Day of the New World. 14th of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Betelgeuse): The cancer my cat is suffering from (squamous-cell carcinoma) is the same form of cancer from which my sister is recovering. Grisly coincidence. 

I tried to call her today to see how she's going (she's scheduled for another round of simultaneous chemo and radiation therapy this month), but I couldn't. It took me a while to realize what was going on, but every time I tried to call, I immediately got a "call ended" error message. I thought it was my phone or its settings, but couldn't find the problem, until I finally noticed the letters "SOS" where the connection bars should be.   

The "SOS" means that I'm not connected to my carrier, but can still get through to 911 or other emergency services. More Google searches finally revealed that my carrier, Verizon, was experiencing a widespread service outage with no reason given or estimate of when service will be restored. "We're aware and we're working on it."

So meanwhile I have no telephone connection with the rest of the world, although to be honest, some 90% plus of my communications with the outside world are through email or text.

What's odd about this, though, is that although the outage seems to be a widespread, national problem, there's very little media about it. Most of what I've seen online to confirm the problem has been on Reddit posts. Usually, when I have a power or internet outage, I get a text from the provider confirming that they know there's a problem and an estimated time for restoration. But Verizon? Crickets. 

Anyway, my cat and my sister have the same cancer and I don't have phone service.