Sometimes you just need a win. Something to go right, when lots of things feel like they are going wrong. That was how I felt the day we reopened last week. On Monday, we’d left the nursery with our primary internet and phones out but with a backup internet service working. Then we arrived at the nursery on Tuesday to get ready to open for the first time in a week and our backup internet was off.

I set to troubleshooting, and of course if you call a cable/internet provider, the first thing they ask is if you turned your modem/router off, let it sit for 30 seconds, and then turned it back on. So my first attempt to get the internet back on was to turn the device off. Which I did. And then the switch stuck. So now, not only was the device not working, it was switched off and it would not go back on.

After a good bit of time on the phone, being told that I don’t pay for a support subscription and that the on/off switch sticking is a known issue with the device, I was about to throw my hands up. For half the day, we were running our point of sale and credit card systems on two hot spots, and, man, it was slow. Grateful to have a third backup, but it wasn’t ideal. Now my only option seemed to be to get a new device, but that was going to take time to get it shipped. So with nothing to lose, I started looking at our broken device. I’ve always been a tinkerer and loved taking apart electronics when I was a kid, but this one confounded me. No screws, no obvious clips, and I only wanted to pry so hard. All I was trying to do was to get the switch back on – I didn’t want to damage a circuit board.

So on a whim, I grabbed a hacksaw and cut a little one-inch section of the plastic off the side of the device, right where the on/off switch was. Carefully, so that I didn’t cut into anything important, I got a little chunk off, and, would you believe it, I was able to operate the switch. I held my breath as I plugged the device in, and it powered up and connected. We were back in business. Or at least in business on our back-up system. I fixed the internet with a hacksaw. It felt good. After a week of things not going so great, this simple win put a smile on my face.

I’m smiling now, because our phones and internet are back in business and because we are starting to get back to normal. And I’ll help put a smile on your face this weekend when I teach you all about houseplants on Saturday, October 26th at 10 am. We’ll go through creating great conditions for your houseplants to thrive, and I’ll do a repotting demo as well to show you how to keep all of your indoor plants happy and healthy. Come out and enjoy the fall temps, sunshine-filled breezy days, and all of the beauty that Fall in Florida has to offer.