I felt no withdrawal symptoms at all while unconnected. Perhaps having my notebook along during vacation time helped me avoid problems involving the discontinuation. After all, I was able to hear Windows start. I copied photos off my camera's xD card daily. I saved the blog entries that I entered yesterday. Yet without the Internet a computer isn't useful anymore.
While gone, Google did well keeping spam out of my inbox. Yet, my BCIT email address contained hundreds of advertisements. I went wild while deleting. I surely hope nothing important ended up in the digital dump.