The telephone wars: waiting for Godot?
Okay, I’ll set the scene: I’m trapped in my house on a beautiful day, canceling all other plans in order to wait for the telephone repair people who may or may not come within the next three hours.
In addition, they may or may not call me on my cell phone to tell me when they are or aren’t coming. They may or may not decide it’s “safe” (a word they refuse to define) to come up my street because they may or may not want to drive around the detour set up by the guys working on the installation of the new sewer pipes, a task that has been going on since June, much of it directly in front of my house.
There, there, neo. Take a deep breath.
A little history: last night I discovered that my landline was playing tricks on me. I could make calls out, but no calls could come in. I did the requisite unplugging and replugging and testing of the phones, but none of them could receive calls; it seemed the trouble was outside.
Phoning Verizon (are you still with me, folks?) only elicited a long chain of interactions with an electronic person of unfailing politeness. She apologized for repeatedly failing to understand me–which is more than most people do (“I’m sorry, my error again…”) when I said, with increasing vehemence, “I want to speak with an agent!” (It turns out, by the way, that just saying the word “agent” will do the trick. But I digress.)
The agent instructed me to go to the outside of my house, where there is a gray tester box, and to plug in my non-remote phone for testing. This could end up saving me a lot of money if the trouble was in the phone and not in the lines. The metal box was cleverly placed in the most inaccessible corner of the building, at about the height the average eight-footer could reach handily. The cover was securely fastened on for maximum convenience, requiring a screwdriver for removal.
But I was up to the task. Opening it, I found a little diagram of its innards, including a highlighted red spot which represented the opening where the jack was supposed to be plugged in. Only problem was–as so often is the case–the map was not the territory. There was no such spot in the actual box, which did not even remotely correspond to said diagram.
Oh, and then the guys in the street told me to move my car and park it further down the road because my driveway would be blocked for the afternoon. And oh, did I forget to mention that I left my cell phone charger at the home of an out-of-town friend the other day, and that, although it’s been mailed to me, it has not yet arrived? So in order to charge said phone, I would have to get into my car and drive around, not only using up precious gas and money in the process, but abandoning my post waiting for the telephone repair guy. Which of course I cannot and will not do.
There. I feel better now.
[ADDENDUM: It’s OK. I’m all right. Doing that diaphragmatic breathing stuff.
They never arrived. And at 6 PM, the deadline, when I called the Verizon repair line for the umpteenth time today and barked “Agent!” into the phone, the lovely lady who answered and then called the dispatcher came back and told me they weren’t coming. I could make another appointment to wait in my house for four hours tomorrow. And oh, yes, I should have insisted when I originally called that I be put on the “pre-assigned” list. Although, as I pointed out, I only just now learned that little tip.
There’s more, but I’ll spare you–and myself–and skip it. However, I did get my cell phone charger in the mail, so I’m all set in that respect. And I did get a promise from the Verizon woman that if I stay within a fifteen-minute range of my house tomorrow–which covers everything I need to do–the repairmen will call me on my cell phone fifteen minutes before their arrival so I can hotfoot it back.
All will be well. I can feel it:
ESTRAGON:
You’re sure it was this evening?
VLADIMIR:
What?
ESTRAGON:
That we were to wait.
VLADIMIR:
He said Saturday. (Pause.) I think.
ESTRAGON:
You think.
VLADIMIR:
I must have made a note of it. (He fumbles in his pockets, bursting with miscellaneous rubbish.)
ESTRAGON:
(very insidious). But what Saturday? And is it Saturday? Is it not rather Sunday? (Pause.) Or Monday? (Pause.) Or Friday?….]
[ADDENDUM II: Oh, and then Blogger went down for scheduled repairs when I first attempted to publish this.]
[UPDATE 9/22/06 4:42 PM: Fixed. And it only cost the paltry sum of $100 for twenty minutes of work. The culprit was an old unused jack that some previous owner had placed in an outdoor location. Time and weather had wreaked havoc on it, and it affected the entire system.]
I hate Verizon. Just thought I’d share, but I’m with you, neo.
Much sympathy. I went through nearly the same thing last year. All three jacks in my house weren’t working. Verizon told me to do the same test you mention, which confirmed it was a problem with the outside line, thus it was their responsibility and they would come fix it for free. After they came and “fixed” it, only one of my inside jacks worked. The other two still had the same problem. I told Verizon this and they told me that since one of my jacks worked, it was now an inside line problem, and I would have to pay to get it fixed. Grrr. Grrr. Grrr.
As a friend of mine once said, “This is the sort of day that makes you want to unwind with a small shooting spree.”
Not to spoil the ending or anything, but Godot never gets there. Pointless play, anyway.
dicentra: So far, neither have the repairmen (sorry to be so PC, but where I live they’re always men). And they only have 21 minutes left to go before they have officially stood me up.
On the other hand, my cell phone charger came in today’s mail. So there is hope.
Neo:
I went from Verizon – curses be upon their heads – to completely wireless via Cingular.
Costs a bit more, but I can use my homephone number anywhere in the USA and other countries. Don’t have to worry about forwarded calls any more…
Give it a try…
I meant “so un-PC” in above comment.
The new pic looks good — it’s a tad dark though.
So what’s up with the new picture?
See new post for photo explanation.
On my computer it’s not dark. But if the consensus is that it’s too dark, I can always put up a lighter version. Everyone’s computer seems to have a different color setting, I’ve noticed.
You’re just a hard core people pleaser. I say, let them buy new monitors.
On those dark days when I am forced to call Verizon and talk to a human, s(he) starts the conversation with “How can I provide you with excellent service today?”
You do have some juicy horror stories, neo!
An important thing:
Make sure you resecure that box – really. It is an ouside jack with no security other than your lock that is *your* phone line. Were I to come over to your house, open it, plug my phone in, and make 10,000 dollars of 900 numbers it’s your bill and little you can do about it. You do not want it where anyone can just walk up and plug a phone in – that is the reason it was so hard to reach.
However simple or hard it was for you to get too it is the same for anyone else. Nearly all houses built in the last few decades have those boxes and all the phones phreakers know about them. If you know they are there you can see them all over the place, I cringe when I see them at eye level (or below) and simply cliped, not locked with a pad lock.
Add me to the Verizon detractors. Best service I’ve had was T-Mobile….sadly they have no service here so I had to switch. My land line is through my cable company though, not one of the phone companies, and I’ve had actually quite terrific service from them. As in they are here when they say they will be every time thus far. Like the new pic neo….you look much younger with the darker hair! Add me too to the group whose monitor makes it appear rather dark. Sheesh Stropy….never thought of that and my box is both unlocked and at waist level!! Add to shopping list a smallish pad lock. Then again, here in teeny, teeny town Tennessee I’m unlikely to have a problem. 🙂
I live in Knoxville Tn, I have quite a few friends in small Tennessee towns that also know of this (Grey, Kingsport, Rutledge, etc). As far as I know none of us ever used the knowledge, but that is more because of how I meet and choose my friends than all small town hackers have a sense of moral responsibility.
Especially with the internet now, knowledge crimes like this have nothing to do with the size of the town you live in. Especially given that most of these crimes are done by teenagers not really thinking about the consequences of thier actions (“hey look! mom/dad will not let me do this from our house – I can go next door and do it this way and no one will ever know!”), not by a focused criminal.