I check my email maybe a dozen times throughout the day, my wife does also from her computer. When it's down for one of us, it's down for both. Because of the satellite ISP structure our IP is NAT'd, that can act very similar to a firewall. Sometimes it's nice to not have to worry much about anybody seeing me from the dangerous outside internet world. I don't even run any kind of firewall on my network.

I really appreciate the help, I'm coming to the conclusion that there's not much more I can do about it but, mutter under my breath (!*&@%^ satellite). I wish I had another option besides 22k dialup.