Success! I've Got Phone - The Saga Resolves

Hello my readers - friends met in person and on-line. The biggest news is ... WE HAVE PHONE! Astonishing, I know, and of course not without a few quirks and a bit of trauma, but we have phone. The tech came out yesterday around 11:00 am and it took until almost 2:00 pm until the wiring was complete and the phones rang with a test run. Apparently our copper wiring was too corroded to fix, so the company determined that switching us to a fiber optic cable would be better all around. 

We now have fiber optic cable from the pole in our back 
yard to the house and then into the "black box". I actually 
own some fiber optic cable myself for a beading/sculptural 
project I started almost two decades ago. I'd still love to 
get that project completed and powered. It would and 
will be outstanding once the structure and lighting 
is complete. 

That was still up in the air a bit, however, because the tech needed to fine out how to get the cable into the house and where it needed to hook up. That took more than 45 minutes of exploration, trial and error, but eventually we discovered the place where the wire would enter the house, as well as where it could be connected to the routing box (which needed an electrical plug). It was a tight squeeze for the wire in a couple of places, but it managed to get where it needed to. Then the new box got powered up and remotely programmed, and the tech tried several test calls. All of them rang phones in the house, so success! 

Fiber optic cable is super kewl stuff. With a power 
source, it carries that power through the cable to the 
terminal point without heat, so faster delivery without 
the need for a ton of insulation. It's also much more 
durable than the old copper wiring, and more flexible. 

Except ... nothing really comes easy in this house. I decided, shortly before 5:00 pm, that I wanted to try the phones once again and make sure that everything was working properly. I also wanted to check our security alarm and see if that was something that I could reset on my own (of course it's not - it requires a tech to come out and reset it so I'll be dealing with a different scheduling issue next week *sigh*). 

For my non-USA friends, the "sound of crickets" is a 
saying meaning there isn't any sound at all, that things 
are so quiet you could hear a cricket chirp. That certainly 
wasn't what I wanted when I was testing out the phones 
yesterday. 

But, I called home from my cell phone, and crickets ... no ringing. I checked the various phones, no dial tone. I looked at the newly installed box, and there were lights, so, not knowing what else to do, I once again called CentiryLink. I called the Fiber division, which were the ones who had scheduled my tech from earlier. They shifted me over to someone who checked the lines remotely, and apparently the lines were working fine. But I had no phone. GRRRR. Then we got disconnected I wasn't fond of the person I was speaking to anyway, so I called them again. 

My life does seem to be one large "Hurry Up and Wait" 
event, but eventually we get there. So much depends on 
the person on the other end of the phone call. In this case, 
the first person was a bit of a PITA but the second person 
was marvelous. 

This time I got a lovely woman who was actually helpful  when I explained the situation. It was another 20 minutes on the phone, but eventually they sent me down to the box and asked me to unplug it. I did, and waited for a full minute before plugging it back in, then we waited while it restarted its' programming. Finally all three lights were illuminated. I tried phoning my land line again, and success! I had ringing phones. I thanked the nice lady and started trying to figure out why our portable phone wasn't ringing when the stationary phones were. After some trials and error (and checking the manual on-line) I realized that DH had removed the phone connection from the base station. Plugging that cable back in did the trick, and all phones are now operational. 

I like our Attorney General. I think he's done a good job 
for the state. I'll be submitting documents to him regarding 
a different phone issue I'm having at the shop. I scanned all 
of the documents into my computer yesterday, and I'll get 
everything put together and submitted to him ASAP. 

Now to get my security system to join the pack - LOL. But ... one step forward. In my "spare" time while waiting for appointments and between this and that, I was working on my complaint to the Attorney General for my shop's AT&T account. I got the multitude of documents scanned, and I was almost ready to send their form along with those multitude of documents, when I hit the wrong key on my keyboard and lost the whole thing to cyberspace trash hell. CRAP. So, I get to recreate that whole form, then attach the photographs, and send it onward. I should move the photos to my dropbox so that I can do this on the laptop at the shop if I end up with time today. I'll try to do that when I'm finished with this. It's a LOT of photos - lots of bills that I'm disputing. 

I've Got a Phone again! Yippee!!! LOL

Never any rest - LOL. But, hell. I've got phone! Things could be worse, right? We'll be at the garden center on the far south side of town tomorrow morning when they open. DH always has multitudes of ideas and lists of plants he wants to check out. I'll be spending more time outside than I want, so I've learned over the years - dress warmly. The garden is starting to green up, though, and I'm sure it'll be a lovely year. My Lantanas this year will be in a different bed, one that will get more light, so we should get some good bloom from them. At least, that's the goal. So, have an excellent weekend and I'll be back on Monday. Slava Ukraini. 

Errands, Appointments, Phones and Hummers - It Was a Busy Wednesday

Yesterday's crazy schedule shift did work out, although I stumbled a few times. Still, by the end of the day I had succeeded in quite a lot. Of course, the main focus was my pre-surgical physical first thing in the morning, and the fact that CenturyLink was coming over to check the phone lines sometime during the day. That was originally scheduled for sometime between 9-5, but when I logged on to check, it had been extended to sometime between 9-7:30, thus taking in the entire day. 

I was expecting the phone company to repair the 
lines, and had to build that into my already 
skewed schedule for the day. Still, by the end 
of the day, everything had worked out - somewhat. 

I was at the grocery store shortly after 6:00 am and picked up what I needed for the next few days. I'll be back for my main shop on Friday, since Friday will be my cooking day this week. But, I got the groceries, put them away, and then headed to the clinic where I saw my Doctor (I really like my doctor - she's fun and very smart. I've been seeing her for years now). This one simple appointment will bracket both surgeries, so I'm good to go onward towards sight once again. 

Allina Clinic, Bandana Square location is close to the 
house, has pretty much everything I need in it, and 
it's a beautiful location - very well designed and 
operated. It's located between my house and the 
shop, so it's close and it's convenient. 

Tomorrow's major task will be renewing my driver's license. It's far from impossible, but can be a time sink. Of course, since I couldn't swim yesterday, I'll be swimming tomorrow. Today's major task will be the phone company's return. After the tech showed up yesterday while I was on my weekly catch-up call with Aearwen, he checked around the house and said the problem was indeed an exterior problem and if he couldn't fix it right away, he'd add it onto Thursday's schedule. I guess he couldn't fix it, because we're now on the Thursday schedule for sometime between 9:00 am and 6:30 pm. Hopefully we'll have a land line again by the time I get home from work tonight. 

Apparently Costa Rica has more species of 
hummingbirds than anywhere else in the 
world. Just look at all of the varieties! How 
truly amazing! 

So, that's the excitement in my house right now - LOL. I did get my hummingbird feeder hung yesterday, and then on PBS last night, there was a show featuring the hummingbirds of Costa Rica on "Nature" last night. It was marvelous. Such amazing birds. The tree where I hang the feeder lost a large branch in our winter snow. It's not impacting anything, but we'll have to clean it up at some point. The tree has been slowly dying for several years now, and it's a large maple in the perfect place. We would rather keep the shade for as long as we can, so we're not getting it cut down - yet. That time will come. 

I hung my hummingbird feeder up for the season 
yesterday. In my part of the country, it should be hung 
anytime after April 1st. Now I have to start keeping an 
eye on it, making sure the ant trap is filled with water 
and the hummers have plenty of food. 

So, I'm off to the swimming pool. Have a wonderful Thursday and I'll be back tomorrow, before I head out to swim again on a rare Friday swim. Be kind, be thoughtful, and Slava Ukraini. 

Schedule Shift - Flexibility is Necessary

It's shortly after 5:00 am - late for a Wednesday post, but here's my crazy day today. In less than an hour, I need to be in the grocery store buying what I need for tonight's dinner and the various things I need for the week ahead. I have Friday as a fall-back day in case I've forgotten anything, but Wednesday is always my main grocery shopping day. 

My pre-surgical physical needed to be made between the 
11th and 18th of April. I'm relieved that my doctor was 
able to squeeze me in first thing in the morning to get this 
done with. Then I'm free until May. 

Why do I need to be at the store at 6:00 am when they open? Because I have a 7:30 am appointment for my pre-surgical physical which I can't miss. But ... (I can hear you thinking) ... why not go to the grocery store on your way home from the doctor? 

CenturyLink is actually a pretty good company, 
but they always put their business customers ahead 
of their individual ones. I don't blame them for that, 
and I've been grateful for that in the past when we've 
had issues at the shop, but to get an appointment 
for repair that's a week distant? That seems a bit 
much just because I'm a residence instead of a 
business. 

Well, that's because I'm stuck at the house from 9:00 until 5:00 waiting for the CenturyLink repair person to check my phone connections and find out why I don't have a land-line right now. Not having a land line certainly isn't the end of the world - most of my communications are made through my cell phone after all. But ... when we have a power outage, or for a couple of other things (like waking DH up over the phone when he needs to get up at a specific time), we need that land line. I reported the issue last week, and today was the first available date. Of course I couldn't schedule for a two-hour time block. No ... it had to be anytime between 9:00 am and 5:00 pm. 

With the exception that I'm stuck at home from 
9:00 until 5:00, it's not much different from 
my standard Wednesday. Everything is being 
compressed into a very busy morning. Hopefully 
my afternoon will be totally kick-back. LOL

So, I pushed my swim off a day and will swim on Thursday and Friday instead of Wednesday and Thursday, and I'll be cooking and spending my day at home instead of doing any outside errands that need to be done. Today I will actually BE a housewife - married to my domicile - LOL. Have an excellent Wednesday and I'll be back tomorrow - hopefully with working phones once again. Slava Ukraini. 

Celebrate Women, Phone Issues and Lent - Random Bits and Pieces

Welcome to International Women's Day. Although I rarely write about women, they do pop up in my stories and longer fiction now and again. I don't really have hesitations in writing about female characters, I just prefer to write (and read) about men. Oh well, to each their own. I'm celebrating International Women's Day anyway, because women are still 2nd-class citizens in much of the world today and they deserve better - MUCH better. I'm a lifelong campaigner for women's rights and always will be. 

It's International Women's Day today. Don't kid
yourself. This world would stop dead if women
weren't around. We're absolutely necessary! 

Today we're gearing up for tomorrow's storm. Starting around noon tomorrow we're supposed to get pounded with 6"-13" of snow and blizzard whiteout conditions. Spring snows in the Frozen Northlands can be horrific. So today DH is getting groceries for the weekend at the store and if the weather is super bad tomorrow, I'll probably close early so that my staff and I can get home safely. Today, however, will be fine and we'll probably be busy. 

CenturyLink. Argh. Although everyone was super
polite, it was extremely difficult to get updates
and confirmations that my tech was actually
going to arrive. Still, once they got there,
it was fixed relatively quickly and I'm
now back in business again. 

Yesterday was a quiet day - not in terms of customer count, but because the telephones at the shop were non-functional. I contacted CenturyLink early in the morning. After playing their game of - "Oh, you're a business? This is the residential repair line. Hold, and I'll transfer you to the business section.", we were finally assigned trouble tickets for each of our main lines and a time frame of 12:30 pm - 4:30 pm for a tech to arrive. Tech #1 finally arrived around 4:00 pm. 

The CenturyLink mobile app was next to useless.
Although I had two different work order numbers,
it didn't acknowledge either one, nor did it
acknowledge the phone numbers. I ended up
uninstalling it by the end of the day. 

It took two techs and almost an hour, but they were finally successful in getting all three of my phone lines working again. The verdict this time? Ice! Apparently ice on our roof, where the lines are stretched, shorted the lines out. One more casualty of our crazy winter weather this year. 

Our customers were uncommonly gracious. Since I had no phone lines, I also had no ability to accept credit cards, and we haven't accepted checks since the mid-1990's. Each customer either had enough cash for their merchandise, or went to one of the two ATM machines located in gas stations nearby to get cash for their purchases. I'm thankful that each person was kind enough to understand that this was not planned. We did apologize for the inconvenience, and I added some extra discounts to their purchases to ease the headache. 

Seafood is on sale and there's a great deal on scallops. DH wants
to buy some today and make seared scallops with linguine
and roasted pine nuts for Saturday or Sunday dinner. I'm
totally in favor of that! AWESOME! 

Tonight is the first Friday of Lent, which means McDonald's fish sandwiches for me and DH. Although DH isn't actively Catholic, he still likes to keep to fish on Fridays during Lent, and I adore fish, so no problems on my end. McDonald's fish sandwiches are some of my favorites, and I treat myself every now and again throughout the year. I love Lent - I get Mickey-D's almost every Friday. He's also planning fish for dinner on Saturday and Sunday. YUMMY! 

Have an excellent Friday, stock up if you're getting this storm, and be safe. I'll be back tomorrow before our snow begins to fly. 

Focus, Focus, Focus...

I am finally catching up with hundreds of Emails and misc questions that I let lie while on my Labor Day vacation. But I have three stories to write and I'm not able to get back into a writing groove yet. I had to return most of my interlibrary loaned research materials for my NaNoWriMo book yesterday, although I still have one for another week, and I have deadlines breathing down my neck. But what do I do? I read. I'm hip deep in a book series on my Nook and re-reading a book on my new phone (reading it for the third time). Having the ability to read any of my NookBooks on my phone is probably not one of the best things - LOL. But it is one thing that is making me love my phone even more. I haven't figured out a comfortable way to write on my phone yet, and the screen is smaller than that of my Nook, but the darned phone is incredibly versatile. *sigh* It's worming its way into my heart.

Gypsy Wagons by Van Gogh paints such a tempting lifestyle...

But I really have to get into a groove and start writing again, and I also owe Lai some beta work. The grooves in the road are there in front of me and I need to hitch the horses up to my gypsy wagon and get my wheels back into them.

I need to get all of my ducks into a row...

I only have two more scenes to write in my o-fic. I am finding that my muses are divided about whether my protagonist will live or die at the end of the story. Jeez! I wish those muses would just get their ducks in a row, make up their mind, and let me just finish the story. It's just a story...not an award-winning novel. And time is running out. I want to edit this several times before sending it off. No choices left here. My clock is ticking. I'm moving though...my pedometer is on my waist and my fingers are ready to hit the keyboard. I WILL write more on that fic this morning. That's my goal and my promise to myself :-)

Phones and "Psychedelic" Experiences

My phone died yesterday. I have had it for more than three years and it has been a workhorse, but it had been dropped a few too many times and it was dated. The big problem is that I knew I would have to upgrade to something more intelligent and larger - not really what I wanted. But when I tried a scheduled conversation yesterday morning and he could hear me but I couldn't hear him...well I had no more choice. I have upgraded and bought a Motorola Droid Razr. A smartphone. Me! I think I'll enjoy it though, especially because I also got Bluetooth with it so that I don't have to hold the darned thing up to my ear to use it. It got broken in yesterday afternoon in a nice long conversation with Aearwen and yes, I think I like.

I spent all yesterday trying to catch up from the phone excursion. The gentleman at the phone shop was a total sweetie and spent an hour uploading all of the softward upgrades and making sure that everything was properly set up and functioning. Unfortunately that meant that I didn't even get the laundry started until almost 1pm (leaving me taking my last load out of the dryer at 9:15 pm). And my Emails? I did finally clear up one of the Email accounts, but had two to still finish up this morning. Easier ones, but still nasty. I'll finally catch up by the end of the week *sigh*.

One of the very kewl things at the MN State Fair was a new traveling exhibit called the Luminarium. It was quite amazing and I would happily have gone back into it again and again. They marketed it as being inside of a sculpture and it was an experience of soft walls, soft music, and structures of light. If you are interested you can find out more about it at http://architects-of-air.com/. We had the Mirazozo Luminarium at the Fair. You would remove your shoes before entering this large air-filled lighted plastic sculpture filled with niches where you could sit and contemplate or you could just wander. Take a look at some of the pictures - it was an incredible experience that I hope I will be able to have again some day.