Telecoms and circuses

The last few weeks I've been having problems with broadband. Quite frankly it's been more like a slim band, thin band, intermittent band, disconnect you band and scratch head all night wondering what the band is up with the band. It happens primarily when I'm on MSN messenger. The connection just cuts off. As though some very fragile wire is hanging lose, then when the wind blows in a certain direction it cuts me off. This is not fun.

Sparkling Eyes told me to get it fixed. It's infuriating. There I'd be chatting away happily to Beautiful then my chat would be no chat. Like I'd been suddenly zapped into space. A moment later, it would reconnect. Sparkling Eyes was getting angry at me. Hey it's not my fault. Now it's my choice get it fixed or not get a chat with the one person in my life I can't stop chatting to. There was no choice. I had to make the call to my service provider.

I rang up British Telecoms on their magical number (151) for reporting faults and a machine spoke to me and tested my phone line. It told me there was a fault. Well does this mean BT prefer the word of a machine as against the word of a human being? It was nice to know I wasn't imagining getting cut off so frequently. Sparkling Eyes would be happy it would get fixed and we could chat. Happy to think I didn't have the broadband equivalent of Tourettes syndrome. The machine made an appointment and said it would be completed in 2 days.

So I waited 4 days and it still isn't fixed. I rang again. This time I got to spoke to a human being. Her accent was Indian, name Tina and she spoke very much like Margaret Thatcher had given her two dozen elocution lessons. Thatcher by the way is amongst the most hated prime minsters this country has ever had. The conversation proceeded and with each comment she made, I just couldn't help getting mad at her. At the end of the conversation I asked her where she was from. She was in India. In a call centre no doubt. I was also mad coz she said her name as Tina, yet another minor item I detest call centres for; giving obviously European names to Asian's who barely have the ability to talk the language. I opened my trap and told Tina she sounded upper class, and condescending when she spoke, I said it was obvious she wasn't from the UK. At this moment she dropped the put-on tone, and it was as though the stress had been relieved from her vocal chords she sounded natural. I know she was unhappy at what I said, which is sad because if she knew the despise working class ordinary people held for Thatcher, I'm sure she'd of understood. It's now 5 days and the line is still not fixed. I bet Tina's gone and lost the fault request slip.

Today I also went into the Fish Factory to do some overtime. Hoping it would be quite, but my big fish group leader was there and he enjoys talking. On the phone. In person. To anyone. So it ended up a circus. Ear plugs were sank deep in my ears, headphones on with music and most was drowned out. He wasn't the only one, but then I suppose most circuses have more than one attraction, but why do they have to be so loud I wonder. I am from a different world, I like to hear myself think. Peace and quite is a beautiful thing. It's lucky I have a long fuse. I wonder tho if it will stretch all the way to India, Tina could just make my intermittent broadband last a bit longer. I'll suppose then I'll be clapping like a seal and doing circus tricks next time I ring.