So after I wrote the previous entry….

So after I wrote the previous entry, I got an email on my phone (I was making a Wally World run at the time). And it was from a Comcast recruiter. Wanting me video interview for a retail store position. Thing is the last I applied for any job was 7 years ago, and even then Comcast/Xfinity was not on the list of applications I put out. I think they scraped my email from the recent Executive Email Carpet Bomb I sent them. Which indicates Very Bad Form in handling customers’ information. Anyway, my reply to them was if their customer service is such a piss-poor disaster then I would never work for them, let alone apply in the first place…..

Comcast still sucks.

Some Nerd Talk with Thunderbird....

I use Mozilla Thunderbird for my email and calendar (and newsgruops if I ever go back to Usenet). When I first started with it you just needed your user name and password to sign into account (and before they had the isp server database, you also needed the servers' names)....

Noawadays, there's 2 factor authentication, Ave passkeys. Recently, I formatted my hard drive, so I had to download Thunderbird. Since I downloaded the most recent version, it recommended that I rebuild my user profile from scratch. So I did. I no longer needed the two extensions to use Google Calendar and Contacts since Thunderbird now supports them natively. Of course when I set my accounts up with Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo, there was a lot of back and forth to my phone because of 2fa. I get it. Security is paramount.....

Then came my 2 Xfinity email account. Set up the first one, and it sent me the authentication code to the Xfinity app on my phone. No biggie. Then came my next address. Put in my username and password, Ave it kept saying it couldn't connect. Used my Google-Fu and it came with fire my second Xfinity account, I had to use the 'normal password' signin option.

I guess that when I was able to get all equipment replaced and set up without a problem a couple of weeks ago was the exception to the  Comcast/Xfinity experience. I guess it's just piss-poor service by default. 

I hate to admit this….

Comcast. Their customer service is usually a piss-poor disaster. It seems like every time I reach out for support, I either have to call an offshore call center, or get a high-pressure sales pitch for a service that I don’t need. And if I say no, I become persona non grata to them. Reach out to them on social media, and they don’t actually read your email. Go in person to the cable store, and they give you the wrong equipment, which means at least two tech visits, and multiple online chats (but I eventually got my cable box to work). And not even the Executive Email Carpet Bomb will work anymore. When I send an email, I expect an email in reply (there are some things that need to be done in writing, based on the principle of if it’s not in writing, it didn’t happen). Instead, I get phone calls. That go straight to voicemail.

So anyway, I’ve needed to replace my cable modem since January 2023 (apparently Comcast now recommends replacing it every three years so your equipment keeps up with your speed). And I needed to replace the cable boxes (every time I rebooted mine, I got an error code about a missing sd card and I was unable to pause and rewind live tv anymore). So this time I went to them on social media (twitter to be precise) and asked if I just bring the equipment in to swap out. And this is where I started to realize that hell can freeze over. They answered my question in the first reply without asking me stupid questions that I had already answered in the first paragraph of my message.

So the following Monday (if you’re keeping score at home, it was last week, not yesterday) we headed out to the Xfinity store, I dropped off my equipment, and got it replaced. Right at the door. I was told to activate the modem first and to use the Xfinity app on my phone. And it didn’t hurt that I got the right equipment the first time. So, in and out in 5 minutes….

Got home, and since all the cable runs already checked out (a result of all the multiple tech visits from the last time I tried this), got the cable modem activated. And then both TV boxes (even the one in my room, which was usually the problematic one). For some reason or another it took multiple chats with customer service and/or service calls to get everything working.

For once, equipment replacement with Comcast was not and exercise in frustration…..

Waltzing with Walz….

I’m going to link to any news story for this. Use your Google-Fu to look it up if you have to….

Biden stepped down. There were concerns about his health and his age. I would’ve still voted for him on the principle of voting for the most qualified candidate. And being convicted of 34 felonies says your not qualified for the Oval Office (or any elected office). And Kamala Harris picked up the torch. And this morning, she chose Tim Walz as her running mate.

Like I’ve said I will vote for the most qualified candidate. And with Tim Walz, Kamala Harris is even more qualified than Cheetos-Face and JD Vance….