I feel terrible.

I feel miserable. Sick all day.Went to bed fine last night, but woke up at midnight with a cough that wouldn’t quit. I had to call in sick. On short notice. It was well before the company minimum of two hours’ notice. But still too short for my tastes (I always like to call out the day before if possible, just because it is so difficult to get a hold of the night manager). My stash of sick leave hours are dangerously low. But I had enough to cover this.

While I was out of action today, I did make it to the store to get some cough medication. So this will be my last sick day. I’ve been fighting a cold for past week and a half, and I’ve mainly just been trying to sweat it out…

Just don’t feel easy….

I feel uneasy. I really don’t know why. It could be because a couple of my co-workers were fired recently out of the blue. Whenever that happens, I always have to stop and take a look inward and ask myself if I’m next. Even if I’m doing nothing wrong, my anxiety is raised, though really for nothing. If it’s to come to me next to be fired, then so be it. I shouldn’t worry about it. But I do. The greatest fear there is is fear of the unknown…. I guess I have to should just look it down face to face, and put my worries to rest.

Or it could be my bills. I don’t think it really is that. I just need to pay them. And I should remind myself that I still have a roof over my head, tucker in my cupboard, and my lights are still on…

Or there is some other matter plaguing my subconscious that is causing my anxiety. Possibly in time it will resolve itself.

But until then, I feel uneasy….

Ok, I can deal with this…

It took over 4 months to do it, but Comcast finally stopped charging me for the modem I returned. In May… And they finally cancelled my home phone service. Now, it took 3 visits to the Comcast store, one escalation to @comcastcares on Twitter & and extended chat on Facebook with Xfinity to do it. There are still privacy/dvr issues…

What happened was last week I went up the cable store in Federal Way for the last time. I had already indicated my intention to return the Xfinity X1 boxes and get two legacy DVRs. I got to the store and explained my predicament to the clerk. He just happened to be a bit more knowledgable than average, and he saw the type of box that I needed in the back. So, I just needed to exchange one box and I got another X1 master box with component out. I got home, and set my boxes up, and re-paired my remotes (which also took care of one of my other concerns, a remote that woudn’t pair up with my tv…). I was able to dvr 1 program (an episode of How It’s Made). I’ve tried recording a couple of games, but I haven’t seen them yet (I think my roommate might be cancelling them). We’ll see on the DVR issues. If I can’t resolve that issue, then I will have to return them for legacy HDDVR boxes again.

Did I mention that Comcast has horrendous customer service?

Another week….

Another week, another 4th quarter meltdown. Last week, the Seahawks had a 17 point lead in the 4th quarter and let it go. I thought I could let it go, as it was an away game and all…

But then today, they had the home field advantage (the 12th Man is a definite factor), and a lead in the 4th quarter again. And they still lost to Carolina. And take a wild guess about who lost this week…

But on the bright side, Beast Mode is back.

How does Russell Wilson take his eggs? Scrambled…

They just stunk today….

The Seahawks lost today in overtime. After they had a 17 point lead in the 2nd half. They had this game. And they lost. Back when Holmgren was the head coach and the ‘Hawks were going through Dire Straits, I thought that a pillory should be erected at the CLink for him. Maybe the same should be set up for Caroll…

The season ended for the Mariners recently. And they’re on there way to Shit-Canning McClendon. I kinda liked him. Under his leadership last year, we actually had a winning record. Maybe next year, they’ll be contenders in The New World Order (Mind-Control Division)….

Worst. Customer. Service. Ever.

<Note: I posted this in the Comcast forums tonight. I’m posting this here as a warning to anybody who would do business with Comcast. It is a follow up to here>

When I started this year, I had two HD-DVR boxes with high-speed internet provided by CenturyLink. My contract with CenturyLink went up, and I went back to Comcast for internet. My first mistake. I went to Best Buy, and bought a cable modem. Took it home, and that's when the fun began. I had to order high-speed internet. The first time I called, I got the offshore call center, and I got some rep who could barely speak English. She tried to upsell me to the Triple Play package, and then berated me to the point that I had to hang up when I said no. Let that sink in, I call in to order more services (to pay Comcast more money), and Comcast's greed at upselling me drove my away. Eventually I was able to make another call, and got someone who wasn't offshore and I was able to order internet. But there were suspicions about that call, too (because the rep had somehow found a 'promotion' for me. I've been around the block long enough to know that no Comcast rep will voluntarily 'take care of me'....

So, I have high-speed internet, 2 hd-dvrs and tv service. I'm still suspicious that shenanigans were played with my account, and so I head to the Federal Way, WA. cable store, and I speak with the rep there. He pulls up my account, says that everything is kosher iwth my account. Then he starts into the high-pressure sales pitch, and I finally bite. I get the Xfinity X1 operating system and home phone service. And I explicitly made sure that I wasn't under contract, and he said I could return the equipment if I didn't like it.....

I got the X1 boxes set up, and I immediately realize that I have no DVR on my box. I can set my box to record, but it goes to the other box. And I have no access to my recordings. As for the home phone service, I'm immidiately beset by collection calls for the previous holder of my phone number. I could live without the DVR in my room, but I decided to cancel my phone service. So when I returned my hd-dvr boxes, I also returned my voice/internet modem. I set up the modem that bought with my own money, and went to the Federal Way, WA. cable store again. The rep who helped me made it pretty clear that I wasn't welcome there. He took my equipment, but refused to cancel the phone service. Basically, he said I have to call the offshore call center, and put up with another high-pressure sales pitch.

So, I reached out to @comcastcares on twitter, and they said they'd fix it. I was even offered a free premium channel service (which I declined for reasons of personal ethics). This was back in May. I was also told that I was on Triple Play with a contract, which wasn't true. So, I didn't think anything of this. Until this weekend when I realized that I was still paying for the voice/data modem rental. So another trip to Federal Way, WA. cable store, and this time I took back my X1 box w/o the dvr....

So today, I told the rep at the store that I was still paying for a modem that I had returned in May. He looks into it. I asked about my box, and I asked for a box with a dvr in it. I have privacy issues. I don't want what I record being available to everone in the house (basically, when I set a recoding, it was sent to the box in the living room, and wasn't available to my box). I was told that I could only use an X1 box now, and a 'master'  box was available for $20.00 a month extra. So I got one. Only problem was that my TV only has 1 hdmi port, which is being used by my Blu-Ray player, I needed a box with component output (basically the 5 rca plug cable). Idiot clerk tried explaining to me that I could use the video output (which specifically said 'sd video'). He then said that I could use the hdmi 'input' on the box and daisy chain the components. Not the case. The hdmi input doesn't work. I can't program the voice remote for my tv. But that's not the worse part. The worse part is when I told the clerk about still being charged for voice/data modem that I returned in May, all he did was disconnect the modem that I was using! So, I come home to no internet service!
Once again I had to make another call. This time I specifically asked for somebody not offshore based, and I was ignored. Most of what he said I couldn't understand (if Comcast is going to outsource it's call center, you could at least make sure English is spoken...). I ended up pulling out my laptop and activating it myself.

And I apparently still have home phone service, despite all my efforts to cancel it....

Not quite ready yet,

Yes, I put Windows 10 on my computer last week. I wasn’t really ready for it. But I want to move on from Windows 7. My computer came with Windows 8.1 preinstalled, and I immediately put 7 on it when I got it. It served well, but when The Anti-Christ, announced Windows 10, I decided to get with the times. I wanted to get 10 pro, but my computer came with 8.1 (the plain version). So I decided to by an upgrade key to 8.1 Pro, which is good, because if 10 didn’t agree with me, I could still have Windows Media Center. So right now, I’m going with Windows 8.1. Eventually I’ll go to Windows 10, but not quite yet. I do have the installation media ready for when I’m ready to make the jump….

Listening to my subconscious….

Ok, so yesterday I remembered to load my coffee maker. And this morning when my alarm went off at 1:30, I hit the brew button. I got my coffee brewed, and I even had it properly doctored. And then I set it on my computer desk, got dressed, and went to work. Without my coffee….

I think my subconscious is telling me I need to address my caffeine addiction….

Must. Have. Coffee

If you’re not running around screaming that The Underpants Gnomes are after your shorts then you haven’t had enough coffee yet. If you start to feel a draft, then they’ve gotten your shorts, and you should switch to decaf. I myself don’t need any coffee if I can make it past 10 am (after 10, work gets so busy that I have the stress to keep me awake). But before 10, I’m a zombie.

There are some days when I have to be up at 1 in the morning to get to work. So I have a small coffee maker in my room, so I can fix my travel mug of coffee in the morning. I usually drink right before I leave for work, or I fill my thermos mug and drink it on the bus.

I was a zombie this morning. Somebody put his thermos in his locker yesterday. And left it there. And didn’t realize it until last night right before he went to bed. And I fell asleep on the bus, and almost missed my connection.

Needless to say I have my thermos, and coffee will be ready tomorrow….