My day today started with an install. It was a nice little apartment. I was let in by an older woman. The place was cozy with a lot of plants. There were some copies of the New Yorker lying around. I was here to install all three of our products. She already had basic TV, so the job was pretty easy. She was getting ready for work the whole time I was there. At one point she said that having the cable box was going to be great for when she watches her grandchildren.
My next job was at a house not too far away. I was met at the door by another old lady. I was here to replace a cable box with a HD/DVR. The job was easy for the most part. But the box kept giving me problems. half the channels would not show up on one tuner but all would show up on the other so I replaced it with another DVR and it all worked. She used to be a history teacher and principal. She was telling me about how she loves the John Adams miniseries and had missed the last episode, so I showed her how she could watch old episodes and she was very grateful.
My next job was at a house to the north. The place was kind of run down. The lawn was brown with some toys scattered about. The door was answered by a middle aged white man. He was having Internet problems. The line seemed to originate from the basement, but the door was locked. I asked if I could go down but he said there was nothing down there, the cable line just goes straight to the back yard. I thought I heard something move, like a rattle sound from down there but not sure. He had a pit bull in the back in a dog run that kept barking at me and there was dog shit scattered about the yard. I could barely stand the smell. I replaced a bad splitter and rearranged some things and then I left.
My next job was at a apartment building down south. I went to an apartment on the third floor. A large white man got up off the couch to greet me as I approached the apartment. He showed me his TV which wasn't getting all of it's channels. He also told me he was only installed a month ago. Everything inside the apartment looked new, but I replaced a couple things anyways. That fixed nothing so I went out to the main box. I rearranged somethings out there and when i went back to the apartment it was working so I left.
My last job of the morning was another install. This was at the apartment complex right next to my last job. The door was answered by a young man with his nails painted black. There was several large Final Fantasy posters on the wall. The guy spent the whole time I was there laying down. He said he works the night shift and was out until 4 this morning. He already had TV and Internet with us. I was just here to install phones. But he didn't really want it, it is just cheaper to have all three products together than just the two. So I swapped the modem with an EMTA and left.
I went to lunch. I don't know if I'm being paranoid, but I think I keep seeing this red Subaru station wagon following me around. But there are probably a lot of those cars around. Anyways, after lunch I went to my first job of the afternoon. This was a house in the same area as the apartment buildings. I was greeted at the door by an older woman and her very little dog that would not stop barking at me. She showed me to the bedroom where her TV was. She turned it on and there was absolutely no picture but we could hear the sound. It was obvious the problem was her TV. Even though the TV wasn't very old. I told her it was the TV and left.
The next job was an install a little to the south at an apartment complex, which turned out to be not at home. So I picked up a disconnect, at a house a little to the north. It looks like we are a little short on work. I just got a call to go back to that house, where the guy wouldn't let me in the basement. Apparently he is still having Internet issues.

I started my morning by going to the shop. After picking up the equipment I needed I headed to plasticland. I was there to do an install. It was for all three of our products. There was a woman here with her daughter. I only saw the back of the daughter as she was out the door to school. In the front there was a giant wooden Buddah head. It took me a little off gaurd at first. What I thought was weird was that there was also a bunch of Hindu stuff around the place as well. The customer already had our basic TV, which helped. She had a wireless DSL modem and I had to explain to her that our modem is not wireless. I convinced her to go buy her own wireless router. The cable box went to the TV in the basement. The basement was scattered with various art supplies. I almost wondered if she watched kids or something. And entertained them in the basement. The job went smoothe.
My next job was at a house. I was met at the door by an older black woman. She had one of our routers. She showed me a printout of a page and told me that was all she was getting for a couple days, but everything was fine now. It looked like the router was actingly like it was never set up. But it seemed to fix itself by now, because everything was working. Her computer was painfully slow. I told her everything was fine and I left.
Next I headed to a house to the south in the land of scrape offs. I was met at the door by a middle aged white man. The place looked like it may have been a scrape off. It was nice and there was a bunch of pictures of his kids, all over the place. We talked about how nice the day was and he said he would rather be golfing right now. He got a new flat screen for the bedroom and wanted an HD box for it. He was extremely helpfull and the job was very easy.
I picked up one more job for the morning. This was in an apartment complex. The door was opened by a young man who looked like I just woke him up. There wasn't a whole lot of furniture here, he was still moving in. I saw a paddel and recognized he belonged to a frat. He talked about being at a strip club last night and now he has a hang over. I was here to install all three of our products. Once I got the TV on I turned it to ESPN and he was very happy. We talked some about sports, untill I finished the rest of the job.
I then went to lunch. After lunch I picked up a job at a house. The door was answered by a hispanic woman. I got the impression that she was a nurse. I was largely tipped b y an oxygen machine with a tube that ran to a bedroom in the back. She had no clue why I was there. I turned on the TV and nothing was on. I looked out back and it became obvious that she had been disconnected accidentally. To get to the pole I would have to go to the neighbor's yard. When I got there I opened the gate and out ran the cutest little puppy. I quickley closed the gate, because I didn't want to let the puppy out. I needed to find a way in to get up the pole. So I went to the gate on the other side of the house. The puppy didn't even realize what I was doing untill I was practically at the pole. I hooked the lady back up and left.
My last job was at a house a little to the east. The door was answered by a kid. THe mom quickley showed up. The daughter was on the couch doing her homework. Their modem was out completely. I checked the siganl and it was very low. I looked behind the desk and found a splitter in which both legs were not being used so I removed it and the modem came right back up. I checked some other things and then I went home.

After our weekly meetings I went to my first job. This was a house. A young woman answered the door. The place was empty she had yet to move in. The place had been remodeled and it looked like they had done a good job with it. I was here to set up basic TV and Internet. The job seemed easy enough, but there was one outlet she wanted activated that I couldn't find. It was in the living room in a middle wall. I climbed into the crawl space to see if I cold find anything their and couldn't, then I climbed into the attic and found the line but it was cut, so it was going nowhere. This meant I had to make a new outlet by drilling to the outside. This wouldn't be so bad if I didn't waste all that time looking for the line. I finished and went to lunch.
My first job after lunch was in the land of scrape offs. This was a large house a short round woman meet me at the door. The place was full of Native American artwork. She showed me a TV and said that the audio on channel 2 was dropping in and out and there was no audio on channels 25 and 26. I knew right away the TV was set to SAP I switched it to Stereo and left.
The next job was an install. It was at some dorms at a local art school. I was here to switch out this guy's modem for a router. He was a tall lanky sort of dorky looking black guy. He was really nice. We talked about how rediculous for the dorms of this school to be here when the school itself is in a different part of town. We also talked about movies and video games and comics. He had a PS3 and a Wii. He had some cool games.
My next job was another install. This was at a high rise apartment building for retirees. It was starting to rain I wanted to be quick about it. i checked the box outside and the apartment was already hooked up. I showed up at the apartment and there was an elderly black woman here with her two daughters. It was a transfer so they already had their cable box and it was set up exactly right before I had even showed up. I just activated everything and left, I was there maybe 10 minutes.
Since I was running so far ahead I decided to take a little break before heading to what will be my last job. This job was at an apartment complex near the hospitals. This looked like a corporate account. I was greeted by a guy who sounded a lot like Boomhower from King of the Hill. He was from Alabama. He was moving here from California. He had some family here as well. They flew out to California to move him here and then they will fly back. They were really nice. I told them about a few things in the area, like the nearest 7-11 and some places to eat. The job was easy. The guy already knew how to work everything.
While working on this last job I got called back from the guy at the dorm for art students. His router keeps dropping out. So I went back and swapped his router. We talked more about video games, then I went home.

My day started at a house in the northern parts of my area. There was a young black man here with a younger black girl (probably his sister). He was excited to see me. I was here to install cable TV in four rooms. Once I showed up he told me that three of the rooms had no cable. So I had to run new outlets to those places. The house didn't look too bad. It had been recently remodeled. The job took me quite a while to do. They just watched one of those judge shows the whole time. I assumed this was because they had an antenae so they were limited in options of what to watch. But once I got the cable hooked up they just turned it back to the judge show (even though they were getting all the channels. One of the cable boxes wasn't working right. I was told it was system wide thing so that's what I told them and left. It was about 11 am when I left and was told there was no more jobs so I took a long lunch.
After lunch I got another install in the same area. I was met outside by a very spastic black man. I went to the front door and his wife opened the door and said the install is next Monday instead. But he wanted it now. They already had phone and I was here to install Internet and a TV. There was one of those house arrest boxes plugged into the phone. Their computer was in pieces on the couch. The guy said he got it from a friend, but it has a password so he can't get into it. He had a laptop as well, but it had no hard drive, so it wouldn't even come on. He and his wife spent the whole time calling computer repair people. They had three kids, the youngest was very small and sleeping on the bed. They had a bootlegged video of Horton hears a Who playing on the TV. Once I got the TV working he was very excited and started watching BET. I got the Internet working as well. He was dancing as I left.
After this I got a disconnect at an old folks home. I have been here often. I just had to get the manager to let me in. Then I went to a apartment building a little south. This building is on a very busy street. The door was answered by a guy who looked like he was in a band. I even saw a guitar plugged into a Fender Twin Amplifier. He was having Internet problems. He was watching The Hitch hiker's Guide to the Galaxy (I enjoyed that movie)and cooking diner. He said he works at the local Aquarium and this was his first day off in 13 days. I just needed to replace the modem, which I did.
My last job was a house on my way home. The door was answered by an older woman. She said her daughter owns the place and she was just visiting. Her daughter had questions about how to work the remote, but she didn't know what the questions were. I showed her a couple things and then I went home.

My day started on the backside of resort town. As I was stepping out of my vehicle a man pulled up and asked if I was there for his place. I told him yes and I followed him to the place. His place was empty. They were just starting to move in. From the looks of his shirt the guy works for the sheriff department. I was here to set up two cable boxes. Once of them was at the old house. So I just activated all the outlets and set up the one box he had. He seemed dissatisfied with the place. He told me that you should not count on what you have until you sign the paper work. He would also complain about things to his wife who must have been at the other place still boxing things up.
My next job was a house to the west. The door was answered by a old retired teacher. The place had a very western feel to it. There was a cactus a wagon wheel and western artwork all over the place. I was here to install a new outlet so he could have Internet in his loft. The job was pretty easy, there was already a cable in the vicinity on the outside of the house. He talked about a cabin he used to own in the mountains and how he used to own a couple other properties in the area. He just got back from Florida. He owns a trailer out there and spends the winter out there. Once I finished the outlet I offered to help him set up the Internet. I went to put in a disk and out popped some porn, Hustler's Barely Legal Slumber Party I believe. He said, "What's that? Where did that come from? How did that get in there?" When the computer came on there was a picture of a naked woman standing in a river as the wallpaper. It looked like it came out of playboy. Her breasts looked not only fake but airbrushed, the way they pointed out vertically. He told me she was a Cherokee standing in the Colorado River. I wasn't sure if this was because her hair was in braids, or maybe that was the caption under the picture when he downloaded it or if this was some sort of excuse, like Native Americans naturally roam naked in rivers and he got the picture out of National Geographic. He then commented on her "rack." I finished the job and left.
My next job was in an apartment complex. There was a Hispanic woman here. She said a tech had been here yesterday a replaced most everything but she was still having problems. I replaced a couple suspicious looking cables and tightened some loose connectors and that seemed to fix the problem.
I then picked up one more job for the morning. This was the same exact place I was at this time last week. This was an apartment complex. There was a young couple with their child who had just moved here from Sand Diego. They were still having problems, I guess I didn't fix it last time. The guy here had already figured out it was the cable to the TV, something had gone bad with it. So I made a new cable and everything was fine.
After lunch I had an install. This was on a very busy street. The door was answered by an Asian guy holding a guitar and a child. He showed me around and as I asked him questions it became apparent that he did not live here. He was watching the place for his brother. So he only knew what his brother told him. I went ahead and got started. The place was empty, they still needed to move in. There was still a dish on the roof from the previous residents, which they wanted to use as well. So I had to hook up two TVs, Internet and phone and not use any of the satellite cables in the process. It turned out to be not as bad as it seemed at first. The guy just played his guitar while I was working, I think he got a new FX pedal and was noodling around with it. Once I had the TV and the Internet hooked up I had to do the phone. Which was looking to be very difficult. The building must have had several different phone lines. Fortunately the couple who were actually living here showed up with a base station and satellite phones, which means I didn't need the house wiring at all. I explained everything to them and left.
My last job of the day was a house near by. There was a middle aged woman here with a much older woman (her mom?) and a dog. Once I entered the dog tried to bite my hand, twice! A was taken aback by this. She said he was nice and scolded him for this and told me where her office was. She was having phone issues. The dog escaped her grasp and came running towards me and tried to bit my hand again. But he was wagging his tail. She pulled the dog out of there and gave him a bone. I went into the basement and found what the problem was. When I walked by the dog he did nothing but chew on the bone. She also asked me to string up a TV in the basement so she could watch TV while working out. As I was leaving the dog tried to bite my hand two more times. He would only go for my hand the whole time. At this point I felt it was game, like keep away. The woman kept apologizing for her dog the whole time. Once finished I went home.

My day started at an apartment building near home. The door was answered by a young Indian girl. She lead me to her apartment. Her Internet wasn't working at all. At first I thought that she was accidentally disconnected but she was connected. I figured that the line itself to her apartment needed to be replaced. It was old and probably had water damage. So I turned the job over to post-wire.
My next job was a duplex in the fancy shopping area. I was met at the door by a guy who was wearing running gear. I wasn't sure if he was about to go running or had just gotten back. He had a Scottish accent. He introduced me to his wife who was Scottish as well. They led me downstairs to where their Internet was. It had been going down, though it was working now. I checked and the signal was low. I rerouted things to improve the signal, which it did in some areas but not others. I looked around and saw that they and their neighbor's were running on the same line from the pole. I could run a new line so that they were separate, but everything was working fine, so I moved on.
The next job was a large house that had been converted into apartments. I was here to downgrade someone by putting a filter on the line. It only took a couple of minutes.
I then went to an apartment building about a block away. I was met at the door by a short red headed woman. She talked a lot in a nervous sort of way. I was here to install basic. I actually hooked up her apartment before I came to the door, so I wouldn't have to go back down. I plugged her TV into the jack and I was done.
I got one more job for the morning . This was a house I had been at last Wednesday. This was a duplex that was in the process of being remodeled. His TV upstairs was having a lot of issues. I went downstairs and tightened the connectors on the splitter and it was fixed. I stuck around and tried to help him set up his Tivo and then I went to lunch.
After lunch I had an install at a house. I was met by a black woman. She told me to wait and got a younger man (her son?) It looked like he just moved into a room upstairs. There was an even older black woman here as well as an equally old black man who spent the whole time I was there watching religious programming on the TV. The young man had a slight limp as he walked around. The house already had service, but he was having a secondary account set up so he could have a DVR and Internet in his room. Since the house already had service the job was easy. I just had to re-rout the place to get him a decent signal. He took off as soon as I was finished.
The next job was a house not too far away. I was met at the door by a black man. There were two women in the living room watching TV. The younger other the two was large and on an oxygen tank. Neither moved the whole time I was there. He led me into the basement. To get down there there was a series of 5 or 6 steps about a 1/4 of an inch below each other and then they end with about a foot and a half drop which was remedied with a wobbly stool. I don't know what that was about. His TV was not getting most of it's channels. I found old connectors all over the house to replace. Once finished his TV was working fine, so I left.
My last job of the day, was a house in the same neighborhood. I was met by a small thin middle aged woman. She talked a lot, the whole time I was there about everything. She had been remodeling her house and doing a lot of it herself. She would say something as a joke and then laugh at and sometimes elbow me as well. She obviously lived alone and was probably rather lonely. She had a couple cats and seemed to me to be on the fast track to being a crazy cat lady. She was having Internet problems. I tracked it to a splitter in her crawlspace. She insisted on on crawling in there her self. I got her Internet working again. I also helped her set up her wireless Internet with a password and everything. I also explained how she could try to help her neighbor, with her Internet problems. Once finished she followed me all the way to my van talking the whole way. I didn't think she was going to leave me alone, but eventually I left and went home.

My day started up in plastic land. There was a young Russian man here. He seemed really smart. He kept asking me about my job, I think he was tired of his current job. He said he was going to school as well. He followed everything I did, but didn't seem to get annoying. The job was easy. He already had the equipment from his previous place. He made it easy for me.
Afterwards I went lunch. I spoke with dispatch and they said they were giving me another job, but I assumed it was for after lunch. After having sat there for about half an hour I realized that this was a morning job. so I had to rush over there. This job was an install in the fancy shopping district. There was a short guy here. He seemed a little perturbed by my being late. He said I looked familiar and wondered if we had met before. I didn't recognize him at all. i was here to install the Internet. This was an easy job, but I got hung up on a couple things. The first is when I tried to look at the GUI for the modem to see its levels. It brought up the levels for a different modem and ti took me a while to figure this out. The levels were low so I was scrambling to fix them. When I finally figured out what was going on I moved on to his computer. He had a Mac, but was running parallel OS's , so I had the internet up on the Mac side but not the Window's side. It took me a while to figure it out.
Once done I decided to take the other half hour of my lunch and then head to my next job. Of course by doing so I ended up late to this job as well. I was met at the door by a black woman wear a nurses uniform. She had two kids here. She said she had to get back to work in 15 minutes. She told me her router was not working and then said it was in her sons room and had him lead me to his room. It was in the basement. His room was nicer than mine. He had a huge flat screen TV, a PS3, his own computer as well as a bunch of other toys. He turned the router on and I wondered if that was the problem. I looked around and I looked out back as well. I replaced a splitter and then she had to go. She bagged me to come back.
I then picked up another job at a duplex to the east. The guy wasn't there at first some electrician was. The place was being remodeled. He briefly told me what needed to be done. I fixed a couple connectors before the guy showed up. When he showed up he showed me a couple more things he wanted done, then we discussed whether he needed an HD box or a cable card for his fancy flat screen TV. We decided on the HD box and I got it installed.
I then got a job at a restaurant on prostitute row. Another tech had already been there earlier in the day. They were having problems with their audio. There was a power surge over the weekend which I guess blew out the box. He came and replaced the box, but the audio went back out 20 minutes after he left. I looked around and tried to figure out what was going on but I couldn't because the box was only hooked into audio, so I couldn't see what was going on without a TV. So I decided to replace the box, and that fixed the problem. At least I think it did.
Then I went back to the job with the black woman with two kids. I decided to replace a cable in the basement and replace the router. While I was working in the basement I noticed a bunch of fancy belts. It turns out the father is a championship boxer. He had several title belts around and posters from bouts all over the walls. I don't know why it took me so long to figure this out. The first router I put on had all the settings on it changed including the password to get into the router itself. So I couldn't get the other computer (which was in the daughter's room) to work. The daughter was in to Bratz, they were all over her room. So I had to put in yet another router and this one finally worked, so I went home.

They had me south west today. This area isn't too bad, but but I spent most of my day lost. That part of town makes no sense. The first job was in a apartment complex. Though no one answered the door. So I called it not at home.
I then went to a house a little to the north. No one was at this house either. I called the guy and he said he was told no one needed to be there. I told him I would look around but if he still has the problem, he needs to schedule an appointment for when he can be there. I jumped his fence and replaced a couple of questionable splitters. I ripped my jeans in the process. I then left. My next job was a couple blocks away. This was another house. There was an elderly woman here with her two daughters. She had issue with her phones. I pulled out the phone line and put it back in and everything was fine. I looked around outside and found an exposed phone line which I removed because it was probably causing a short. I told her all this and left.
I then had an install at a apartment building in the area. There was an older couple here. They were very nice and ultra religious. This I could tell by the video cassettes and the fact that the guy said he recently upgraded his service so he could get TBN. They wanted a new box in the other room. They used to have satellite and the guy made it a point to tell me how much more he likes my company versus the Dish. So the room already had cable running to it, I just had to hook it to cable instead. They were remodeling the place working on the bathroom currently. They told me they just got married later last year. They were also excited about baseball season.
I then got a call to go back to my first job who wanted me to go back. So I went back. The place was answered by a young woman who looked pregnant. The place was empty. She pointed to where she wanted the Internet to be. I was in the corner with the stains. She had a rambunctious pit bull, who apparently is not house broken. She said the computer was going to go in the corner with the stains once they cleaned the place up. The dog would get in my face whenever she left the room and step all over my computer. She spent the whole time on the phone. I got out of there as quick as possible.
I was then given a job at a gated community. I was here to install a new outlet. There was an older woman here. She said her daughter had just moved back in and needed cable in the other room. So I had to drill a new hole and run some cable. The quickest way to do this was to run it on the ground and set up an appointment to bury it. Once done she asked me to move the cable box in the other room which was easy enough.
I was then given one more job before lunch. This was an apartment above the leasing office. There was a young couple here. They were having serious problems with there cable. Everything looked fairly new and I replaced as much as possible to fix the problem, but nothing worked. I tracked it down to the line in the wall, so I had to schedule an appointment with post-wire and finally go to lunch.
After lunch I went to a house way south. There was a young woman here. Though at one point her kids showed up and they were about 10-12 years old, so maybe she wasn't that young. She showed me the basement where her EMTA and cable box were. I found several connectors that needed to be replaced. Then I went outside and found a bunch more connectors to be replaced as well as some old filters at the tap. Once finished I went to my next job.
This next job was another apartment complex. There was a young Hispanic man here with a young boy. The boy was playing on a gameboy waiting for the TVs to come back on. The guy was his uncle, he seemed like a nice guy. My notes said that all three TVs were not working. Which they weren't when I showed up but they were obviously getting signal so I sent them a download and they all came back on.
My last job was a downgrade. This was a house to the north. I just had to add a filter to the tap on the outside. Once in the alley way a random guy appeared out of nowhere and asked if I was here for his house. I was not. We talked a little bit and then he disappeared again. I finished the job and went home.

My day started in plastic land. My first job was an install. A woman answered the door and said her appointment was not supposed to be for a couple more weeks. Then she left for work, so I pushed the appointment out.
My next job was another install next door. I woke a guy up and he let me in. I was here to install a DVR and the phone. The job was pretty easy since they already had our services. Eventually the wife came downstairs as well. She looked to be pregnant. They already had one kid who left for school. Then I went downstairs I could see they had a little photography studio in the basement. Everything went smooth. Once done I showed them how to work their DVR and the wife got really excited about getting to tape old episodes of House.
The next job I got was in an apartment complex down south. The door was answered by an elderly black woman. She showed me to the bedroom and complained that her DVR made too much noise. You had to get really close to it, but there was a scraping sound. She insisted that it is much worse at night everything is quite and you're trying to sleep. I went ahead and replaced the DVR for her. She felt really bad about the whole thing. I tried to let her know it was no big deal but to no avail.
The next job was in another apartment complex across the street. I just needed to activate an outlet. The woman here had moved the TV from one end of the room to another and had a cord draped across the room. So I activated a different outlet so we could get rid of that wire.
I then had another job in the same complex. There was a young couple here with a kid. Thy were complaining that their DVR wasn't working right. It would turn off and on randomly. So I switched they box out. They were nice. They had just moved here from San Diego. They told me how expensive it was to live out there. The woman looked like she was pregnant again.
I then went to lunch. After lunch I went to a house. Upon entering the house I noticed there were two black teenage males and their mom and every one seemed to be on the phone. The place smelled like marijuana as well. The woman showed me to a bedroom where the EMTA was and the box was dead. So I replaced it.
Then I got a job at a house just off of prostitute row. An older white man answered the door. He showed me out back and said that he was trimming his trees and a branch took out the cable line. So I had to replace it. It was an easy job though, with the trees cut down there was nothing in my way. I checked in with the guy before leaving and when I was stepping out of his place I stumbled and almost fell.
I was then given a job int he same neighborhood. I was let in by a young woman listening to The Offspring. I hadn't heard them in a long time. She said she was in school, I assume she was doing homework or something. I was here to pick up the cable box. The place was pretty sparse, she mentioned they were moving at the end of the month. I then picked up one more job. This was a house that had been converted into apartments. This particular apartment was in the basement. I was let in by a young guy. The place was extremely cluttered. I couldn't turn around without knocking something over. He had a cat which he kept in a cage and it would keep meowing the whole time I was there. Apparently it attacked the last cable guy. He complained about some things, but everything looked fine. The only suspect thing I could find was the line into the apartment itself which I replaced. After a while another guy showed apparently he lived here as well. He looked a bit older than the first guy. He was dressed like he just came from the nearby hospital, he was possibly a nurse. I was surprised that two people could live here. I saw two burners from the stove on and I joked if that was how they heated the place, but they said yes. The thermostat is controlled by the upstairs apartments. So that's the only way they can heat themselves. Once finished I went home.

My day started at a house. There was an older couple there. They were having troubles with their television and DVD player. The TV would get wavy and shut off. It would also change the channel on its own. They thought it was the remote control. I told them it was the TV. They also couldn't get their DVD player to open up. They thought the two were related. Somehow they turned on the child lock, so I had to figure out how to unlock it.
The next job was a house further north. There was a big hairy guy here. He had me meet him out back at his garage. He had a box set up out here but it wasn't working right at all. He had run the cable himself and at first I found it to be water damaged. But when I fixed that it didn't improve the signal so we had to replace the whole line. He helped me out which was nice. So we were able to get it done pretty quickly. He worked with wood in his spare time. He was in the middle of making a bookcase, that looked very nice. He said he broke his hand in December helping a friend put up Christmas lights, and hasn't been able to work on it since, so quite of bit of dust has built up. He was very eager to get back to work.
The next job was next door to where my girlfriend used to live. It was weird because it was a place I had seen often from the outside and now I get to see what it was like on the inside. All I knew was that a Hispanic family lived there. The place was dirty. There wasn't much furniture inside and it was dark. I guess no one was awake yet. A young Hispanic woman answered the door. She led me downstairs. The stairs themselves felt like they were going to buckle under my weight. She led me to one room where an older Hispanic man was here sleeping. The box wasn't working at all. It turned out to be something in the system. I fixed it, but it was something that should have been done when they called, rather than having me show up.
The next job was another house to the north. A young tall man answered the door and led me outside. He said the last tech said the line to the house needed to be replaced. This was correct I did need to replace it, but I wondered why the last tech didn't do it. Once I replaced the line I came back inside to make sure it was all working. Walking down the stairs in the basement I slipped on the last step and hit the ground. I picked myself up, checked the TV and left.
My last job of the day was a house even further north. There was a pickup truck in front of the house that had a bunch of shopping carts in the back of it. The door was answered by a black man. He said his Fax machine wasn't working. So I tried to figure out how everything was hooked up. The fax was in the garage. His back yard was full of yet more shopping carts. Eventually I figured it out. As I was finishing a preacher showed up. He had his bible out and was giving what seemed to be private instruction to the man living here. There was also a child who appeared at this point from one of the bedrooms.
Once I left I went to lunch. After lunch I went to a house that was in the same neighborhood. A black woman was laying on the couch, she waved me in. She was having problems with her phone. She didn't move from the couch the whole time I was there. She was just sitting there watching CSI. The EMTA had low signals, so I went around outside and found a splitter I could rearrange. I had her try the phone and she said it sounded better so I left.
My next job was a house a little to the south. A man answered the door and said that his phone wasn't working. He showed me where the phone was and it wasn't completely plugged into the wall, so I plugged it in and left.
The next job was at a complex to the north. I had never been here before. No one answered the door though. So I picked up an install 2 blocks north. There were two young Hispanic women here with a couple kids running around. She showed me what she wanted done, then took the kids out back to run around. While I was working I could hear rooster in the backyard constantly calling out. Which I thought to be a strange thing to hear in the city. I'm not sure whether that's completely allowed but, whatever. The job was incredibly easy, I was out of there pretty quick. so I picked up one more job.
This job was in an old folks home. I was greeted by a black man in a wheel chair. He was missing one leg. He said his cable box wasn't hooked up. I just changed the input and everything was working fine. He said it wasn't working earlier and kept insisting that I did something to fix it. I think he was trying to save face. I went over how to work everything and went home.

After our weekly meeting I went to a rather nice small house. I was greeted by a middle aged man who had a big fluffy dog. Almost like a chow, but not quite. He already had TV, I was just here to hook up Internet and Phone. The job seemed simple enough. He wanted the Internet in the same room as his TV and the alarm panel was in the next room. As far as I could tell he and his wife were doctors of some sort. There were a lot of plaques on the walls. When I hooked up the EMTA it wouldn't sync up with our system. After a while it became aparrant that this must be due to a filter. So I had to carry my ladder through the neighbor's yard, because there are no alley ways in this neighborhood, and climb the pole. And sure enough there was a filter there. Once I got back inside I proceeded to get everything working, but then my computer would not cooperate, so I had to call IT to finish the job for me. Then I had to set up the guy's airport as well and it would not get on the internet. So It took me a while to fool around with the settings to get that to work as well.
After all that I took lunch. Then I headed to a small neighborhood right outside plastic land. When I entered the house there were three black men here. One was trying to set up an entertainment stand, the other two were on the couch watching. One of the guys on the couch came up to me and introduced himself. He started to show me around to what needed to be done, but when I asked him a question he said the guy who's getting this done isn't here. It turns out that the guy who is showing me around lives here, while the guy who I'm doing this work for is moving in I guess. I don't know how they know each other though. So I take a look around back and see that the line needs to be replaced. The problem is that not only is there no alley way, but there looks to be space designated for one, but it never got constructed. So there is an area between the back of the houses that is all overgrowth. Trees and bushes, that I have to fight through in order to get my ladder up the pole. Once up there I start working when I noticed a fox skulking around amongst the bushes below me. Also while I'm up there the guy who I'm setting up shows up. He was a big black guy with gray dreadlocks. We talked some. It turns out he does IT for a local charter school. He said he wants to set up servers in his place eventually. I finish my work and get my ladder out of there and go back to the house. The rest of the job went smoothly.
My next job was an install in a little duplex in the country club area. I was met by a hippy-ish looking fellow who was playing with three boys in the front yard. He let me in and showed me to the TV I was supposed to hook up. After a while He left to go biking and his pregnant wife showed up to watch the kids. The job was easy, though I had some problems getting all the channels to show up, but I eventually did.
My last job of the day was a house further north. It was so far back on the lot, I missed it at first. There was a middle aged black man here with his son. It was a really small house for such a big lot. I was here to set up the TVs, but he wanted me to do the Internet as well. Unfortuanetly we require a $200 deposit these days, and he couldn't pay it. He said he could barely pay for the TV. He does concrete work as a contractor so he was hoping things would pick up in the summer. The place itself was cramped, with two small bedrooms a small living room (with 2 couches that could easily be beds) and a small kitchen. The place was cluttered and kind of dirty. The whole time I was there he and his kid were outside working on their bikes. I got the TVs hooked up for him and went home.

My day started at a apartment complex. The door was answered by a lanky black man. He said he was getting nothing on his TV. Everyone in this complex is supposed to be getting cable, it is a bulk account. I went to where the box is and saw a line with his unit number on it hooked up. It was labeled wrong. I had to find the right line and hook that one up instead.
I then asked to pick up another job. I was given an install way down south in an apartment complex. This was a woman who works for the company, probably in the call center. She already had all her equipment and in the area she wanted it. We talked a little about what she wanted to happen then I went to work. I had obviously just woke her up. She was here with her child and they were both sick. She complained about how doctors don't issue medicine for children anymore. They just have to suffer. She talked a lot about her kid. The place was a mess but they were moving in. While here I was given two jobs back in the area I was for the same time frame, so I hauled ass to finish this job.
The next job was in resort town. Nobody was here at first so I called. The woman works in the town, so she arrived shortly. She was pregnant and had a child with her. Her modem wasn't working, neither were two of her TVs. Only one was working and I was the third tech out here. She needed to get back to work so she left me alone in her place. I replaced as much as I could as well as boosted her signal.
I then had one more job for the morning. This was an install in resort town. A woman was moving in. She was her with her mom who was in town visiting and her sister who lives out in the suburbs. There was nothing here, she still needed to move in. This made the job easy. Her mom at some point remarked that she was moving in to a much better situation. It sounded like a divorce or bad break up. Her sister's kid was here too. He was bouncing off the walls the whole time and he would keep asking me when the Internet would be ready. I tried to work as fast as possible because I wanted lunch and I could tell they wanted to get on with their day.
I stayed in resort town for lunch because my first afternoon job was in there as well. This was a trouble call. A large woman answered the door. She had a couple problems. The first was that her TV upstairs was not working. I checked and it was on the wrong input so I switched it over and got it working. The other was that she wanted the remote for her cable box to be programed to her other TV which I did as well. She complained about go up and down the stairs, she said she was recovering from pneumonia. It was an easy job and I was out of there quick.
I ended up with one last job for the day. This was to install an HD box in the land of scrape offs. This was an original house though. An elderly woman greeted me at the door. Her son was there too. She had a weird accent and would speak rapidly. Neither of them knew a whole lot about electronics. The guy kept saying that his wife would explain all this to them later. The job was easy. Then I went home.

My day started at a new building. These looked to be condos of a sort. Cheaply made as most new construction is. I could see parts where the stucco was already coming off to reveal the Styrofoam underneath. Nobody answered the door, so I called it not at home.
As I was waiting to get a new job I fell asleep. I was aroused by my radio going off, to tell me I had two new jobs. The first was a disconnect at an apartment complex. Nobody was working the office yet so I had to be let in by the cleaning crew.
The next job was a high rise of retirees. Nobody was at this one either, though. So I picked up a job at another high rise. This was a very fancy place, I've been into a couple times before. Each floor of this building is divided in half. I was met by a black woman. She showed me the TV with the box on it. I could see it wasn't working right. I looked and followed the line to another TV. I found a splitter and replaced it and then I found a connector that needed to be replaced. The problem was that there was no slack, so the connector was in the wall and I couldn't replace it. So I decided to try and bypass it. I worked on this for at least an hour, before finally giving up. I hooked everything up the way it was before and slightly tweaked it so it was working for now, and then I left out of frustration.
My next job was across the street. I was met outside by an Asian girl. She led me inside the building. She let me into her apartment and started to speak to her roommate. I then entered the living room where her roommate was. The roommate was wearing a large shirt and when I entered the room she proceeded to move her hands to cover up the lower part of her body. I diverted my eyes and she hurried out of the room. She must have only been wearing that shirt. The place was a mess. This building is a half way house for single moms, though I didn't get the impression that either of these women had kids. I was here to pick up the modem. I guess they didn't want Internet anymore.
My final job of the morning was an apartment in the same area. The door was answered by an older woman, she went to walk the dog and told me the guy would be here in a second. A young man about half her age let me in. At first I thought these two were mother and son, but it turns out they were lovers. His eyes were glowing red. I just woke him up. I was here to put in an HD/DVR. The place was a mess. There were empty shooter bottles on the floor ashes everywhere. Empty pizza boxes. Plates with food that is god knows how old, just laying around. The whole time I was there he would only talk to me by asking questions. Then when I responded he would say, "Right On." After a while I started to ask him questions. He works at night mainly. He told me he was a bike messenger. He mainly just delivered summons. I really didn't want to enter this place it was so messy, so I pretty much did the job from the doorway. Once finished I went to lunch.
I only got one job for the afternoon. This was a large house in the country club area. There was an older woman here. I was here to hook up one TV with an HD/DVR and a modem. She had a computer guy there setting up a new computer for her. The job seemed easy. Though much of the place was old. I had to replace many connectors and splitters, just to get the place up to date. When up on the pole I removed a bunch of filters, but I missed one. This cost me maybe an hour, before I climbed back up there and found the filter. The woman herself didn't know how to work anything. I found myself not only explaining everything in detail, but in triplicate. It was frustrating, but I got through it. I don't think any of it sunk in. Thankfully the computer guy was a friend of hers and he knew how to work everything. Once finished I went home.

I was once again back in my usual area, which felt great. My first job canceled before I even left the house so I had to pick up another job. This was an apartment complex all the way next to the highway. It was still under construction. There was a young woman here and she had a big dog. It was a very rambunctious dog, so she had to keep it in a little cage. It looked like I had woken her up. Her modem wasn't working at all, it was dead. I just had to replace the modem. She was a little irked about the fact that she had to take this apointment. I guess she wanted the appointment a couple days previous, but this was the only time she could get.
The next job was at a house. This was an install. A thin black woman answered the door. She greated me with a Happy Easter and joked about hidding easter eggs in the snow. She showed me the three TVs she wanted hooked up. One of which was in her son's room, whom she had to get out of bed. The she took me out back and said I needed to go up the pole to hook her up (which I knew) and that she knew this because they were hooked up illegally and got caught so now they want to pay. We laughed at this and I proceeded to work. The job wasn't too bad. Most everything was wired already. She would follow me around and talk to me in a nervous sort of manner. Constantly joking.
The next job was in the same neighborhood but a little further south. The house was for sale. It was a nice house in a nice neighborhood, but they wanted over $600,000 for it. That seemed like way too much. The door was answered by a woman. She showed me the TV which had a blue screen. I changed the input and the box was on again. Though I needed to fix some cables behind, that had been rearranged. An older guy showed up and asked what was going on. I explained everything I did and now everything was working. He said it went out during a movie and he insisted that the situation was more complicated than that.
The next job was an apartmetn bulding about 2 blocks from my old apartment. I was let in by a woman who that raspy emphazema voice. She lit a cigarette in front of me. She seemed to have no clue why I was there. I was told there was a problem with the volumne, but that was fine. I also showed her the HD channels, which she never knew she had. She mentioned a letter she got. (I hate these letters we send out, why can't we let sleeping dogs lie). It turned out she got this letter because she has a cable box but it wasn't hooked up. She was in the process of moving somewhere else, so it was packed somewhere and she didn't know where. She was frustrating, she didn't know how to work anything. Not only did I have to explain everything to her, but I had to explain things repeatedly, because she just wasn't getting it.
So I went to lunch. After lunch I got a big install. This was a big house three story square house. The kind that were mainly turned into apartment buildings. This one used to be offices, but it was bought by some gay guys for about $490,000. This was a steal. But I guess it was foreclosed upon and sat on the market for 8 months. I was here to isntall all three products. They were in the process of moving in, while they were remodeling the place. The hardwood floors were just recently finished and there were some walls torn out. It sounded like they had a lot more work to do. They kept offering mamosas the whole time I was there. I took me a while to figure out how the place was wired. I was working in an area next to the deck where the air conditioning unit was and I saw down there a bottle of cocoa butter, some torn up bras and a syringe. I brought this up to the guys who said some vagrants had taken up residence there while the place was unoccupied. I'm guessing that helped drop the price. I finished the TVs and the modem, but the phones were a mess. I spent an hour and a half trying to figure out the phone wiring, which was very screwed up because the place was a bunch of different offices. I had given up and told the guy he should invest in a base station with satelite phones, at which point he told me that that was exactly what he had. I don't know how I got out of there without yelling or hitting somebody. I then went home.

I started at an apartment complex down south. A young pregnant Hispanic woman was here with a young boy. I was here to hook up her TV for her. It was a relatively easy job. I try to keep the talking to a minimum. Her kid was cute though, he was following me around watching everything I was doing. I got it hooked up and left.
My next job was at a town home. This happens to be the residence of a starter on the local NBA team. He wasn't hear thought. There was two black gentleman one shorter who seemed to be in charge and the other just hanging out. The place smelled of marijuana when I first entered, they must have been smoking recently. There was a big white guy here two but he left shortly after I arrived, he was probably here to fix something as well. I was here to replace their router, they wanted a modem instead. They were just going to buy their own router. The place was modest. A big screen TV and an X-Box. A table and couch. A few posters on the wall of Bob Marley and Pulp Fiction. I saw into the bedroom which was pretty messy. The place wasn't very big and he didn't have a lot of stuff in it. I did the job and then went to lunch.
My first job after lunch was an install at a house. No one was there though. So I called it not at home and got a new job. This new job was at the fancy new condos in the fancy shopping district that I was at last week. There was an elderly couple here. They just moved from Philadelphia. They said their whole family has moved out into this region so they moved out here to be closer to them. The job wasn't too difficult. These places are all pre-wired. There was an A/V team here setting up his flat screen I would jump in and help him. He would ask me about the gauge of the cable and the signal strength, I wondered if he had worked for the company at all some time in the past.
The next job was a house down south. My work order said the house had never had cable. I was worried about having to do everything. Thankfully she had cable a long time ago. I was worried the cables were too old, they looked very border line, but I checked with my meter and saw nothing wrong. So I hooked up her new HD TV for her.
I then picked up two more jobs. The first was an upgrade. I just needed to remove a filter. There was a couple here going through their garage. The man showed me outback. The place was a mine field of dog shit. He apologized for it. Removing the filter was easy. It wasn't up on the pole like it should have been, it was at his back porch.
The next job was a disconnect. There are no alley ways in this part of town. So I had to go through a neighbor's yard to do it. He was a nice old man. He moved his vehicle for me. I felt bad for making him go out of his way. Once I had my ladder up his dog came charging out of the back door barking up a storm. It stopped right at my feet and then backed off when I didn't flinch. The guy called his dog back. I proceeded to do the job, then I left.

My first job of the day was an apartment in apratment town. I called the customer to be let into the building but the woman who answered said someone came on Saturday and fixed it. So I cancelled the job. But I couldn't do it with my radio for some reason, like I normally do. I had to call it in.
The next job was a house a little to the east. This house was nice, it actually looked like a scrape-off. A woman answered the door. She was a little flushed. She needed to get her kids ready for school and I was a little early. She asked how long it would take, I told her it hopefully wouldn't take long. She wasn't getting all of her features. I had her show me around but everything I saw looked correct. Then I looked outside and found a cheap amplifier in the system. The woman said that the preivous residents wired the place. I removed it because it looked useless, and everything looked fine. At this point it looked like the problems I was having with my radio everyone else was having, and dispatch was lovingly blaming me for this.
The next job was another trouble call. This was a duplex right on the corner of a busy intersection. The number of the place said it should be on one side of the intersection but it turned out to be on the other side. The door was answered by a woman. She said everything was fine so I could cancel the job.
The next job was another house in the same area. The door was answered by an elderly woman who moved very slowly. The place had a smell about it. It was kind of dark too. It looked like no one else lived here. She had a pitbull named Charlotte, who looked about as old as she did. It wouldn't stop smelling me the whole time. It may have been blind. She was having trouble making her remote work. I think it was on the wrong setting. I changed it and everything was fine. I showed her what was wrong, in case we have this problem in the future.
The next job was a house to the south. The was an install. A woman answered the door. There were three kids here. I got the impression she was watching them, they weren't her's. I was here to replace the cable box with an HD box. She said she had some people out there to put in this HD set up. This was in the basement. There was a nice looking painting down stairs, I wondered if she painted it. I saw right away they didn't leave me any HD connections. I hooked up the HD box and the picture wouldn't fill up the screen properly. I told her this was because of the connecitons, and she needed to call her people back out.
I picked up one more job for the morning. This was a trouble call in an apartment building. The door was answered by a large black man. He showed me to a computer. He told me the problems he had at the install. Then he showed me the problems he was having with his computer. The modem was working fine. There was an error on the computer screen saying that the problem was his ethernet card. I downloaded an update of the software and explained to him what was going on. He admitted that he might get a new computer. He likes to look up porn on the Internet and he got a bunch of spyware and virusus on his computer. Yet he thought it was the modem...
After lunch I went to an apartment building. There was a young woman here, who looked like a skater. There was also an older woman and a child here. I assumed the woman was her mother and the child was her's. But the child belonged to the woman who I guess was a friend. Shw was still very much moving in. It looked like she was moving from another building in the same complex that was being renovated. She was streesed out because she had midterms due today and she was leaving tomorrow for spring break in Mexico. The job was easy. She already had her equipment and even though I was here to set up all three product, she wasn't using the phone. She just had it because it made her overall price cheaper. This made the job easier. At one point I walked in on a conversation where the young woman was talking about how she went to the dentist who said her teeth were decaying. She then referred to an eating disorder she used to receive treatment for (bulemia?) that even though she doesn't do this anymore, it must have finally caught up with her. While working on this job, I called into dispatch again and another system went down at which time I was told to not call in anymore today.
I ended up with just one more job. This was a plcae I had been to before. They are still having Internet problems. This was a square building in the fancy shopping district that has been divided into several units. Last time I was here there was a man who didn't know much about what was going on and kind of watching a child, while he spoke to his friends on the phone the whole time. This time a woman was here. She was watching Oprah and pointed out to me that this episode is for men. I was more interested in finishing this job so I could go home. I tracked some issues down to a line going to a different TV, so I replcaed it. I hope that was the problem.

My first job of the day was a house in a gated community. I was here to put a box on an account that had cable but no boxes. An older lady answered to door. She showed me to the bedroom where she wanted the box installed. Her husband eventually showed up. He had a lot of questions. He seemed older than she. They both moved around very slowly. Once I had the box set up they had a lot of questions. I would explain things generally like I normally do, but when they asked questions I quickly understood that they knew nothing about this system and everything had to be explained in minute detail. What would normally take 5 minutes, now took over 30.
When I finally left there I headed to a town home complex. A black woman answered the door. On the couch in the living room was a man asleep. The room was dark but the TV was on. She showed me upstairs to where the computer was. She said that she is constantly losing her Internet and would have to reset her router to get it back. This was obviously the router. I looked around and found a splitter that could be replaced. The signal on the modem was low, so I tried to re-rout things to improve the signal, but in the end I explained that it was the router.
The next job was a house to the north. A white man let me in. He was complaining that his modem constantly resets itself and that he has had this problem for three years. He would just replace the modem. I was trying to figure out where the cable in the room goes by looking behind a bookcase. To do this I had to go around a birdcage, but for some reason I didn't see the parrot on top of the cage. Until it was about 2 inches from me and tried to take a bite of my jacket. The customer then said that the bird would indeed attack me so he took it into the other room. I was then able to follow the cable, which goes into the crawl space. I had top replace a couple connectors and a piece of bad cable, but none of this was the problem. I told the guy this was a network issue and that I would turn the job over to the appropriate people. I had to take a look at what was going on up on the pole, and then I turned over to our network people.
I then did a disconnect in the same neighborhood. Then I was given an install in an apartment complex a little ways away. This is a pretty ghetto apartment complex. A tall young white man answered the door. I was here to install TV and the Internet. He had is own modem. The job was pretty easy. He told about a friend of his who gets drunk and orders pay per view movies and then passes out. He'll do this several nights in a row with the same movie driving up his cable bills. As I was finishing up the guys friend (same guy who orders the movies) showed up and exclaimed, "I'm surprised you have running water let alone cable!" I then went to lunch.
After lunch I got an Install. I was here to do Internet and phone. Two middle aged Hispanic men lived here. One knew English pretty well, the other didn't speak at all. The job was easy, I set up the Emta at the only outlet next to the front door. I spoke to the guy about getting a router so he could use his laptop upstairs.
My last job was over by the University. This was a duplex. I arrived right when the woman who lives here showed up. It looked like her parents were here watching her children. She said that her phones would go out for hours at a time. Sometimes it would come back but with a lot of noise on the line. I looked downstairs and everything looked fine. I looked outside and saw a line exposed to the elements and had obviously taken on some water damage. I figured out which line that was and eliminated it from the system. Since everything was working when I showed up, I hoped that was the problem.

My day started downtown. It was at a condo. There was a young couple here. I was installing an HD/DVR. They already had our services, so the job was easy. We talked a bit. They wanted to know how to hook up their surround sound. I explained that to them. We also talked about the Marathon being run downtown in honor of St. Patrick's Day.
The next job I got was at a house down south east. I was let in by a young man. He looked Persian. His face reminded me of Mel Gibson, a short Persian Mel Gibson. When I showed up I noticed that dispatch had taken this job from me and gave me two others. But I was already inside by this point so I had to tell them to give me back the job. I was here to install all three products. The house had been remodeled so the inside wiring was good. But the previous residents probably never had cable because there was no line running to the house itself. So I had to run a new line and do all the outside work. He told me his in-laws were in town to help move but they just went to lunch, so now he has time to get stuff done around the house like putting up blinds in all the windows. So he was working the whole time I was. He was listening to Kanye West and Tribe Called Quest. Once I finished the outside the inside was much easier. I just had to put in the wall plates and connect all the phone lines together.
I then went to lunch. After lunch I did an install at an apartment building. This building was on a very busy street across from the university. There was a Hispanic couple here with their teenage son. It looked like he slept on a mattress in the living room. I brought everything I needed to do the job only to find out everything was hooked up already. I just had to put the box they already had on the account and activate it. They saw the box I had brought and decided to ask me to hook it up in the bedroom, which I did.
The next job was another install at another apartment building on the same street just a little further north. There was a young couple here. They were watching Knocked Up. I was here to install the TV with an HD/DVR. The job went by really fast.
My next job was a house a little to the south. There was a middle aged woman here. She was having problems with her modem. She seemed largely illiterate about technology. The modem just turned out to be bad. So I replaced the modem and started to head home.
As I pulled up to my place I was given yet another job. This was a house way down south. The woman here already had her TVs hooked up, she just wanted boxes on all her TVs. She had two large dogs which were friendly but a little too friendly so she stuck them out back. The job went by quickly. I hauled ass, because I wanted to get back home.

After our weekly meeting I headed south east again. My first job was a town home. There was a tall middle aged woman here with a bunch of Hispanic guys who were laying down hard wood floors. I was here to install the TV and the Internet. The wiring in the place was really old. I had to replace a few connectors, but when I removed a wall plate upstairs the connector behind it fell apart. I couldn't find a way to fix it, so I had to drill a new hole and run some new cable, which involved me hanging out of the second floor window. She then wanted me to run a new outlet out of the other room on the second floor. Which I did and had to run that cable across the neighbor's yard to a pedestal. I could tell she wasn't exactly pleased with this, but there was no other way to do it. At this point she told me she wanted another outlet in this other room. I wasn't pleased about this at all, but had to do it. This was the room where they were laying hard wood floor. These guys didn't care that I was there they were working and using all there power tools right around me (can I file workman's comp for hearing loss?). All in all I spent three hours at this place, but finally got it done.
I took a lunch, which comprised of going back to the job I was at the previous day and talk to a contractor about replacing the universal remote system. I was an hour and a half late in meeting him. He replaced it but it was still causing a problem. We mulled over the fact that this may have been a problem from the beginning but we at our company were not able to track it down until just now. We talked and thought about it for a while, but in the end his system was not compatible with ours.
My next job was a house not too far away. I was here to install phone. The customer already had Internet and TV. The thing is he didn't want the phone. He just got it because it made his bill cheaper. So I just swapped his modem for a different one. I replaced a couple of splitters as well, but the job went quickly.
Next I went to an apartment complex. There was a round white guy on the couch and two Hispanic kids playing on the ground. he proceeded to tell me how the box last night started making a bunch of noise and flashing green. So I replaced it. It took the new box a little while to fully load, but that was the only snag.
The next job was in a little gated community. There was an elderly couple here. The woman was a bit of a meddler and didn't really know what was going on. Her husband showed me the TV in the bedroom and complained about his box making noise and breaking up. So I replaced it. He also complained about the TV and cable box not syncing up. I gave him a bigger cable box hoping that would help.
My last job was at a fancy high rise apartment building. There was an older Jewish guy here. He mentioned that he wasn't living here for long, his flat screen TV was on a cardboard box. His cable box wasn't even turning on and the LED display was flashing. So I replaced it. Another easy job. At one point we started talking about Elliot Spitzer and he said, "I don't care who you are, you just don't spend $80,000 on pussy." Then I went home.

I was in the south east yet again. My day started at a house. There was an elderly guy here. He was complaining that his TV in the basement wasn't working. I go down there and noticed the TV was set to channel 5, so I changed it to channel 3 and left.
I picked up another job. This was in an apartment complex. There was an elderly woman here. She got a thing in the mail saying the cable box wasn't communicating. I looked around and found several old connectors that needed to be replaced. As well as some old filters outside in the box. but when I got back inside I noticed the cable was going to the VCR before the cable box, which was the actual problem.
I was then given an install. This was in the fancy new condos I was at yesterday for a downgrade. This place was nice and more expensive than the typical home. I thought it strange that such a fancy place is right next to the University where the average person could afford to live here. I had to be let in by the building manager. The actual resident wasn't around. There was no furniture in the place. I was just here to set up the Internet, which was pretty easy.
My next job was another install. This was at an even fancier and newer building in the fancy shopping district. They were actually still constructing it. As I was on the 5th floor there were people still painting the walls. I stepped into the unit and the guy here was yelling at some people who had fucked something up in his closet. He then showed me what he wanted done. I was here to install all three products. The job was fairly easy, they were in the process of moving in, but there was no furniture in it. The guy told me he was moving from a town in the mountains. Though I think he is keeping his property up there, he is just going to go back and forth between the two.
After I finished I went to lunch. After lunch I went to another fancy high rise in the same area. This was on the top floor and possibly fancier than the last place. There was a nice old woman here. She said she was out of town and just got back and now none of her TVs were working. Two of the TVs she showed were actually working but her universal remote system wasn't. The third TV was a jumbled mess. So I tried to figure out what was going on. It turned out that a filter had been placed on her unit because she was feedbacking noise into our system. So I sought to find out what was causing the problem. It turned out to be the device that worked her universal remotes. I unplugged it and got in contact with the guy who installed it. We made an appointment to deal with this further the next day.
I then went to a house a little to the south. A very elderly guy answered the door. He had a problem with his TV. It was set to air instead of cable. I switched it and ran through the channel set up. and everything was fine. As I was waiting for him to show me out, he said "I'm 80 and dying." Which was easily the most depressing thing I had heard in a while. I wanted to change the subject so I asked how long he had lived in this house. He said he had been there for 35 years. I realized that was longer than I had been alive.
The Next job was a house to the south east of here. There was an elderly woman here watching Jeopardy. She complained about not getting the guide. Which I knew right away what the problem was. I just needed to change the input on the TV. She said she was largely blind. She also told me that she used to have a 72 inch TV, but her kids said it was fuzzy so they bought her some fancy new flat screen TV. She said her kids also said the TV was fuzzy in her bedroom. She asked me to check it out, but it was fine.
My last job of the day was another house in the area. This woman had an office in her house and had moved it into the basement and had cable ran down there. But now she wanted it moved to where it was and that outlet wasn't working. In running the new line the previous tech had unhooked the old one. This was a pretty standard practice, but she seemed perturbed by it. She wanted me to make sure that everything was working in case she moves things around again in the future. Which I did. Then I went home.

Holy 200 Batman!

My day started south east today. I'm begining to think this is my new area and nobody bothered to tell me. I struggled to stay awake driving to the first job. This was in an apartment complex. It took me a while to find the customer but eventually I found him. He was a short Arabic guy. He spoke good English but he didn't talk much. The place was a mess, he was still moving in. This was an install of all three products. He already had the equipment and knew how the products work. He just told me to set up where ever. That made me happy. I took me a while to find the box, actually I wandered around until I found someone who works in the complex and could tell me where to go. Once I got that sorted out the rest was a breeze.
I then went to another complex to the east. I had two jobs in this complex. No one was home at the first one. The second one was answered by a young woman. She let me in. She said that her old TV had gone out and she switched the cable box to the new TV and now it doesn't work. It wasn't plugged into the wall. I plugged it back in and left.
I then got a job at a house quite a ways away. This house was being remodled. No one was here. I called the woman and she said she would be there in about 10 minutes. She said the door was unlocked and explained how the phones were not working. She said one tech came out and got everything working. They took out a wall and now nothing was working, so another tech came out and fixed it but now nothing is working again. The phone was shorting out. The wiring looked sketchy but there was not much that could be done since they were still doing construction. I finally tracked it down to this wallplate that was hanging down. Some of the wires had been pulled out and were touching each other. It was a quick fix, and everything was up and running.
I then got an install. This was at an apartment building near the university. There was a young Asian woman here. I was here to install the Internet. Aparently she had Internet in the past with her roomate who left. So she was getting it re-hooked up. It was an easy job. While I was out back hooking her unit up a guy came out with a barrel of peanuts, he started laying it out for the squirrels. I almost felt like going off on him for feeding the fucking squirrels, but I didn't. He said he was recently down in New Mexico near a peanut farm and the peanuts were really cheap, but now he needed help getting rid of them. Sure enough they started coming from every direction for the feast.
I got one more job before lunch. This was at another apartment building near the university. Someone was downgrading their service and wanted me to take their box. There was a young woman here. I just took the box and left.
After lunch I went to a house. It's on a busy street, but once inside you don't notice. There was a woman here with her newborn. One step inside and you get hit with the smell of a baby. It was a very pungent odor. Channel 68 on her box was acting up as well as a few other channels. I found a bad connector and I replaced the splitter. This fixed the other channels but not 68. So I replaced the box. But the new box was even worse. All sorts of channels were flashing in and out. So I got yet another box. This one seemed to work so I left.
The next job was a house in the same area. The door was answered by a teenage girl. She said her mom would be home in ten minutes. So I walked around the outside, but this house had been remodled so all the wiring was internal. Eventually the mom showed up. She told me she kept having problems with her Internet and her phone. I checked and found an old splitter. One that should have never worked. I replaced it as well as a wall plate. It's hard to tell if I really fixed it but hopefully I did.
I then got a job at a brand new apartment complex right next to the university. This was a downgrade. I just had to find the box in order to put a filter on the line. It didn't take me long to find the guy who is in charge of the building. He showed me where I wanted to go and I did my job and left.
I picked up one more job which was on my way home. This was in teh country club area. A nice old guy answered the door. He got a thing in the mail stating that one of his cable boxes was not communicating correctly. I hate when they do this. Because these people don't know anything is wrong. We are just creating more work for ourselves. The guy said he just got back from Vail today. He spent the weekend there. He talked about seeing the Gypsy Kings and how great of a concert that was. I replaced a connector and a wall plate and then seemed to fix the problem.

When I started the day the computers were down, so no one could see what jobs they had. This put everyone at least a half an hour late for the day. I finally headed to my first job. This was a house. A hippy looking guy answered the door. The place was a mess. He showed me the back yard and the line to his house was laying on the ground. He explained that a branch from a tree came down and took out a whole bunch of lines. He also told me that two other techs had been out there and couldn't replace the line because they had to get into a neighbor's yard and there was a paranoid old lady there with a dog that she had refused to put away. I had notes saying she had been warned that we will got the police and animal control if we have to. When I went over there no one was to be found, she apparently got the message. Now this person who's line I'm replacing goes to this pole which is more of a relay, because the line has to get to the next pole down where the tap is. To get to this next pole I had to go through three other neighbor's yards and of course they each had dogs. In the end it took me three hours of climbing fences and poles and stringing cable. This made me late for the rest of the day. When I finished the guy was so happy he offered me a beer which I had to deny.
Once I finished there I headed to another house further south. There was a middle aged man here with his son. The kid was watching TV, he was cooking. He showed me to a different TV that wasn't working. I looked behind it and a chord had come out. I plugged it back in and everything was working fine.
The next job was in an apartment complex. There was a small round gentleman here. He was watching celebrity apprentice when I showed up. He had a great fondness for the blues brothers. There was posters and various other paraphernalia around. His first complaint was about the quirkiness of his DVR. Unfortunately all our DVRs are the same way. Mine does the same things and I told him this. His second complaint was that his computer was running slow and there was one page that was not fully loading. He showed me a speed test from one web site that showed it was slow. I changed some splitters around outside and came back in. It still showed the connection as slow, but I went to a different speed test site and it showed it as being super fast. As for the web page, I had no clue what was causing that. Either he was having software problems or that web page was having problems.
I skipped lunch and went to my next job. This was at another apartment complex. There was a young couple here. They said they just moved here from California about 5 months ago. They've been living in a hotel room since, and just moved into this place. They had no furniture, it was all back in California. They were still trying to sell their house back there. They had 5 cats, two very hairy ones and three hair-less ones. The hairless cats looked creepy. I was here to hook up their TV which was very easy.
The next job I had was a downgrade. This was another house. I spoke to the gentleman here to make sure I had the right information, then I drove around the block and let myself into the neighbor's yard. I had to find the pedestal and put a filter on the guy's line.
My last job of the day was an install at an apartment complex. I was here to install all three products. There was a young woman here with her parents. They were remodeling the place. The father was laying wood flooring down. The daughter was helping him. The mom mainly wandered around and meddled with everything. She really annoyed me. The daughter bought the place. She was telling stories about the place when she bought it back in Aug. Some woman lived here and never cleaned or updated the place. There was cat poop in the bathtub. The woman died in the bedroom. They've been remodeling the place since Aug, that's saying something. There was one cable outlet, that was probably never used. I had to drill a couple holes to run it into the next room and the bedroom beyond that. It was a bit of a pain to work around them all and what they were doing but eventually I finished the job.
On the way home I got asked to check in on another tech who needed some help. It was on the way home so I agreed. This was a house. He was having trouble getting the phones to work. Somewhere in the house lines one and two were connected so the system was shorting out. We figured out how to bypass it but that only solved half the problem. We also found some wires that were not connected well, so I redid those connections and that seemed to fix it. Then I went home.

After our weekly meeting I headed south east again. This was an apartment complex, I've been to a couple times before. The door was answered by a young guy. He looked like a D & D type of guy. He was easy going and nice. He had a old big black dog and two cats. I was here to install all three products. He had his equipment from his previous residence, so the job was pretty easy. I went to hook up the EMTA and he warned me that it was in his smoking room so pardon the smell. I though that was interesting to have a smoking room. It didn't smell that bad, bud he did just move in. The room was set up for X-Box live. The only snag with the install, was that some of the information from his account was from a couple address ago. So I had to wait on the phone for a while until they got that figured out.
After that job I had a disconnect in the same complex. Once finished with that I went to lunch.
After lunch I went to another apartment complex. A young African woman answered the door. She had two kids running around. She complained her Internet wasn't working, but it was working fine her computer just wasn't hooking up to it. When I approached the bedroom with the computer in it I noticed the shape of an iron imprinted in the carpet. The computer was working fine. I just needed to set it up so that it would enter the right password for the network.
I then went further south to another complex for another disconnect. Then I went up north to a house. I took a wrong turn which delayed me a couple minutes, but allowed me to circumvent a speed trap in a school zone. This was fortuitous because the way I had been cruising around all day, I probably would have gotten a ticket and they have threatened to fire anybody caught speeding in a school zone at my company. The job itself was very easy. I was met at the door by an older couple. Their phones were not working. I looked and the EMTA was working fine. I noticed that it was plugged into a wall plate with two phone jacks. I moved it to the other phone jack and everything worked fine. The woman blamed her husband for this, he told a joke at her expense, I felt like I was on the set of a sitcom or something. As I was leaving the woman noticed the chord dangling from my meter and exclaimed, "You have a tail!" I chuckled and turned around and could see in her eyes a bit of seriousness about the statement. At which point I left.
The next job was at a town home complex. A young woman answered the door and looked at me confused about my presence. She wasn't expecting me, her roommate made the call. She called him and he said the box in his room wasn't getting all the channels. She didn't know he had a box in his room. We go up to his room and there was a large flat screen TV in there. I could tell she was surprised by this, she had no clue. He was definitely missing some channels. I looked around and found several things wrong. From a low signal to a whole bunch of bad connectors. I spent some time trying to make sense of things as well as fixing everything that was wrong. He eventually showed up. Once I got everything working I could tell he was happy.
I then picked up a job at a house. This was further north, near where a friend of mine's parents live. I was here to hook up one TV. not even with a box. The house itself was already wired, I just had to go up to the pole and connect it. There was an older couple here. The gentleman explained that they were remodeling his place so they were staying here in the meantime. He told me he used to work for one of our competitors. He only had good things to say about them. He said they had bought him out and he got his pension. He also talked about how he picks up the occasional work around a local Catholic school and some consulting work.
I left there and went to my last job. This was another town home complex. An older woman answered the door. She explained that every so often she would lose a web page or have trouble sending an email or once how when she was trying to stream Oprah it kept breaking up and that she was worried that someone might be stealing her Internet. She also said that she was talking to her mother and someone random guy but into the conversation. As for the later of these two things, I have no clue how that would happen. Her wiring couldn't be crossed with a neighbor's because with the way our system works, it would cause problems and just not work at all. So it would have to been a data or network issue. Either way it is out of my hands. She said she had a previous technician out there who told went outside and told her that someone was stealing her Internet. That would be impossible. I wondered if she misunderstood, and the tech said that someone was stealing her cable. I looked and saw signs that such things had occurred in the past, but nothing of the kind was happening now. I told her this. As for the loss of a page or an email I tried to explain to her how the Internet is only as good as the weakest part. She told me she once saw someone on Oprah explain how the Internet works, and that what I just said made sense. Then I left and went home.

They had me south east today. My day starated at an apartment building. This building is actually on the border of this area and my usual area. It could have easily been my usual area. There was a middle aged guy here. He was complaining about some channels going out. Although it was working now of course. I checked things out and replaced a splitter and a cable, but there was still some noise in teh system. It was coming from a crusty old TV he had in his bedroom, I told him about it and it sounded like he was going to replace it.
My next job was an install. This was a house near a rather large Catholic complex. The complex is rather large and impressive, but you wouldn't know it's there because it's completely hidden by this neighborhood. The house was quaint. There was an older woman here. She already had out Internet. I was here to install the TV and phone. She had Direct TV and while I was there, she was trying to end her service with them. They said she signed an 18 month deal and they would have to charge her for prematurely disconnecting. She was certain she never signed any such thing. She works at a law office and has no problem taking them to court. They also told her they wanted her to get on the roof and remove some pieces from the dish and send it back. The job for me was pretty easy it didn't take very long.
The next job was a house not too far away. This was a nice house right on a very busy street. Though from inside you wouldn't be able to tell. There was an older couple here. The husband I believe was a realtor. They had three different phone lines one of which was not working. Two of these lines came from different EMTAs and when they were pluhhed into the same telephone as line 1 and 2, it created a short and knocked one of the lines out. I wasn't entirley sure what was causing it but I saw a chance to simplify the situation, I moved one of the phone lines so that they were on the same EMTA. That solved the problem. So then I went to lunch.
After lunch I went to a very large house. There were contractors all over the place. The house was in the the finishing stages of being remodled. There woman who lives here met me at the door. She took me to the office and said that the Internet wasn't working. The reason it was not working was because they disconnected the cable and didn't run any new cable to this part of the house. I talked to the guy in charge and he said he wanted me to set up the router in a compartment in the garage where all the cable were run to and he would have people run new CAT-5 to that room to get it hooked up.
My last job of the day was another install. This was an old house. There was a woman here with her two kids. They were in fact twins. The girl acted very innocent while the boy was very mischevious running around causing trouble. The woman was having trouble keeping up with him. She told me the house was about 100 years old. I was here to put a box on one of the TVs and to set up the phones. The job was pretty easy untils I got to the phones. The wiring in this place was old and confusing and it took me a while to figure it out. She told me that the previous owners had the basement as an apartment, so there were different phone lines running all over the place. I got it worked out eventually. Then I went home.

They had me in the northwest part of town today. I started at some new condos that overlookecd the Interstate. They were new as in still under construction. A young woman had just moved in. I saw something that told me she had moved here from the suburbs way to the south. I was here to set up Internet and TV. I wandered around and found one of the construction guys to show me where the box was to hook up her unit. After that the job was really easy. She already had her equipment and it was exactly where she wanted it. There was a snag when trying to hook up the Internet, a problem with the system. So I had to sit on the phone with tech support for about 15 minutes while they fixed it. Then I left.
I got some coffee and headed to my next job. This was another install at an apartment building. There was a bunch of middle aged Hispanic guys hanging out in the street. In the building there was a police office wandering the halls. The door was answered by a young white male. As sketchy as the neighborhood seemed, the inside of the apartment was actually kind of nice. I was here to install the Internet. I had a difficult time trying to find the line to his unit. I had to tone it out, but I eventually found it. At which point I finished the job. I could tell he was anxious for me to finish, he probably had to go to work.
The next job was a house to the north. A short Hispanic woman answered the door. There was a couple white kids playing in the living room. She told me that there was a couple more taking a nap. She must be a day care provider. She also told me this is here slow day, she usually has more kids running around. Her phones weren't working. I checked the EMTA and it was working fine. I looked around and asked to see the basement. She said alright in that tone that says you don't know what your getting into. She opened it for me and said that she tries to never go down there. I chuckled, but she wasn't joking. I had to walk sideways to get down there. I've had an easier time getting into crawl spaces. There were spider webs all over the place. It was like raiders of the lost ark. I found the phone lines and quickly realized what was going on and what I actually wanted was in fact upstairs. So I hurried out of there and found a phone line that had disconnected, so I hooked it back up and explained to her what happened and how to fix it in case it happens again.
I picked up another job even further north. This was another house. An old woman answered the door. She seemed a little crotchety. She complained about previous techs that had been out there. She showed me to a bedroom and apologized for the mess, saying it's not her room. I saw that everything was working fine at the moment. I asked to see outside at which point she told me that the last tech said something would have to be done on the pole, but then left and did nothing. There was some obvious work that needed to be done, so I went to work. I did have to go up on the pole and replace a bunch of connectors. I hope that did it. She seemed pleased that I actually put some work in. As I was leaving I noticed a young man here, it was probably his room that the EMTA was in. I assume he was her son. He tried to act like he knew what was going on with the cable but I pretty much dismissed him because I was done at this point. I left and went to lunch.
My first job of the afternoon was at an apartment building for retirees. This place was next to a lake and had a great view of the mountains. There was an elderly short Hispanic woman here. Her TV was turned to channel 129 instead of channel 3. Which was a very easy fix. She also asked me to check her VCR and make sure it is working correctly. I put in a tape and it immediately started to eat it. I took me a while but I was finally able to get the tape out. I put in a different tape and it didn't play at all. The VCR was crap. She asked me to remove it and hook up the DVD player that was int he other room which I did. She was happy and tipped me $10 for it.
My last job of the day was a house a little to the south. There was a young couple moving in. I thought at first they were a couple, but they had separate bed rooms. Who knows what was going on. The house was nice, not unlike some of the houses I'm used to seeing in my usual area. I needed to get up the pole but there was some small construction team laying cement in the alley so I had to keep myself busy until I left. They wanted a new outlet drilled which I did as well as all the other inside work. I felt like I was working backwards, but eventually I was getting it all done. At one point the guy offered me a beer, which I politely refused. I finally got up the pole, but when I got back down nothing was working. I climbed up the pole again and nothing was coming out of it. I called one of the line technicians who was already on his way. It turned out I blew a fuse down the line. It didn't take long for them to fix once they showed up, but I felt like a dumb ass for it though. When I stepped inside the house it was obvious he had been smoking marijuana. I didn't say anything I just finished the job and went home.