A SPITE real-life drama

If You Can't Fix My EMail,
Could You Mow My Lawn?
31 Hours With Technical Support

by Audrey Duede

Hour 1
Yesterday, I got up and turned on my computer to check my mail, my first act every morning after crawling to the refrigerator to get a Diet Pepsi, and it kept asking for my password in the most obnoxious way until I got mad and dialed up the help desk. The man who answered looked up my account to see what the problem was and told me I hadn't paid my bill! Okay, I'm pissed off enough when I get shut off for not paying the bills, but when I have actually paid it and they shut me off?

I pointed out that I had, indeed, paid that bill, not once, but, owing to poor record keeping on my part, I had paid it twice by accident. They offered to let me talk to someone in bookkeeping, who looked in his records and found that my payment had not been entered. He assured me that he would fix my problem and that I would be online by afternoon.

Hours 2-7
I managed to get through the early part of the day without my email fix by wandering aimlessly around the house drinking Diet Pepsi and gnawing my fingernails down to my elbows. I had to go to work at three, and was still not online when I checked before I left the house.

Hour 24
This morning I tried to connect and -- still no connection! After that little fiasco with the IRS last March I know better than to mention visiting the office with an automatic weapon, so when I called the help desk, I was perfectly polite.

The Internet Service Provider that provides (or sometimes doesn't) my service appears to be a young company, possibly one that operates out of someone's garage. The young man who answered the phone this morning looked up my account in what I would guess was a laptop balanced on the hood of his father's station wagon and assured me that he would have me back online in 10 minutes and told me to try again to dial up in 15.

Hour 25
An hour later I was finally able to make a connection with the server, but my mailbox, with whom I've always had a good relationship, rudely demanded to know my password! I typed it in again, and was informed that I did not have ownership of that temporary folder. Breathing heavily through dilated nostrils, I entered my password again and was again refused. That damn ISP was holding my mail hostage!

I called that nice boy at the help desk again and patiently explained that I could not get my mail from my folder. He was surprised! He put me on hold, tweaked some knobs, got a drink from the garden hose, and came back to say that he had fixed the problem and that I had ownership of my mail folder again, and could I check while he waited? Oh definitely. I clicked on retrieve and...nothing. Right. On a quiet day I get 70 or more pieces of mail and now I have nothing?

Hour 26
While I waited on hold again I re-subscribed to one of my mail lists and started typing a letter to my cousin in Phoenix. I assume the boy wonder was watering the lawn and wheeling the garbage cans out to the curb. He came back on the line and said he was at a loss for what to do next, but said that one of the real tech guys (his big brother, the computer science major, probably) would be in early in the afternoon ( he was at a party at the frat house until late last night?) and I should wait and try calling back later.

Hour 30
Back to wandering the house, drinking Pepsi and gnawing. I did some laundry, too. After lunch I tried to dial up and collect my mail, and guess what? I was back to not owning my folder again. This time I got another guy at a help desk, the one back in the corner by the rakes and snow shovels. He didn't know my story so I told it again from the beginning, and he led me through checking all the connections and whatnot on my desktop and finally said he didn't know what the problem was. I mentioned the nice boy who gave me ownership of my mail folder earlier and he suggested a few other things to try and we did them together, but darn it, I just could not access my mail, so I told him again about owning the folder. He had me check something else on the desktop. Really, I said, what about that ownership thing? He asked if I could hold a minute, and I said sure, because I didn't have anything else to do, like read my mail.

Hour 31
Then he put me on hold while he rotated the tires on the station wagon, and when he came back he said there, I learned something new, the other guy told me how to give you ownership of your folder. Good idea, I said, now tell him not to leave those garbage cans out by the curb all night.