So, I never had a problem with any phone company until last summer. That is 20-ish years of pleasantness between them and me. The first sign of trouble was when I moved into a new apartment with a roommate and that person (known to some of you as “Lackus Brainus”) called Madagascar and I was billed some huge amount. Needless to say, I did take care of that bill and made a mental note. I said, “Self, remember that if you see that dumb ass ever again, you can always knee-cap him”. So, after threatening letters from the phone company, I paid my phone bill and was done with that whole thing. The trauma was over.
The next big stepping stone in my journey to hate the phone companies was when we moved again. My boyfriend, daughter and I moved to a new apartment building. It was kind of short notice when we called Evil Qwest (known from here on out as “E.Q.”) to have our phone switched to the new apartment. They said that it could be done in 5-7 working days. “No problem” I thought, "I have a cell phone, I’ll just have to get by with that". So as the 5-7 working days started to go by, we had the phone hooked up to the wall, charging, and checked it every so often to see if it worked. Well, one day it did. I made a few calls, everything was fine…. until the phone started disconnecting my calls. When the phone was working again, we called E.Q. and let them know that there was a problem with our line. The lady actually told me that the phone had not been connected yet and that I did not have service at the new apartment yet, that being the problem. I had to explain to her in great detail that the phone was working at the new apartment, because I was calling her ON THAT LINE! She was stumped so she assigned a “case number” to me and promised a repairman with the usual "5-7 working days" spiel. The man came – he said that it was not a problem with the lines on his half, but a problem with the lines inside the building. Well, that is where I kind of freaked. The building is less then a year old, and the people who lived there 4 days before me had a phone that worked JUST FINE!!! So E.Q. and I went round and round, until I was finally so pissed off I had the phone shut off. Which I thought at the time ended my battle with E.Q, but there is more…
I had E.Q. leave a forwarding phone number (my cell number) on our old line so that my friends and family would know where to call. One evening, I received a call from E.Q. offering some great package if I switched from my current provider. Low rates, great peak hours, long distance costs… etc. Well, after having just gone through what I had with E.Q. during the move, I lost it. That poor lady didn’t know what hit her! I was yelling and freaking out big time! Needless to say, they never called again. Which leads me to Cellular One.
Since E.Q. couldn’t perform,
all I had to fall back on was Cell One. Good enough right? So all is well
on the cell phone front until one drunken Saturday night I was trying to
call my best friend Mel. She lives in Puerto Rico, but with Cell One I
have free evenings and weekends – so that was OK. I dialed her number and
got a recorded message that said I could not place the call. Drunk and
relentless, I tried about 27 more times to no avail. Completely pissed,
I e-mailed her my “miss you dearly” note with a “p.s.” about how I couldn’t
call her because my phone was all screwy. So I went to Cell One on Monday
bright and early. They tried to call Mel from their own cell, then from
the office phone. Apparently, Cell One has barred their customers from
calling Puerto Rico permanently! Some sort of fraud problems I guess. They
suggested I get a landline. Why do I have to suffer because some asshole
somewhere tried to screw the system?!?!?! This sucks! All I have that I
can count on is Internet. But then you have the whole Excite going bankrupt
or whatever – and they are my provider. I think that this is a sign that
someone up there does not want me to communicate with others. But know
this: I WILL COMMUNICATE! I HAVE LIVED ON AN ISLAND IN ALASKA THAT HAD
NO POWER AND I COMMUNICATED! I CAN THINK HARD ENOUGH ABOUT MY GRANNY AND
SHE WILL CALL WITHIN THE HOUR! IT WILL HAPPEN AND NO ONE WILL STOP ME!
THE CONSPIRACY WILL END!
-J