(I’m prone to alliteration. I won’t apologise—it’s a mindless form of entertainment and relatively harmless if taken in limited doses).

My first full day in Manila finds me fully rested and up at a relatively normal time. Trips flying west are typically not as bad as those heading east, but I tried to reduce residual jet lag by staying awake for most of the flight from LAX to Taipei. I had a nice sleep at the hotel in Taipei, a full day with my friend Sylvia in Manila, and a mostly good night sleep last night (getting up every hour to pee away the Elevation-Induced Elephantiasis notwithstanding).

This morning, I got up refreshed at 08:30 and came out to find a lovely breakfast of fruit and croissant awaiting me, while Sylvia (ever slender and lovely) works out at the gym.

I walked about taking a few snaps of this lovely residence (Roland is the Belgian Ambassador), and then, my idyll came to a crashing halt: no WiFi.

No cellular, either, as I haven’t had a chance to buy a SIM card. In other words, I find that I am stranded. Un-tethered, un-linked, alone in an etherless world; un-hinged, as it were.

Just me and … my thoughts and a laptop.

HOLY CRAP!!!

After my momentary panic subsides (okay, not so momentary: I went through every single setting on my iPhone to see if I had missed a button sequence that would magically launch the WiFi), I figure out that being un-hinged isn’t such a bad thing at’all!

I wrote up the posting about Upper-Case Compression Socks with no distracting research-induced rabbit holes. I simply marked those places I wanted to research later, AND I MOVED ON.

So there you have it. I am un-wired and still breathing!