TL;DR

A rat ate my fiber optic cable. Technician came, fixed it, sat with us in the safe room during a missile alert, left. Ten minutes later the rat ate it again. Technician happened to be passing by. We improvised cable armor. You can’t make this up.

The Rat That Byte Twice.

It started as a pretty ordinary day. Well, as ordinary as days get these days. We’ve been working from home since the war started, which means internet isn’t just convenient. It’s everything. Meetings, work, keeping up with the news, knowing what’s happening. Unwinding with TV or some gaming after a long day. Even the kid is on Zoom constantly these days. Every single person in this household depends on that connection. Even our mission critical LEDs. Losing it isn’t an inconvenience. It’s a full stop.

I’d been out in the morning, one of those rare trips to Tel Aviv, the kind that feels almost surreal when most of life happens within a 10 minute radius from home. Came back, made coffee, opened the laptop, got into flow.

Twenty minutes later, the internet died.

Byte One

The router was blinking wrong. A quick check confirmed it: fiber disconnect. I called Partner (my ISP), waited the obligatory half hour on hold, and got a technician booked for the next day.

Just for sport, I went to check the shared communications cabinet in the hallway outside our apartment.

I opened it.

A rat bolted out.

I closed it.

So that was that. Spent the rest of the day tethered to my phone’s hotspot, one eye on bandwidth, the other on the news.

The Fix (Act One)

The technician arrived the next afternoon. Friendly guy. Professional. He pulled out a device, plugged it into the fiber from inside my apartment, and told me to go check the cabinet outside. I opened it, and the bitten cable was literally glowing red at the break point. The light from the tester shining straight out of the wound. Hard to miss. He came out, took one look, and pointed to the bite mark. Clean through. Classic rat damage apparently: they go for the thin cables.

He spliced it, tested it, confirmed connection. I ran a speed test. Full speed. Beautiful.

We shook hands. He headed out.

Thirty seconds later, a missile alert went off.

He came back in. We all piled into the safe room. Sat there for a few minutes. He mentioned this was already his third shelter of the day, with different families he’d fixed connections for. Just part of the job now.

All-clear. He left again. We laughed.

Byte Two

Ten minutes passed.

I was still at my desk, basking in the glow of a working internet connection, when the router started blinking wrong again.

I stared at it for a moment. Surely not.

Called the technician while walking to the cabinet. Opened it.

Another bite. Fresh. The rat had come back, detected suspicious byte activity, and expressed its opinion, maw wide open, teeth glistening even before the optic lights.

The Fix (Act Two, Reprise)

Here’s where I got lucky: the technician was still in the neighbourhood, on his way home. He turned around, came back, fixed it a second time, and then we did something we probably should have done the first time: armored the cable. Full MacGyver mode. Pipe insulation, duct tape, done. Duct tape fixes everything™. Rat-resistant, we hoped.

It’s held since.

Somewhere out there, a rat made my day significantly worse. Twice. With surgical precision. During a war. While I was trying to work.

Respect, honestly. Terrible, but respect.

Stay safe out there. Both from missiles and from rodents with a taste for fiber optics.