AMAZED, FLUMMOXED AND BEWILDERED........AM I

I live in a world of convolution……and yes, it is a word. It means puzzlement. I have imagined, over the years, that the more steps something takes, the more satisfied I will are with the results. I sometimes even show a tendency of taking the long way from point a. to point b. because it then makes it seem as if I've accomplished a great feat when, in reality, it's probably as easy as....oh, I don't know……going from point a. to point b. I have a tendency to get lost, however, if there are more than two or three steps. Just like any other puzzle......I always seem to have parts left over when I'm done. I am always looking for the easy way out. And yet, I never seem to think in simple terms when it comes to trying to solve a puzzle. It seems more thorough to consider all possible angles that will lead to a solution. That's why I prefer word puzzles. There won't be any letters left to throw in a box like extra screws when I'm done. One day recently, I picked up the phone and heard no dial tone. Immediately, I panicked and began to imagine all of the scenarios as to why the phone wasn't working. I was making it too complicated right off the bat. I began to go over my checklist of things that could have gone wrong. First, I checked the other phones in the house and, sure enough, they were all silent. My first instinct, since we have our phones bundled with the TV and computers on our cable system, was to curse the cable company and all of it's perceived incompetence, while shaking my fist in the air like a Three Stooge. That I did well. Then I tried turning on the TV. It worked as did the computers, so it wasn't not a signal problem. My next move was to use a little trick the cable guy taught me the last time all of my communication with the outside world was cut off. I went to the modem, pulled out the battery,, unplugged it (which was a puzzling step in itself because both turn off the power) and counted to thirty. I suspect twenty nine would not be enough time and thirty one would be too much, so, at thirty on the dot, I plugged it back in and re-installed the battery - or was it the other way around, I never can remember the order of that step. Needless to say, the phones were still dead. Must have hit the thirty one second mark. Now it was time to call the cable company on my trusty, little flip phone so I could get one of their crack associates to walk me through whatever steps I had to take to get my phones back. The guy with the foreign accent named Chip (or was it Teddy) told me to find the phone jack on the back of the modem and follow the cord to where it plugged in to the wall. To do that I had to go into the bedroom and move the desk and the bed and the dresser.. That's where the cord went......or so I thought. When I got to the other end, I realized that all of the furniture rearranging was totally unnecessary as the phone jack for the room was on another wall under the window. It turned out I really didn't need to follow the little gray "yellow brick road" that lead me to the wall jack. It was right next to - on the wall. It was when I reached my final destination, however, that I realized how in vain the entire day had been. That was where I pushed the plug back into the wall, picked up the now working phone and dialed the cable company so I could thank Chip or Teddy for his expert assistance in getting me to the phone jack in my bedroom from a call center in Manila. I have, since, invested in a "smart" phone. One that is, ultimately, quite a bit smarter than I am. The next time I forget to connect our land line, all I have to do is tell my "smart" phone to "call the cable company" so that Chip or Teddy can remind me to check the plug. Now, if I could only tell my "smart" phone to do actual "plugging," I can even cut out the middle man, whether it is Chip OR Teddy. I'm pretty sure there's an App for that but now I'm puzzled about how to find it on my smarter-than-me-phone.