No TV for a week? AAARRRRGHHHH!

[Nanohedron]

More tales from the bone-strewn wasteland of corporate bureaucracy: So as you know, they're supposed to send me the main board - "To speed things up," as they put it. Well, yesterday still no sign of the board, and the repair guy is coming tomorrow on the 28th. Tomorrow. I think I'm allowed a measure of growing apprehension, so I called and asked what was up. Of course the poor guy on the other end was given no record of any of this (accessing my case number, mind you), so he put me on hold while he got ahold of others who ought to know something. Best answer was that it was probably in the mail as of the 23rd, with a window of arrival extending to the 7th of October. "The 7th? Seriously? The guy's coming this Saturday. The 28th. I was assured...", I said. "For some reason there's no tracing information on it," said the poor fellow, who was becoming aware of the very real evidence of a chain of incompetencies one after the other. At this point the best I have is that if the board doesn't arrive at the eleventh hour on Saturday, I have to send the repair guy packing and wait for when the thing does get here, and reschedule. It's been nigh unto a month, now, and I'm starting to feel that my patience is being abused. I'll not be writing any good reviews about the service on this one even if, by some miracle, it does get fixed on the day appointed.

[benhall.1]

I hope you're playing is coming along by leaps and bounds.

[benhall.1]

Oh ... and I hope you're sorry for tempting fate by suggesting, on a public forum no less , that it might take as little as a week.

Now let that be a lesson to you.

[Nanohedron]

I hope your playing is coming along by leaps and bounds.

I'll give you leaps and bounds.

After having gone through some William Gibson I'm reading The Tale of Genji, now. It completely suits my growing jaded ennui and sense of this vale of tears.

Oh ... and I hope you're sorry for tempting fate by suggesting, on a public forum no less , that it might take as little as a week.

Now let that be a lesson to you.

Fate, shmate. I believe now that this parade of doltery was foreordained whatever I did or didn't do. These corporate giants are made of the spongiest, rickety stuff. I think they only exist as such because of a mass hallucination.

[benhall.1]

The Tale of Genji!!! Blimey! A bit above my level, I fear. Or is it one of those early, foreign classics that turns out to be a rip-roaringly good ol' yarn?

[Nanohedron]

The Tale of Genji!!! Blimey! A bit above my level, I fear. Or is it one of those early, foreign classics that turns out to be a rip-roaringly good ol' yarn?

You have to have a taste for it or it's like to put you to sleep. You have to understand that this is considered to be the first known modern novel ever written (and with its sheer size it certainly hit the ground running), so while it's worth it for that, much of the time characterisation's a little flat. It's more about the surrounding details, but all in all it's surprisingly sophisticated writing, considering it had no known categorical antecedents other than diaries to draw from. But then again, the Heian court was a highly literate society long-polished to a fine gloss under merciless peer scrutiny and critique. The archaic and oblique language of it has been exercising translators (Japanese ones, mind you, never mind the rest) for centuries. There's heartbreak and tragedy, some comedy, some cattiness among the Imperial ladies-in-waiting and some frankly honest (and sometimes curiously well-intentioned) misogyny from the men, class consciousness of the meanest sort, and fashion obsession we would find shallow yet all too familiar to our own times; stylistically the frequent hanky-panky isn't addressed directly in ways we would recognise, so you only know it's going on if you're paying attention, otherwise trysts are usually so covered by conversation and garden-viewing that they're easy to miss; and then there are apparitions and the the occasional demonic possession that the priests battle manfully, but that's about as rip-roaring as it gets. Mainly it's about life in a deeply cultured milieu, and it has a philosophically pessimistic flavor. It is a window on the thinking of the times, if that's what trips your trigger. I have to take it a little at a time.

[Nanohedron]

Well, no main board in the mail today, but I didn't have to break the news to the repair guy because he "called in sick". They have a stable of them. Really, if it had finally sunk into their thick skulls that there was no point to it they could have been honest about it. In spite of all I could have respected that.

So a little car trip to Best Buy, a face-to-face talk with the manager, and his efforts to get things moving. Now we wait - again - 'til Wednesday.

I decided that in keeping with the spectacular meaninglessness of it all, it would be more than perfectly appropriate to consult the I Ching to see what, if anything, it had to say about the situation. I dispensed long ago with the prescribed yarrow-stalk sortilege; now I just open the book at random and read what my eyes fall on, it being as good as any other method if you really must go there, IMO (which is seldom for me except in times of bemused exasperation such as this when a distraction is welcome). And what I found was appropriate indeed: hexagram 49, named Revolution (Moulting), nine in the third place, which reads, "Starting brings misfortune. Perseverance brings danger. When talk of revolution has gone the rounds three times, one may commit himself, and men will believe him." Taken as a view of the operations I've been observing in the corporate sphere, it makes its own kind of sense if you stretch it to fit. A peek at the next line, 4, suggests by way of progression a happy outcome in the end. I mean, duh. Hello - warranty. But it also suggests, if one may suspend incredulity, a shakeup in the ranks. I can only hope so.

A dish of augury, please - extispicy.

[fearfaoin]

By this point, the Perfessor would have built a new TV out of coconuts and Ginger and Mary Ann would be arguing about who to vote for on Samoan Idol.

[Nanohedron]

I know, right? And you wouldn't have to be subjected any more to my tedious ramblings about abstruse books no one cares about.

Well, I am done with patience, and the gloves are off. I call every day now. I'm cracking that whip. They are going to learn to dread the sound of my cheery voice saying "Hello" again and again, day after day, week after week, for as long as it takes, and as Heaven is my witness they will not forget me. They will rue the very day they ever trod carelessly upon Nano, and upon anyone else if I have a lesson to teach them. I will be the sore on their big collective corporate arse. I will make them weep and gnash their teeth at the irritations they will have to endure from me, for their making a cynically vulgar oxymoron of the words "Service Department".

Talked to some guy in the Caribbean. Got transferred to some guy in Peoria or something. Found out that the main board in all probability wasn't sent at all. So now it gets sent today. Supposedly. Which means the repair guy coming Wednesday will probably have to be sent home. I ask you: at this point, shouldn't heads roll?

[mutepointe]

You have lost all your street cred with this thread.

[Nanohedron]

Street cred I never had. I ask you to consider: Do you think I am the only person in my household? If I'm not, should I only consider myself? Do you think all people are glad to resort to the latest trends? For that matter, do you think all know, or want to know, how to do so? Do you think a laptop should be a suitable mode for all tastes? Should freedom of choice not be permitted to apply in good standing within popular culture? However many toys the world piles up in becoming more and more desperately connected, I go elsewhere toward a bid for simplicity, such as it is granted unto me. If that is incomprehensible, the problem isn't mine. And now, all I want is for corporate donks to pull their thumbs out of their nether brains and do the right thing, for this is the time to do it. That is all.

So, all you tech fiends: make self-satisfied crowing noises to me all you like about how hip and au courant you are with your countless ways to use your many devices for all they're worth when you can keep track of them, and contrastingly how lame I am; you are sorely missing the point. I am not living under a rock. I already know what Hulu and Netflix are. I know where to find them. I knew it before starting this thread. I've used Hulu, and many times, in the past. Those avenues are not relevant. Or, if the point is clear but of no interest to you and you only want to hear yourselves talk, then fine. But it should be no difficulty for you to know where I'm at by now. I have computer, phone, and - soon again, I hope - TV. I use them to the least of their capacities, and call me a throwback, but it's more than adequate. My world is plenty Jetsons enough already. In the unlikely event I absolutely have to Skype with the President or whatever, I'll go mooch off my neighbor.

[Nanohedron]

Being a gadfly may have worked; I am given to expect that the board will arrive by putatively urgent FedEx tomorrow. I hope the timing works for the repair guy, whom I am holding to his appointment, trusting he will be healthier than the last one. And now they have my model back in stock, for what guarantee there is of keeping one at the ready for me just in case. Doing a month's worth of the back-and-forth by phone with a ship of fools has been all very entertaining and fun, I must say.

[Nanohedron]

It's occurred to me that I've been rather hard on some of you, so in the spirit of conciliation, here's a little song I just wrote to the tune of Planxty Something-or-Other ... ah, Lord Inchiquin it is. The downbeats are in bold for those of you who want to sing along:


"O come all ye networkers shiny and bright
And I will tell to you stories of digital might
'Tis a sad thing, ah surely, to wear out the hours
Of a life that is hardly connected.
There's Facebook and Twitter and Snapchat and more
But if you miss out on these they will show you the door
Oh, an e-Card is so much more better than flowers
If it hasn't been virus-infected.

Just think of all the things you could 'like' in a flash
And your enemies beflame into virtual ash
Opportunities abound for Nigerian cash
No one really knows you, so make an internet splash.
Having thirty-odd ringtones is fabulous style
If caller ID won't work as expected.
You can Tweet of what you eat and then later excrete
L-O-L to the Web about your smelly feet
Post shots that they took of you puking and drunk
Post pics of your cat and selfies of your junk
Send a Facebook to cops how you're going to scoooooore...
*oops*
And post the mugshot of you all dejected."

It's a work in progress.

[ytliek]

After that... dang nab it, you need some TV!

I think you should be talking to the Best Buy "Loaner TV Service Officer" to ease the weeks long deprivation.

Get a loan.

[Nanohedron]

What, you don't like poetry?

"O me smartphone's a cracker, I'm telling you true
It has apps upon apps upon apps more than you
When I'm out with my friends we sit glued to our phones
N txt each othr 4 R cnvrsation.
And when I'm out walking the mall or the street
I can't look up from my texts, I just follow my feet
When I bump into people or bushes or poles
'Tis only mild is my own consternation.

It's hyper-public life unlike ever before
I can get myself mugged before I'm out the door
You can shop on eBay 'til you're dizzy and poor
It's all there for the having - such is its allure
That you may as well ask yourself: Who needs a wife
With naughty websites for your delectation?
And now my little ditty must draw to a close
It's been real, or at least virtual, I should suppose
So please do not Skype me; it doesn't agree
With how handsome I look in true reality.
I would turn on the TV, but there goes the pho-o-one...
Another email and another vex-aaaaay-tion."