Audio System Installer

Yesterday the installer came to look at my house to get a feel for installing my speakers and wire. He was recommended by my dad and my dad's pretty picky, so he should be OK. However, some of the things he said didn't install confidence in me. First off, the tallest A frame ladder they have is 8 feet; I have vaulted ceilings and to be safe, a 10 feet A frame will be needed; he said that he can use an extension ladder and rest it against the beam (the beam is exposed). Second, he tried to tell me to place the speakers somewhere where it would be easier to install. Third, he told me that the installation in 2 of the rooms would be hard; those rooms are the easiest as when we had ceiling fans put in, the electricians had no problems in there...they just cut a hole for the fan and fished the wires to the attic. Fourth, he told me that in his own house we just notched the drywall and ran wires in the notches instead of drilling holes through the floor joists which seems to me the cleaner way to go; granted my way is more time consuming, but I'd prefer not to have drywall patches all over the place. I guess we'll see tomorrow when they come to do the install. I'm just going to have them put in the speakers and run the wires; I'm not even going to have them run the wires to my termination panel, just to the attic area and tack on an extra 10-12 feet of cable and I'll fish the rest. I'll be around for the install and will show them the easy

Sprint PCS

I have my ups and downs with Sprint PCS. I've had coverage with them for 6 years and am on a decent rate plan with plenty of minutes. I've added my whole family to the plan and they share my minutes. It works out well for everyone except for me as I have to fight Sprint almost every month. Recently I noticed that 2 of my phones had contracts that I didn't agree to adding. After calling Sprint to get the contracts corrected and getting very frustrated, I put the issue aside and said forget about it. I don't plan on leaving Sprint, but I don't like contracts on principal. The other day I sent Sprint email and they "corrected" the contracts, but they were still wrong. On the second try, they managed to get the contract correct on 1 phone (I forgot that we had rebates on the last new phone we got for that line, so there is 1 year left in the contract) and removed the contract on the other phone. Amazing that they finally got it right; I always thought email was less effective than phone, but I guess threatening legal action and threatening to contact the attorney general got that issue resolved quickly. It's kind of amazing that they were able to remove the contract on one line, but still haven't been able to remove the contract on my primary line when someone at Sprint switched my plan without my knowledge (they switched it back, but couldn't remove the contract).

If my rate plan wasn't so good, I'd switch in a minute. However, I hear that everyone has problems with their carriers. What can we do other than not use mobile phones.

Customer service?

We use MCI for our phone service including their voicemail. When we have voicemail, we get the stutter dial tone and our phone blinks an LED indicating we have messages. Well, this light and stutter tone are stuck on. I called MCI and explained the situation. While I was on the line, I also brought up an issue where I'm no longer receiving email notification when we receive voicemail (very handy when we're out as I have my server send a text message to my phone). After spending a few minutes trying to explain about the email feature (it's a feature of the phone service), I gave up and said just to solve the first problem. I was then transferred to the "technical department" (which was where I thought I was when I navigated through the menus) and after being on hold for awhile was told that this issue would be resolved in 24-72 hours. To top it off, the first person asked if I was calling about our old phone number. You'd think by now they'd know that we cancelled that number over a year ago. It would be nice if customer service folks actually had some clue about the products/services they offer.

I guess we'll wait and see what happens with this issue and then I'll see if I want to battle the other issue.

My dog was a termite

My wife swears that our dog was a termite in another life. We keep finding him chewing wood that he finds in our yard. The wood is left over from an old fence or something like that; not sticks, woods. Why he eats it, we have no idea. I also think he was an earthworm as he eats dirt as well.