As I wrote today Google Spreadsheets were down for several hours (and still are for some users who are getting the “Trying to reach google.com…” error ). If you are still experiencing this error there is a workaround that works for me.

If you have Firebug add-on in your browser (Firefox or Chrome) follow these steps:

1. Open your browser and login to Google Docs, load a spreadsheet.
2. Open Firebug and enable Network tab.
3. (Re)load the spreadsheet that is causing problems.
4. In Firebug, search for the (red) GET resource that failed to load. You should recognize it by name, it should be “GET test?…” or “GET sorry?…”.
5. Click on the URL, copy the URL resource.
6. Load the URL in a new tab.
7. A Google CAPTCHA will be displayed.
8. Enter the characters from the image.
9. Reload the spreadsheet.

This should be it! It worked for me and for my coworker, so let me know in the comments if it works for you!