There are several things about moving that are frustrating.
The main one is not having the cable guy show up when they say he will show up. I waited nearly eight hours in the lobby of my building, after telling the sales rep at the cable center that I had no working phone and the technician would have to come in to the lobby.
He was coming to hook up television for me. Gotta have my daily dose of “Maury,” ya know.
I waited. And I waited. And I waited.
No show.
Oh well.
It was unfortunate that he didn’t arrive as expected, but sitting like a doorknob in the lobby all day did present an opportunity to meet some nice
neighbors I’m sure I would probably would never have met otherwise.
Another technician was due to come the following morning to install my missing phone and Internet service.
My little appointment card read “Between the hours of 8 a.m. and 10 a.m.”
I sat in the lobby with the paper and a cup of coffee, fingers crossed that he would get there before I completed the crossword puzzle.
At nearly the last minute, I saw the cable truck pull up in front of the building so I bolted outside to make sure he didn’t drive off.
As I approached the vehicle, I noticed he was busy on the phone, trying to communicate with someone.
I tapped on the window, nearly scaring the wits out of him, and he got out of the truck.
“I don’t have a phone, so I hope you weren’t trying to call me!”
He said, “Well, I do have a number here that I called and left a message on.”
“It doesn’t work. Not without Internet service, anyway. Come on!”
He followed me into the building and I explained my situation from the previous day, adding as a last statement, “I sure hope it wasn’t you who stood me up!”
He replied emphatically that he would never have done that.
As it turned out, he hooked me up, lock stock and two smokin’ barrels. I got my phone, TV, and Internet all within an hour.
This guy hustled like mad to get done in the time allotted him, and when he found out that my dad had been in the military, he did some extra cool things for me.
He’d been in the military, too.
Anyway, after he left, we were running around like total idiots turning on the televisions and browsing the Internet, like we had just crawled out of a cave and were grunting over the first sparks of fire.
Having that relocation nightmare behind us, the second nightmare loomed large.
As it presented itself, I cringed inwardly knowing what trauma would surround the whole scene.
Mentally, I was not geared up for it.
I weighed the various options of how to extract myself from the situation but knew that there was no feasible way possible for me to do that.
What’s the second nightmare, you ask?
Getting Hubs a cell phone.
Not just a cell phone, mind you, but a real up-to-date state-of-the-art all-the-bells-and-whistles phone.
Right now he has a generic phone that you can slide off the rack at any drugstore. Get a pre-paid card for it and you’re done.
He still has a problem figuring out which button to push for ‘On’ and which button to push to end the call.
I know. Trust me. It’s frustrating. Especially when he is trying to call someone and he hasn’t had anything to eat in a couple of hours.
Remember the gorilla jumping on a Samsonite suitcase?
That’d be ol’ Hubs in the living room with his cheapie cell phone ... on an empty stomach.
Now he’s got the dee-lux model and it’s far worse.
Every ten seconds when he’s home from work he’s calling out for the resident Techno Geek who is not quite 11 to show him how it works.
“But how do I make a phone call?” he bellows, fists up in the air in anger.
“Push this button, press these numbers, send...”
“GAAAHHHHH!!!” Like Homer Simpson finding out there’s been a ban on donuts.
Then he turns to me.
“Show me how to do this!” he barks.
“No comprende.”
“How do I turn it ONNNN?” he cries, squeezing the latest techno gadget in his vise-like grip.
I shrug.
“I need this phone for work!” he implores, showing me the open phone.
I cross my arms over each other and bob my head, blinking like Jeannie used to do.
“Aww. Didn’t work. Sorry.”
How could he think that wasn’t funny?
Techno Boy writes down brief instructions and tucks them in Hubs’ wallet.
And I know for sure, next time that wallet is opened, those instructions will fly out of there on the backs of the moths that come out of that thing.
It’s clear that I will have to learn how to use the phone.
Otherwise I’ll never get time for “Maury.”
