December/2005

After 13 days, 2 lost home phone numbers, 3 no shows, at least 20 voicemails left, and 6 promised status reports that never happened.....

I have heat again. Repair guy showed up at 9:30pm. I've never heard anything as beautiful as the sound of a running furnace.

... and a partridge in a pear tree.

As of this moment, the heat is still not fixed. They never showed up that Thursday!!

Friday also came and went, apparently the repair dude's van broke down?!

Saturday

We're promised they will arrive between 12 and 2pm. At 2:30pm, I call. I get the same chain smoking woman, who tells me they have a full load, and are running late. We're the day's "priority" though, and someone will definitely be out to see us today!!!

4:30pm. Nothing. I begin a barrage of voicemails - they don't even close until 5pm, and I can't reach anyone. I leave all my information on each voicemail, each one spoken in a exponentially more direct and ass-holish tone. No call backs.

Called the insurance company, and am finally treated to someone courteous and sympathetic. They are refunding us for the space heaters we've purchased, and we can call someone else out and bill them. Yay!!! Took long enough for that OK to go through.... and that would be awesome, if the contractor didn't take some parts of the furnace away with him last Wednesday, effectively taking it hostage.

Sunday

It snows. Brrrr.

Monday

Deena calls in the morning. She is told that the repairman tried calling us "all day" Saturday, and we didn't answer. Deena has them read the number to her. It isn't ours. Strike up another fuckup to this company. (They've called us before, they have our correct number... not to mention in the least the 20 voicemails I left with it on Saturday.)

Someone will be in our area between 3 and 5. If they have time, they'll fit us in.

After hearing this relayed from Deena, I fly into a mini rage. I call. A receptionist answers that I don't recognize. She is new. I nearly make her cry. I feel entirely justified. End result? Someone is coming today, even if it is at 8 or 9pm.

Yeah, right. I'll believe that when I see it.

To top it all off, I now have a head cold. I've lost the ability to be angry. I'm just numb now. Numb with cold.

Anyone in the Portland area that needs furnace repair? DO NOT USE Super Service Mechanical. Located at 5555 SE Sun Meadow Terrace, if anyone would like to toss a brick through their window on my behalf. Or, 503-659-2937, if you'd prefer phone harassment.

At the absolute worst time of the year, our furnace decided to die. This happened exactly one week ago. Why isn't it fixed yet? Because our home owners insurance doesn't appear to care that we're freezing. Oh man, I have such seething hate for them right now.

So it goes like this....

Thursday

This is a test of the emergency broadcast system. This is only a test. If this were a real emergency, you'd hear sirens outside, and people screaming in gut wrenching agony as they tried desparately to cling to life.

I'm transitioning over to MT, and writing a little LJ -> MT converter, (I'm keeping my Livejournal too - but since I no longer work for them, I'm going to keep a 'local' blog, here.)

Until I'm done porting everything over, this will be rather sparse.

Update: Wow, the script worked on the first shot. Woop. So, anything older than this post was originally published here.