#like we'll be lowering a number of expenses (rent etc) by moving

[shopwitchvamp]

Hey everyone, I just gotta say- Thank you all so much 😭!! Today's been the best day our shop has had since October, and it's just a huge relief to see especially with our move coming up. Also 75% or so of today's orders have been from repeat customers which is amazing! To anyone that ever comes back to the shop to keep supporting us THANK YOU!! (And to anyone giving us a chance for the first time THANK YOU TOO!) I know things are really uncertain, uneasy, and difficult these days.. last year was already tough, and who knows how rough of a year (or 4...) we've got ahead of us. So I really can't say thank you enough to everyone for still being here supporting us despite it all. So anyway, in conclusion, thank you-

[austinpanda]

Dad Letter 071821

18 July, 2021

Dear Dad--

I shall tell you an epic tale of internet loss! Here's what happened: When we went to bed last Monday night, we had no internet. No big deal, it just goes out sometimes. Still didn't have internet when we woke up on Tuesday, and we continued to be without it all day Tuesday. Then I got off work, and called them, and spent about two and a half hours dealing with them, before the call mysteriously dropped, and I decided not to deal with it any more on Tuesday.

In the two and a half hours I spent failing to reestablish my internet connection on Tuesday, a lot of the problem was explained to me. Firstly, whenever they access my information by my phone number, my Austin, Texas Time Warner shit comes up, and they immediately feel lost in the twilight zone, because I'm in Maine, and have been for some time. Once we get through that shit, and they find our current account, then we have to verify our address. Here's where the stupidity awakens and begins doing yoga to loosen up for the arduous work ahead.

When we moved here, we couldn't get them to give us internet service. We tried so hard, in so many long phone calls, to give them our money, but they refused, because our address doesn't exist. There CAN'T be a trailer 1A, there can only be numbers. If you include a letter, the way 1-A includes a letter, it breaks the whole fucking internet. The guy who represents the leasing company that owns the trailer we're renting even went down to the local Spectrum office and talked to them in person, and it still didn't work, until this one time when we called and got that one guy, the One Right Guy, who knew how to make it work.

The way he made it work was by taking note of the fact that trailer 2 appeared empty (It was not.) and he could just put "Trailer 2" in the address, which made it work, and he could give instructions to the installation pukes that it was actually 1A who needed the connection, not trailer 2. And I was there when the pukes showed up, so I was able to make sure they ran the cable to the proper physical location. And after that, all the mail we got from them said we were trailer 2, and had pissy notes written on it by the mailman asking us to correct it.

But we couldn't correct it, because that breaks the whole internet, if you'll recall, so we found a solution: We went with paperless billing! No more mail from Spectrum, our internet providers.

Then, few days ago, someone associated with trailer 2 requested a termination of service, and sure enough, Spectrum came and shut off the cable/internet to us in trailer 1A, because of the intentionally obfuscated trailer number bullshit.

And they can't just turn us back on, because trailer 2 now has service going with Spectrum, and 1A still doesn't exist! Never fear, they assured me, in the most recent phone call. They can create my address in their system, update everything so that it all has the correct trailer number (1A) on it, and even give us a new, cheaper deal on our next 12 months of internet, EXCEPT!!! When they're creating a new address, they have to physically send someone out to do a required thing, and there's no way around that. The guy still tried to upsell me on a complete cable/internet/phone package, and asked me lots of questions about what I watch, and how much, and what I pay for my phone each month, etc. I found a genuinely sweet and non-sarcastic way of telling him, "We ain't gonna talk about that."

That last phone conversation was yesterday, Wednesday, and now it's Thursday, and they'll be coming by to hook us up between 11:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. There's a chance I may be charged a couple of fees for the installation, but the Spectrum puke on the phone said he'd make sure we either (a) didn't get charged for it, or (b) get immediately reimbursed for all of it. We'll see how THAT goes, and it's almost time for the installation person to show up.

Okay, the installation person has come and gone. His reaction when I explained why he was there was priceless! He couldn't believe that our internet had been working fine until they switched it off by mistake and he STILL had to come out here and physically do stuff? Crazy talk! They should have fixed it over the phone! Zach and I both assured him that the nice phone pukes at Spectrum tried that many, many times, but since we were a whole new address being created, someone had to come survey the blah blah blah, and he basically said, "Yeah, that's bullshit."

Having said that, he DID have to take our combination cable modem/router away, and replace it with two devices, a cable modem, and a router. We had one combined device, a single black rectangular thing, and now we have two: a black rectangular thing, and a WiFi router that looks like it dispenses febreeze into the air, but it actually dispenses the internet. They really should make it dispense both; I know we have the technology to make that possible.

###

Now a couple of days have passed, and we continue to have speedy, reliable internet. I’ve been bemoaning our lack of adventure lately, but when it comes time for adventure to happen, we tend to want to stay indoors instead. I am working on fixing this! I’ve determined that a lot of my recent depression has been the result of all the isolation over the past year and a half, so I’m now attempting to do more stuff with other people. I have a goal here, too: to be able to have a New Year’s Eve party at our trailer with at least 5 or 6 fun people in attendance. So far I’m up to about 3 fun people, but I’ve got a few months to go, still.

Here’s something I’ve been experiencing some dread about: tomorrow I begin working at the casino full time. I haven’t worked full time since Progressive, years ago, and I’m worried that it’ll rob me of my sanity. I think I’m going to be okay, however! Because, as I predicted, nine hours at the casino doing audits isn’t the same as nine hours at the call center being shat upon by anxious car accident victims. Now the only person who poops on me is my boss, and then, only if I mess up something in a particularly regrettable fashion. Otherwise, my work is free from anyone giving me poop. It’s a refreshing change.

Also I’ve got a hearing aid-type thingy. Getting hearing aids is expensive, even with insurance, and I found a sort of middle ground option. They make a thing called an Olive Smart Ear. Basically, it’s a hearing aid that you can set up at home, and because (I assume) no doctor is involved in the process, they can’t legally call it a hearing aid. It’s called a conversation enhancing ear bud. Woo!

Anyway, the Olive Smart Ear isn’t really intended to be used in pairs. But when you get it, and charge it up, and stick it in  your ear, and you install the phone app, you can give yourself a hearing test. It shoots tones to your ear, and you press a button on your phone when you hear the tone. Then it adjusts the gizmo to suit your particular areas of hearing loss, and bam, something resembling a hearing aid but cheaper, with no doctor visit. You can also switch between three modes: normal living mode, conversation mode (background shit is muted) and television mode (TV shit is amplified).

I’ve spent some time wearing it and noticed a few things. First of all, I can hear all my S sounds really loud now, and I hit those Ss too hard, and it makes me sound lispy. I don’t wish to sound lispy any more than I ever wished to sound southern, so I shall work on that. Also, everything makes sounds. The remote to the projector TV makes little clicky sounds I never heard until now. Everything we own makes little clicky sounds. The air conditioner in the living room makes deafening jet engine sounds. But the hearing aid gizmo itself is kind of cool, all black with a couple of glowing lights. The whole thing is a button! You jam it in your ear, and tap and hold to turn it on, tap and hold longer to pair it with your cell phone app, tap and hold longer to turn it off. Quick tape to lower volume, quick double-tap to increase volume. It’s very futuristic. Plus, now I can hear a mouse get a hard-on.

More next week. All my love to you both!