Resolution

So I may have made my peace with the infamous, notorious, Time Warner Cable. It seems too good to be true, which is why I'm having a hard time believing it.

My friends came up last weekend, and it was great. Great to see them, and sarcastically great because of the weather. It was hideous on Saturday, raining "cats and dogs" as the pictionary game we played would say (assuming, of course, a pictionary game could talk).

Well, regardless of the irony that board game brought us, it was raining cats and dogs, and that day we happened to have BIS-- Bad Internet Syndrome. I just made that up, but it is entirely appropriate. It would stop, then start but be really slow, then stop for a while and start up again. Then it went down for an hour. Then it was up again.

So, even though I was enjoying my time with my friends, I still had the urge to call and complain to TWC, which I did. The lady I talked to tried telling me it had been working perfectly. Same old song and dance, but I wasn't buying it. (I'm already paying enough for their shitty service, I don't need a side of bullcrap too.)

"No, it's not working, because I can't use it. ( YOU IDIOT. QUICK QUESTION: WHO LIVES HERE, ME OR YOU??) I know that you *see* it is working fine, but that is wrong. That is what the last guy said, but he was wrong, and the guy he sent out here confirmed that was wrong. He looked into the modem history and saw there were complications and errors. SO DON'T YOU DARE FREAKING TELL ME EVERYTHING IS ALL HUNKY DORY!"

My tone was pissed, but I refrained from hollering and using derogatory terms. I also didn't say the words capitalized above, but I sure thought them. I couldn't believe the nerve of this woman telling me I was wrong. "I unplugged from the wireless router, and was plugged directly into the modem." I said, "it's still not working.."

She didn't believe me, but she still asked, "Should I send out a technician?"

"Uh, well you've already sent out 3, and none of them could fix it. Everytime they come it's working fine, so what do you want to do?" I asked, seeing the 4th guy as a pointless waste of time.

"Well we'll send a guy out."

"Ok, when?"

"They will call with an appointment time,"

"Ok..."

"How's Tuesday? Would you rather have AM or PM?"

"Uh...?" Didn't she just say she the tech would schedule the appointment? Seriously? Do you have a brain? At all? Didn't think so.

So Tuesday came, and so did the technician. Jon. (and just as I used Level III Technician Ron's real name to shame him, I am using Jon's real name to thank him--and give him credit for proving my sanity)

It was actually quite funny, because on the way home, there were two TWC van's clogging the road. One was on one side of the road, up in the wire's at the Ranger's house; the other was on the other side of the road, talking to the driver. Ironically, I was stuck behind the guy who was going to my house, so at least if I was late I could blame him. Right?

Well he quickly put his car in gear and drove down the main road, pausing a bit when he came to my road. I boldly signaled to turn right by waving my arms in that direction, but I don't know if he saw me. He turned right, and drove right past my house. I pulled in and waited for him to figure that out, but he took so long so I went in the house and put the dog on a leash instead. (It's easier to control the jumping he does that way)

When the guy came in, he was very concerned about the issue, "So can you tell me what's going on here?"

I was like, "Well, you are the fourth guy to come out, I really don't know why they sent you; no one else can figure it out, but the problem is the internet will shut off. And I know that it's the internet because I've plugged directly into the modem and it still doesn't work. and blah blah blah"

So he questioned me to make sure I knew what I was talking about, then went downstairs to check the input. Took him about 5-10 minutes just to figure out where the cable was coming from---and he didn't like the setup one bit. "You have (or are losing) 14 dbs," He said before clarifying--because I had no idea what he was talking about, "You should have 3..."

"Oh? That doesn't sound good." I said, as he proceeded to test the cables and stuff like that. He said that the input was going into a 2 way splitter, that was going into a 3 way splitter, or something crazy like that; I should have paid attention, but I was honestly so sick of anything with the word "cable" in it I didn't care to listen. Instead I just hung out down there and waited to see if he could find anything; I hope he didn't think I didn't trust him, or anything. I just wanted to know if there was a problem.

So after that he went upstairs. I can't remember if he found something there, but my mom says he did. Then he went outside and found out the levels being sent into the house were way too high (which was why the basic cable channels were coming in so fuzzy--I told him, I thought it was just because we had a large TV and it distorted the quality)

He fixed that, and said that there was an additional problem he would send the guys out to fix. So what now, Level III Technician Ron? Who is crazy now?

Jon was so nice he gave us his card, and his supervisor's number too! Then told us not to deal with TWC anymore. He couldn't believe they'd set us up like that, and though he was professional about my complaining, I think he had sympathy for my situation. He was all, "Yeah, I don't see why you wouldn't be upset you just want your internet." After all the aggravation and stress, I would have given him a hug if it wouldn't have been that weird.

Well, with that all said, I think I may finally have faith in my cable company. I may finally like them----even if they won't give me my Motorola DVR, and even if my setup is from the 1990's, and even if I can only title search for TV shows by using the first letter, and even if every time I search for House I want to throw the remote through the TV because I have to scroll through 80 listings of home Makeover----I can now scream, not in anger but in joy, THANK YOU SO MUCH JON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!