Wednesday, January 19, 2011

The AT&T wringer

That's what the nice guy I finally talked to in Kalamazoo called it last Friday.

"My god. You've talked to everyone on the planet."
"Yes. Yes, I have. I'm glad you can see that!"
"You've really been through the AT&T wringer."

Yup. Eight hours of prepaid cell minutes. That would be $60 of minutes cards, plus the cost of the cheapest Tracfone I could buy. Why? Because AT&T gave me an on-date of January 10th. When did I get my internet? Today. January 19th. When do I get my phone? Supposedly now tomorrow, January 20th. What transpired between the 10th and today is, to put it mildly, unbefreakinglievable.

When finally yesterday, having gone to my bff's house to use her landline, where it took yet another 2 hours (total time on phone: 8 hours, 20 minutes. Total number of calls: 12. Total number of people talked to: at least 20. Total number of reasons given: at least 10) to finally get some explanation and resolution. I totally lucked out and got a woman who knew both the phone crap and the internet crap, and was able to look at everything that had happened, and figure out what to do.

Somewhere along the line, my phone order had been cancelled! And yet, accounts showed that my phone service was waiting on a deposit. Which I then 'paid', but not really, because the order had been cancelled. My internet, so the story goes, had been whatevered by the tech who came out to set the house up because the gate to the backyard was closed and 'client not home', which I was, halfway watching for him. He didn't knock or ring the bell to be let in. So, then, my internet turn-on was cancelled. They changed my due-on date 5 times. FIVE TIMES!!!

While I had little hope going into today, I did have hope, because the nice woman at AT&T who seemed to actually know what the hell she was talking about gave me hope. And lo and behold!!! A tech showed up just after noon, for an 11-1 appointment time, and got me up and running in about half an hour! So now I really have hope for the phone going on tomorrow night.

Let me just say how incredibly relieved I am to have my netflix for my day in bed tomorrow. Holy smokes, people!!!

In other news, Mr. Nic Mann, generous sperm donor of my darling and beloved grandson, has done it again! There is a new young woman expecting his daughter on May 19. Connor will be 5 on May 14. I know I know... how hilarious is that?! And, even better, she's not the girl he's been with since Cassady was pregnant, and is still with now! Nope. She's a summer fling of not-girlfriend status. My attitude about not jamming him up too much more by trying to get his child support increased (I mean, it did get set when he was a 17 year old high school student, and as a 22 year old man it is the same measly little pittance) has completely shifted. New babymama will for sure sue for child support, and will get more, as he is an adult with two jobs, so I will be going in to see what we can do to get Connor's support increased before the new bebeh comes about.

She seems like a nice girl who wishes she'd had a perspective on Cassady and Connor that didn't come from Nic prior to being where she is now. We're going to have lunch soon, she and I and her mom. She and Cassady have bonded over Nic's douchiness, and she reached out to me on facebook. Man oh man. Curveballs! BattahbattahbattahSWING!!!

I got five years under mah belt here with jackassedyness on the part of babydaddy, his scary mom, and his nice but disconnected dad. None of whom know his current predicament. Isn't that cool! He's such a big boy, he hasn't mentioned to any of his parents (his 'team'... ya'll may remember... the 'team' who informed me that I needed to pull parent rank and haul Cassady down to the abortion clinic?) that another one is on the way.

Ya'll, somebody call Maury. Sheeee-it.

Is it bad that I find this all highly amusing?

** apparently, he did tell his mom, who, unsurprisingly, tried to pay for an abortion. She was turned down. **

3 comments:

Aimee B said...

Is it bad that I am almost laughing too? So glad you didn't "pull parent rank"... whatever that is! Never felt like I "outranked" my babies, I've just "out aged" them!
Practically speaking however, get that child support up! Yes, he is young, but apparently all his parts function and Connor deserves to be supported! Love you, girl!

Gramomster said...

Hah! Yeah! All his parts but his BRAIN!!!
Do you know, it's been almost a YEAR since he's seen Connor, and he lives less than 5 miles? And that's far! Since we moved! And he picked the one weekend his own dad was in town to spend, ahem, 3 hours with his 4 year old son.
So yeah, brain, def not workz.

Valerie Munthe said...

It could be so much worse: he could be exercising his "parental rights" and be a total shit-hole Dad, unwilling to cooperate with Connor's other family members. It sucks and is heartbreaking that he's contributed yet another human being that will grow up never knowing or understanding their father. I agree, get the child support up and don't let up: obviously this "child" has never experienced true consequence for his actions, and apparently having a child wasn't enough of a wake-up call. Progress, not perfection.
AT&T is terrible!!! I remember calling them to cancel my service and they tried EVERYTHING to keep me on. In the end, I told them that the ONLY thing that kept me a customer for THAT long was the fact that their local tech guy was a drop-dead GORGEOUS hunk of man-flesh who'd come to my house and fix my phone at the drop of a dime. Seriously: screw them.