| | Yesterday was "THE DAY". It was the much longed for, highly anticipated, "We're finally getting it" day. The day that U-verse was scheduled to be installed. At least, that was the perspective of the males of this house. I on the other hand, questioned how much longer it would now take to finish the already started projects, let alone start the ones still on 'the list', now that they would have how many channels to choose from?! 8-/ Aw well, at least I still have my blogging o;-p. Part of "the deal" B3 and 4 had made with Brian about moving back home, had to do with getting cable TV, of one form or another. We have only had it once. W-a-y back. When cable TV and the likes were still relatively new. And the only reason that we had it then, was due to the district manager from the cable company, for the area that we lived in, showing up on our front porch. Turned out that we literally were the only house on our block without cable. And if we would sign up, then the sales rep. for our district, the manager for our district, and the district manager for our area, would all qualify for big bonuses. They REALLY wanted us as customers!!! We hadn't been interested in taking on another monthly payment. We were having a heck of a time keeping up with the 'necessity' ones that we had. However, they r-e-a-l-l-y wanted our business. Brian had them in the palm of his hand. We ended up signing up. And for the barest of bare pricing of $10 a month, we had more than basic cable. We also had the Disney channel, and the "family channel", a-n-d ... ;-}. We also got free installation. And, we only had to keep it for six months before we could cancel without penalties, at which point in time, we did cancel. Otherwise, the bill was going to jump by fifteen dollars a month. Brandon and Brent had tried to get cable TV while living on their own, but even though one of them does have a cell phone account in his own name, he still didn't have "enough" credit history to qualify. The other one has no credit history what-so-ever. And we couldn't co-sign for them, what with being so close to going into foreclosure and all. So part of "the deal" with moving home again, was that between the two of them, they pay half of our monthly mortgage payment, AND, we would get U-verse, with the bill being split three ways. Seeings how we already have AT&T/SBC for our house phone and internet service, we got "a deal" on adding U-verse. When the guy showed up to start installing it yesterday, the four human males that live here were thrilled! Boo on the other hand, took one good look at him and decided 'nothing doing'!! Not sure if it was due to that the guy was scared of him (the guy admitted such). Or, if it had to do with all of the "stuff" hanging off of the guys waist. Whatever the reasoning, Boo didn't think that guy should be admitted to 'his territory', let alone be allowed to wander at will. So Boo got put on his leash out back. For literally hours. First, there was the problem with our phone lines. Long story short (I can too do that o:-p), every year since we moved back in after the fire (7 years total now) we have at least once yearly had to call the phone company due to hardly being able to hear people, due to the amount of static suddenly on our line, or hearing others voices on the line (as though we had a form of the old 'party' phone lines), or sometimes we were even picking up radio stations. Over the phone, they would try to convince me it would turn out to be something inside our house. ALWAYS, they were proven wrong. Numerous times we were told that squirrels had chewed through the lines somewhere along our block. A couple of weeks ago this had happened and the repair man had installed 'filters' on all of the phones inside our house. When the guy yesterday had hooked into our phone line via the box attached to the outside of our house, he got extreme static, along with a loud whistle type sound. As he started investigating it, he declared that the whole thing had not been properly installed in the first place, only sort of rigged together. He was able to get part of it fixed, and then after having gone back and forth to the local areas control box, had put in a call for the 'bucket guy' to come and do repair work along the lines. All of this had taken him over an hour, and he had not even begun to do anything towards actually installing U-verse yet. He was not pleased!!! And seeings how "management" only allots them so much time per installation .... . And sitting on the back porch, Boo felt that he had made enough trips in and out to his truck, as well as leaving and coming back again a couple of times, the guy should be GONE!!! We moved Boo's water and food to the back porch, while our guys started assisting the installation guy. the SBC guy was thrilled that our guys had already drilled most of the holes, as well as put lead wire/roping in place. Brian did not want holes drilled through the exterior walls to every room for installation. We would really like to insulate this house via exterior applied installation next year, and then put on new siding. Extra wiring all over on the outside would make that tasks more complicated! The installation guy was also thrilled that all of our guys were here to help. He could start feeding wire up from the basement, and they could be in the rooms of the other floors pulling, thus he didn't have to do near as much running up and down, and back and forth. Etc.. While all of that was a huge help, the project still kept taking for-ever. Usually it takes two to four hours. But we were having it run to "the boys" basement room, and the living room, and he had to run something to this computer in the den, and three of the upstairs bedrooms. And of course, not all of it could just be simple. "Murphy" wouldn't allow that!!! The guy had arrived about 10:15. By two thirty-ish, Boo had had it!!! And of course, I couldn't move his leash further out in the yard and hook it to the garage like I've done in the past. The hook connection to the thing in the ground wouldn't open far enough for me to get if off 8-/. Figures. By three o'clock, it was raining. Boo hates rain!!!!! !!! And, it was a cold rain. He had tried scratching on the door to be let in till I was sure there were going to be permanent marks on the door. The only inside room we could have possibly locked him in was Benson's, but we'd put Rascal in there. We'd given Boo extra treats .... . I was sitting in the living room when the back doorbell rang. Instantly my mind questioned it. I had not just heard Boo barking. Not his "stay away" bark. Nor his "so happy to see you, please pat me" bark. Nothing. Who was at the back door. And where was Boo / what had happened to Boo?!!! When I opened the back door, there was Boo. All by himself. Grinning ear to ear. He had pushed the button and rang the backdoor bell ;-p I started laughing so-o-o hard!!! Oh my goodness!! He won. How could I refuse? ;-p I brought him in hooked to the leash we use when taking him for walks. Once he caught on that no-o, we were not headed out for a walk. And after getting snapped at a couple of times when he started to growl at the installation guy, he literally sighed and accepted everything. To the point that after only a relatively short bit, we were able to let him off the leash. After a bit more, he decided that he just had to see everything they were doing ;-p Typical curious Boo. By the time the guy left, he had a couple of hours of over-time in. Not do to Boo, but Boo had declared himself a friend! :-} And the guy was THRILLED with the large plate of homemade fudge brownies we sent him off with (you're drooling. Wasn't sure you'd noticed. ;-P) And we heard Brandon chuckling with excitement in his room while trying to decide what to watch ;-p |
