Off grid

The first time we went off grid, we didn't mean to.

We were staying in a bubble on the roof of a garage in the Austrian Alps in an Airbnb. Our hosts had invited us to share their dinner and we'd talked as the sun set.

Climbing into the beds in the bubble, we couldn't get the wifi to work. That was okay. Looking at the stars and the wind bending the trees above the bubble was a good substitute.

In fact we didn't get on wifi until we reached our hotel in Liechtenstein the next day. Nothing catastrophic had happened, although there was the usual bad news.

We sat on the terrace of our suite watching a robot lawn mower cut the grass and decided that not being on grid was pretty peaceful.

Rick had the idea to do it once a week. Except for the Catalan referendum, we have kept to it. Twenty-four hours of no Trump, no May, no Putin, no Facebook, no email. It can be a calendar day or 24 hours.

If our family of friends needs to reach us for an emergency, there's the old-fashioned land line.