Sorry about yesterday, but on top of being worn out from stuff on Tuesday, I was scrambling to fix some last-minutes bugs in software I’m working on. At any rate, I’m hoping at this point that most of the unpleasantness is behind me for a while, and life can get back to something more like normal.
- Well, here it is the evening of the 7th of January, two full weeks after I moved and called Qwest the first time asking why my DSL service wasn’t working, and twelve days after getting back online. This evening I got a call from UPS, since the DSL modem I was supposed to get from Qwest was sent to my old house, and the driver remembered me and knew that I’d moved. Yet another call to Qwest (33 more minutes spent on the phone, bringing the total over four hours), and a call to UPS later, the modem should be arriving here on Friday. But complaining again netted me a different phone-service package which should get me back to about the same price I was paying before getting switched to a package which was going to
save me a bunch of money
and in addition to the $50 credit I’d already gotten, the guy tonight increased that to a credit for a full month of service (at thesaving me money
rate of about $95/month, and not the newsave me money
rate which should be something like $80/month).
Of course, this being Qwest, I’m not going to actually believe any of it until I see it working, but I also got to speak to a supervisor who’s promised that the three specific people I can prove screwed something up with my order:No, you don’t need a new DSL modem.
Yes, we’ll ship that out to you to arrive on December 31.
Oh, that didn’t go out, but I’ll get it corrected and make sure it goes to your new address.
And Lance, if this doesn’t work, I’ll be talking to your supervisor, too. If it does, I might actually be able to go a week without having to call Qwest, and I thank you for that. - Molitor milestone overshadowed by Rose’s latest tale. The only real question about Rose is whether he’s actually broken his string of 14 years of lying or not. Molitor, on the other hand, shows a lot of class and is just the kind of guy who belongs in the hall. Here’s more on Molitor’s moment. Dennis Eckersley also got voted in. Two good players made it this year. [press-patch]
- Bush Grabs New Power for FBI allowing them unprecedented power to obtain records from financial institutions without requiring permission from a judge. I think this is the same bill that means giving your bank more information when you need to open an account. Conveniently enough, the bill was signed on the day Saddam was captured. [boing boing]
- Bush hits snag on plan to help illegal workers by creating a guest-worker program for the US. I’ve seen how guest-worker programs work in Austria and Germany in 1980, and I don’t think it’s a good idea. Many of the jobs that end up being filled by guest-workers are jobs that are normally
entry-level
jobs in the US and are often filled by teenagers or college students. In Europe, they’re also facing big demographic shifts due to their guestworkers, while there’s almost 100% unemployment among the young. Guest-workers become permanent, and rather than kids getting a job, they idle through school. Doesn’t seem right to me. [press-patch]