ellen’s XP box (the Mac installer requires Internet Explorer, please get a clue, Comcast – no reflection on Noel), and bingo. We’re back online, as fast as ever.