Be afraid. Be very afraid. I knew Copperpacolypse was coming for all of us. It came for me on the day my kidney stones were to be removed. You wouldn’t want to have been there.

You almost certainly don’t know that there is a giant upcoming technical disaster—in the name of progress—that apparently can’t be stopped. You aren’t ready for it. You may not even know it is coming. But AT&T is going to turn off all landline phones, starting next June and wrapping it up by 2029. Copperpacolypse. Burglar alarms won’t report. That emergency phone in the elevator won’t work. Neither will the call button in your apartment building. Three days of phone service during a power outage? Fuggedaboutit.

A portent was that day at Kaiser Walnut Creek.