We had our meetings this morning then I went out to my first job. My first two jobs in fact were in the same building. This was a building for retirees. The first job was a disconnect which was easy. The second was an install. There was short Hispanic woman here. Her father was moving in later this week and she wanted to get everything set up for him. She was getting everything perfect for him, which I thought was commendable. I was here to install two TVs. The only snag was that in order to get the cable into the other room I had to drill through the wall. We got whatever permission we needed and I did it. Since he hadn't moved in yet there was no furniture to work around. Then the maintenance guy asked if I could help him with something. He wanted me to set up a splitter so he could run a new line in someone else's apartment. Which I did and then went to lunch.
After lunch I went out to resort town. This was for another install. There was a young guy here with his dog. He said he was a trader. He kept asking me a bunch of questions about the Internet. It was very important to him that his Internet be good, for his lively hood. He also wanted a couple TVs hooked up. The job was pretty simple. He told me he had a house in a good part of town. We talked about how this wasn't a good time to be selling. He said there was some development going on across the street from his place that he didn't like. So he sold it. He said he was going to live here until the housing market bottoms out, then he'll buy another house.
I finished that job and got another one in resort town. The guy wasn't home when I got there, he said he could be there in 20 minutes. So I waited. In the mean time I looked around outside and found he had been disconnected. I told him so when he showed up. We went inside and sure enough everything was working now. He handed me some brochure from my company saying to call them for installation. I took the brochure so that I can pass it on to my supervisor, then I left.
The next job I was given was at a rather nice looking building that had been divided into several units. There was a middle aged woman here. She thanked me for coming back. I get the impression that she missed her appointment and I got called back here. Her Tivo wasn't acting right. The channels were all screwy. I looked and the Tivo was saying that the wrong kind of card was in there. I looked at the card and it was right, but the Tivo was reading it wrong. I tried a different card but the Tivo didn't respond, so I put the first card back in and reset the Tivo. Then it started to work right so I left.
My last job was an install in the retirement community. I called and a man answered the phone. He sounded Asian. When I showed up I was greeted by a middle aged Hispanic woman and her son who was in wheel chair. It wasn't an accent it was a speech impediment. I got the impression they were from Venezuela He wasn't retarded, in fact he was very smart, probably smarter than me. Maybe he had cerebral palsy. I was here to install three TVs and the Internet. I had to drill a couple holes. He had a fancy computer that ran on a different operating system than what I'm used to. Probably some variation of Linux. I finished the job and went home.

My day started out in plastic land. I had an install. I was here to remove a cable card and replace it with a DVR as well as install phones. A guy answered the door. It looked like the whole family was here. His mother was hanging out in the kitchen. I saw his wife briefly when I showed up, but she must have gone to work, because I didn't see her after that. They had a kid too. The guy kind of followed me around at first. I guess to make sure I knew what I was doing. The job was very easy. For the phones I just swapped the modem for the EMTA and I was finished.
I then got another job in plastic land only a couple blocks away. It was an equipment pickup. The door was answered by a guy who was on the phone. He let me in and said one second. Then he went downstairs. He came back up with an HD box. I gave him a receipt. During this whole exchange his daughter never left his side, peeking out at me from behind his legs. She must have been scared of me.
I then picked up a job at a house to the east. There was a lady here working from home. She told me that her computer in the basement wasn't connecting to the router. I tried to maneuver the router to get the signal through the floor. These old houses have some very thick walls. It was starting to work, but I think I broke the antennae because now none of the computers could connect, so I had to replace the router. In the end I could get the computer in the basement to connect but it was a very weak signal, so the connection would drop. I explained to her what was going on, she said she might have to convince one of her IT guys to come out and hard wire it.
I then picked up one more job for the morning. This was back in plastic land. There was a woman here with her child. She wasn't getting a good Internet connection. I found a problem with how things were hooked up down stairs, but the real problem was the router itself. I had trouble connecting directly to it. I couldn't even identify it. I think she was hooked into a neighbor's router and that router was giving her problems. So I told her how to hook directly into the modem and which of her neighbor's routers she could tie into.
After lunch I got a job at a house to the south. There was a woman here. She said that her router was giving her problems when she tried to secure it, but when it was unsecured she could use it fine. But she does VPN to work from home and needs a secured connection. So I replaced the router. The whole time I was there she was scrambling around. She was going to go catch a flight for some work conference and needed to pack. Eventually her mom showed up to help take care of her son while she was gone.
I then got a job a couple blocks away. This was an L shaped building. I had actually been here once before. Though the last time I was here I remember a bunch of Hispanic teenagers being here. This time it was a black woman here. This is the first time I've been to the same unit but there have been different residents. There was a bunch of little African statues throughout the place and a giant fierce mask above the TV. I would love to have a mask like that. She was not getting any signal to the TV. I checked out back and everything looked fine, but upon further investigation I noticed that both connections at the ground block were loose. So loose they weren't truly connecting. So I tightened them up and everything was fine.
My last job was at an apartment complex. An African man answered the door. There was a very cute baby hanging out on the floor. The whole time I was there she would squeal to try and get my attention. They were having problems with getting all our features. He said he rearranged the room and ever since he moved the TV it hasn't worked quite right. Everything looked fine. I replaced a few connectors to no avail so finally I replaced the box and that did it. So I went home.

They had me south east today. My day started at a house. An elderly woman answered the door. She moved very slowly. She said the TV downstairs wouldn't turn on. Though when I asked her questions she couldn't supply too many answers. It seems her son lives downstairs and it was his TV in which the complaint was made. I took a look downstairs and sure enough the box was dead. So I replaced the box and headed on my way.
The next job was not too far away. It was another house. I could tell the guy was not in a good mood. Apparently some one called in sick so we were behind and I ended up showing up late to the job I was just given. The guy said to me that certain features weren't acting right, but every time I asked further questions he would get frustrated and say that he doesn't know and that his wife is the one with the complaint. So I replaced an old connector and the box. As I was doing this the guy's neighbor called and asked what was going on, because he saw my van. The neighbor told him he say a bunch of trucks down the street working on something over the weekend. The guy told me this and asked me if that could have been a problem. I asked if anything has gone wrong since that point and of course the guy didn't know. He was pretty much useless.
The next job was n install. This was an apartment building. There was a young couple moving in. Most of their stuff was still in boxes. They had two little dogs and a cat. The place smelled like a rodent. That smell when somebody has a pet rat or gerbil. Maybe it was left over from the previous resident. They told me what they wanted. It wasn't too hard. They already had all their equipment and a bunch of cable. I had to drill a hole through one wall, but it was easy.
I ran a quick errand and went to one last job for the morning. This was another apartment complex. I was here for a failed self install for Internet. Though when I arrived it looked like no one even tried. The door was answered by an older woman with one arm. There was a teenage boy here. Their interactions didn't quite seem like Mother/Son. She talked to me about going to a funeral in Chicago last week, and what that was like. She talked about trying to get left handed keyboards (The right arm is missing). She alluded that she had two hands at some point. I almost wondered if she lost her appendage due to diabetes or something, at least that was the impression I got. The job was pretty easy. The woman kept talking and talking, she must have been lonely or something.
After lunch I went to another apartment. There was an uptight black man here. He had a slow deliberate way of speaking. The place was little on furniture and big on papers. They were strewn all over the place. The guy told me he was a realtor. He was having problems with his router. It would just shut down randomly, so I replaced it. He didn't talk much, he just made himself lunch and read while he ate it.
Then I headed to a house, in a little complex. There were power lines running right over the place. I could hear them crackling and had a tingling feeling in my scalp. The door was answered by a woman, who was not expecting me at all. She called her husband and he explained what was going on. Some of their features were not working correctly. I looked around but nothing jumped out at me immediately, So I replaced some suspicious connectors and cable. But since the problem was not a regular occurrence I have no way of gauging whether or not I fixed it.
The next job was another install. This was also in an apartment complex. I was let in by a Marine. He was told that we wouldn't do the wiring in the apartment(I think he misunderstood), but it was to my advantage because he already wired all the TV's for me. So I just had to activate the apartment and set up the cable box. As I was working he said "I don't have any pot, but would like a Propel or bottled water?" and I started to think did I just hear that right? Then he said, "We go through a lot of pop around here." It had been a while since I heard the word pop, I think that's what through me off. The job was easy. His roommate showed up as I was finishing, he yelled in joy about the fact that he had TV. He said its been a boring couple of weeks.
My last job was an apartment building that was right next door. This place was for retirees. I was called in by an elderly gentleman. He had a leg brace on. He was also hooked up to an oxygen tank and had hearing aides. He told me about the problems he was having. He wanted me to remove the cable box and take it back. I was setting his TV up for the just basic cable. He proceeded to talk about his brother who had died about two years ago. He kept saying that his brother was the smart one, he knew all about electronics. His brother was in to Ham operating. And the guy proceeded to tell me about how his brother would keep him up at night talking to people all over and how his brother would build his own electronics. This guy was obviously lonely. He could probably talk forever, but I was hungry and tired and wanted to go home, so I left.

My day started at an apartment building. It was pretty ghetto looking. It was a square building broken into four units. The door was answered by a young black girl who told me no adults were there, so I rescheduled the job.
The I headed to a house. There was a young white couple here. They had a couple dogs they had to put out back. Their router wasn't working at all. Since it was one of ours, I had to replace it. The guy showed me to the computer and I started to work. He then left me and did things upstairs. The job was easy. I couldn't help but feel that they haven't woken up yet. They might have even been hung over.
The next job was another house. This time there was an elderly white couple here. They were watching Meet The Press and Ralph Nader was on. I asked if he is running for president (I figured he wouldn't be on if he wasn't there to announce that) and the woman said yes. She then began to rain insults upon him. She obviously blames him for putting Bush into office back in 2000. I was here to replace the remote in the bedroom. The lady started to ask me about her TV and whether or not it was HD. IT obviously was and I found the HD connections. She then asked if she could get an HD box in the bedroom. So I set her up with one.
The next job was another house further east. In front of the house on the street, was a pile of puke. Somebody partied too hard last night. I was met at the door by a young Hispanic man in a local sports jersey. There was a woman with a child in the living room. He led me through the house which was dirty and cluttered and down to the basement, which was no better. He took me to what I guess was his room and showed me the router. Everything looked fine, but he said his sister's computer upstairs wasn't working right. So I went up and took a look at it. I could see a couple things wrong. But I fixed them rather quickly and went on my way.
I then picked up a job at an apartment complex. There was a Hispanic man here. He was getting nothing on his TV. The table next to his TV was interspersed with photos of his kids and statues of bald eagles. Behind the TV was a porno. It took me a little while to figure out what was going on here because everything was labeled wrong. But eventually I found his line which was disconnected, so I reconnected it and then went to lunch.
After lunch I went to my first job of the afternoon which was at a bowling alley. I talked to the manager who had no clue what was going on. He said that we called him and said something was wrong. I looked an found that the equipment was small business equipment which I had none of and wasn't entirely confident in dealing with. So I called dispatch and rescheduled it for tomorrow when someone from small business can look at this.
The next job was a town home complex. The door was answered by a black woman. There was an older black man on the couch hooked up to an oxygen tank. He said he was having trouble with a bunch of channels, all of which were working now of course. I looked around and found nothing wrong. There was a couple suspicious cables which I replaced. But everything looked fine, so I left.
The next job was another town home complex to the north. There was an African couple here. They spent most of the time I was here on the phone. Each on their respective cell phone. The guy was complaining about missing a bunch of channels. I was messing around and found a bad cable which I replaced. I also looked outside and found an unnecessary splitter, which I got rid of. This seemed to fix it.
I then headed to a house a little to the east. There was a middle aged lady here. She had a couple dogs. She was complaining about the quality of her HD picture. She swears that her other TVs look better. I hate these kind of jobs because these people are so hard to please. I looked for the splitter and found way too many things hooked up. I rearranged things to give a better signal and she seemed genuinely pleased with the picture. She also wanted me to look at her TV upstairs. It would randomly show a black square while she was watching TV. I told her that was because she had captions on. I showed her how to turn them off.
I then picked up one more job. This was a house towards the west. There was a young couple here, with 3 children. Two were newborns, twins. They weren't able to access all of our programming. I checked and their signal was all weird. I found it was due to a filter on the line, that shouldn't have been there. I don't know how or why someone had done this, but I fixed it and then went home.

My day started in the retirement neighborhood. There was a woman here who seemed kind of young compared to most of the people here. She said she wasn't getting a picture. She was just watching TV and hear a pop and there has been no picture. The TV wouldn't turn on, the cable box would. I plugged the TV into a different outlet and it still didn't turn on, so I told her it was the TV. She needed a new one.
The next job was an install. It was in the same neighborhood. An elderly lady answered the door, she had a strange accent. I was here to install the phone. She didn't seem to understand what I was doing. But then again most people don't understand that when we o phone it is over the cable. So I worked and she pretty much left me alone. The job was pretty easy. In the end there was one chord that was hanging out. I offered to tuck it under the carpet to hide it and she said it wasn't necessary. She said it in such a way I could tell she didn't want me there anymore. Somehow I managed to rub her the wrong way, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out how. So I got her to sign and I left.
I then got one more install for the morning. This was a building that had been broken into about 6 units. A short round Hispanic woman answered the door. There was a couple of kids running around. I was here to install all three products. The place was already hooked up for some reason, I guess the previous residents were never disconnected. I started in the basement. The kids were down here watching TV. I set up the box but it was missing a whole bunch of channels. I looked and replaced the splitter and every connector I could find, but it was to no avail. So I decided to work ahead on the Internet and phone. These I were setting up in the daughter's room. This was the easy part of the install. At about this point another Hispanic woman showed up with her kid as well. All three kids were running around screaming. I resolved to replace the line to the place in order to try and fix that problem with the TV. But I could only get about 3/4 of it done because the last portion ran through the neighbor's porch and I had no way of getting in there. I went to see if I had done enough to fix the TV but I had not. The lady told me that she had to drive her friend to work so she needed to leave, so I left the job unfinished.
Then I took a late lunch. Afterwards I did an install int he same neighborhood. This was another apartment complex. There was a little old German lady here. She was listening to Sean Hannity on the radio. She asked if I had heard about this John McCain thing. She said she was disgusted at how people out there want to tear down a perfectly good man and then lift up others. I wondered at who exactly she meant by others, but decided not to ask. Some people get touchy about politics. I was here to install her TV. She said int he past she only used to get Fox news, then she complained that she couldn't get channel 2 then like magic she could get channel two but now she couldn't get fox news, which was why she is now getting a cable box. The reason for this is that she was not supposed to get fox news and when she called in, someone got sent out to put the filter back on her account. While I was working Sean Hannity started said that Clinton and Obama were both professing Socialism. Then the woman started going off about Socialism and how terrible and evil it was. I don't know what is more ridiculous, Sean Hannity's outlandish claim or her immediate acceptance of that claim. She started going off about how people just want stuff for free and how TV is to blame, and I don't completely disagree with what she was saying but I don't see how that has to do with Clinton and Obama being Socialist. We also talked about Obama some and how he is being compared to John F. Kennedy. She said she never got into the whole Kennedy thing, and she was always more impressed by Nixon. Somehow I thought that summed everything up. It took me a while to get out of there, she just wanted to keep talking and talking.
I eventually got out of there and got one more job. This was an Internet install int he fancy shopping district. This is one of the few original remaining houses here. Just about everything has been torn down for apartment buildings and townhouses, or scrape offs. There was a young guy here with a big dog. He showed me to where he wanted the modem. I took a look outside and saw immediately I needed to replace the line. As I stepped back inside, the dog almost attacked me before the guy got him to back off. He put the dog in another room. That was the closest I had come to being attacked by someones pet. I worked outside mainly, replacing the line. It didn't take as long as I thought it would. I was ready to go home. I finished the job and went home.

My day started with an install not too for from where I live. The place was in a row of town homes. There was a nice younger gentleman here. I got the impression he is from New Orleans. There was a bumper sticker about Katrina and some magazines and such from New Orleans. To start the job off I had to get in the crawl space. I'm actually spurised I was able to fit in there it was so small, but I got to the line and was able to push it back up through the floor. I then checked out back. The back area was a walkway that went behind the various units. And it was mine field back there. I can't stand the fact that nobody ever cleans up after their pets. Especially this guy, if you know the cable guy is coming the least you could do is clean the dog shit. Hooking this particular unit up was a little weird, because I had to do it at the mid-span (on the strand between the poles) rather than the tap. In fact there was a lot of weird shit going on up there, it looked like there may have been a tap at the mid-span instead of the pole at some point bu tthey removed it, but it was easier to ignore any possible issues going on here than get involved. I finished outside and went back in. At that point the job was easy. The guy knew how everything worked so I left.
My next job was on the same block which was nice. I was here to install all three of our services. This was a fancy new apartment building. The woman who lived in the apartment was actually in charge of the building. She was very nice, she just kind of showed me around then she had to go back downstairs. She had a bunch of old pictures of San Fransisco , which is where she was from. A couple of them were from the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge. One was of the great earthquake, it had a woman and her daughter smiling for the camera while San Fransisco was smoldering behind them. The job itself was pretty easy.
Since I was so close to home I had lunch there. My first job of the afternoon was only a couple blocks from my place. There was a young woman here. She said she was a student. The place wreaked of cat. I was here to install the Internet. She was happy to have it installed, otherwise the only way she could get Internet was to crawl into her kitchen sink and piggyback on someone's wireless router. The job went by pretty quick.
I then got another job in the area. It looked like a reception problem, but no one was home. So I had to pick up another job. This was a house on one of the busiest streets in town. I parked on the next street over and walked to the front of the house and saw the gate locked with a padlock, so I thought I should try the alley way. I entered through the alley way and noticed a pond with a small waterfall to my left. There was a dead fish floating in the pond. The door was answered by an older gentleman. He stunk horribly. The sort of stink that comes from a lifetime of smoking. I've known smokers my whole life, but it's been a while since I smelled someone this bad. The stench had infected every pore of his body. I could smell it about three feet away. He was having problems with his Internet. I detected a lot of noise being generated within the house. I tracked it down to bad cables. He said that a while back he was remodeling a bathroom and since the walls were open he ran cables throughout the house. There was no way of running new lines or replaceing these. I could tell he didn't like this explanation, so I replaced the modem as well to appease him. I'm pretty sure it wasn't the problem though. Then I went home.

My day started with a job at a house. The appointment was scheduled for 7 am to 8 am, but I don't start until 8 am. So I I got there about 8:15 am. There was a note on the door saying they waited for me, but had to go to work. The thing that struck me as weird is that this was an install and would have taken me longer than 8 am.
So I got a new job. This was another house not too far away. But no one was here either. So I did my next job. This was an outside only job. I just had to pull a filter off of a line. This was four houses down, so it didn't take long to accomplish.
The next job they gave me was an install in plastic land. This was for a fellow employee. The woman here works at one of our offices down south. She works with our phone product. I was here to Install our TV and Internet services. The job itself wasn't difficult at all. Most of their stuff was still in boxes. She was moving from out by where my mom used to live. We talked about the company some. In the end she tipped me a $20.
I then went to lunch and headed to my next job. This was at the retirement community. There was an old guy here. He just picked up one of our new remotes and it didn't work his TV. I programmed it to his TV and then left.
The next job was in the same area. This was a place I have been to several times already. There was an old black lady here with her grandson. She recognized me immediately. She was missing some channels. This was a little confusing because the last time I was here I replaced everything, so I know it's new. I walked around outside and found that the line was damaged. The grounds crew sliced it up with a weed whacker. So I replaced it and everything was working fine.
I got one more job in the area, but when I got there no one was home. So I got one more job. This was a large house in the country club area. An older gentleman opened the door. He was here with his wife and grandchildren. It was difficult to get through the front door because they had double doors but in the space of one door. So I had to squeeze through sideways, to get through one of the doors. One of the boxes wouldn't turn on. It turned out it was unplugged. So I plugged it back in and went home.

My day started at the retirement community. I was met at the door by an elderly woman. She said that the remote wasn't working at all. I picked it up and it worked right away. She seemed confused about it. I instructed her to point the remote at the box. This particular model of cable box only works if you point directly at it. For this reason alone I don't like it. She said she had been pointing it at the TV. That's probably what was going on.
The next job was in an apartment complex in the area. I walked in and there was an old frail black man with a pecuilar mustache on the couch. He seemed confused about my presence there and then an equally frail black woman came out from the bedroom and said she had set up the appointment. She was connected to an oxygen tank. She had a small child here as well, possibly a grandchild. The place was extremely cluttered. She said she moved out of a three story house to this place about two years ago and is still unpacking. They weren't getting some channels. I found some loose connectors, which I tightened and that seemed to fix everything. I replaced a connector too just to make is seem like I was actually doing somehting. She was in disbelief it was that easy.
Afterwords I headed to a house a little north. There was a white pettite shy woman here with a couple children. One child was Asian, which I though was a neighbor's child. But I saw pictures of both kids throughout the place, so maybe it was adopted. The husband showed up and he was as shy as his wife. I could barely hear what he was saying. I was hear to swap their DVR. The old one wasn't working at all.
Once I finished the job I headed towards my place. This job was at an apartment building not too far away. The guy here had a big fancy flat screen TV and was complaining about the quality of his picture. It turned out he wasn't using the HD outputs of his cable box. I switched it over to component and it was better, but he wasn't thrilled. Then I switched it to HDMI and that improved it some more, but he still wasn't thrilled. So I had to educate him about HD channels and programming versus non-HD channels and programming.
I was hoping to maybe have lunch at home, but got stuck with one more job. This was in plastic land. There was a middle aged guy here with his wife. He said that his TV doesn't look right. That about a couple days ago it started to get fuzzy. But when he plays a DVD its fine, so he thought it was the box. I switched the box to a different input on the TV and it was fine so I left and had some lunch.
After lunch I got one big job for the afternoon. This was not too far from where I live. It was actually a lot easier than it was on paper. They already had our video and Internet services, so I just had to set up the phone. They had an alarm but it was extremely easy to get to. There was a guy here with his wife and child. They pretty much left me to my work. So I finished the job and went home.

I started my day by going to a house. This house looked like it needed a paint job, the front door was a little rickety. I knocked but no one answered. I called and a guy answered and said that everything was working so I canceled the job.
Then I headed to an apartmetn building for elderly folk. There was an old Indian lady here. Her place had a lot of photographs of her various children and grandchildren. She was having TV troubles. After being on for about 30 seconds the screen starts to break into horizontal lines, then it starts to look as though the picture is tilting away from you. It looked like that old Tron game from the 80's. I told her it was the TV, she needed a new one.
The next job was the ghetto apartment complex. There was a young woman here with here child. The place was extremely cluttered. She apologized for the mess. It turns out she works for the company. She was having TV problems. She had changed the input on the TV. I just had to turn it back. She felt really bad that it was so simple.
The next job was in the retirement community. There was a little old couple here. They were only getting the local channels. They just got a new TV over the weekend. I knew right away it was going to be simple. I just had to change the TV from antennae to cable. I tried to explain what had happened and how to correct it themselves, but I wasn't sure if they got it or not.
Next I headed to resort town. A young woman answered the door in her PJ's and she apologized for this fact. There was an empty bud light can as well as an ashtray full of cigarette butts on the table. They had pulled some of the cables off of the back of the box and hooked them back up wrong. So I put it back together, but the box still wasn't working quite right. She said it's always done that, she just ignored it. I replaced the box anyways, with one that works better.
After lunch I headed to an apartment complex. I was here to pick up some equipment, but no one was home. So I headed to another job. This was further north. There was another young woman here. Her Internet wasn't working at all. I switched some things around outside hoping that would help, but it didn't. So I replaced the modem. But for some reason it wouldn't let me set it up. I called tech support and it turned out that something was wrong with the system itself. They put me on hold. I was struggling to stay awake so I started to play spider solitare on the customer's computer. Eventually they told me it was going to be a while, so I should move on and finish the job later.
The next job was at a nice looking old house. An elderly woman answered the door. She had one of those seats that take you upstairs. She showed me her TV. She said she didn't think her son hooked it up right. She kept saying he ripped something out. I think she was very confused in general. As far as I could tell she had never had a box before and for some reason got one, and her son set it up. But He took off before explaining it to her. I changed the input and tried to explain everything to her. She was being a little difficult. She didn't like the idea of having a new remote. I tried to explain how to use everything but I don't think it sunk in. I looked out back and saw an old line to the house, which I didn't necessarily feel like replacing. Everything was working fine, so I canceled the job and moved on.
The next job was on the same street but further north. This was another house. A nice lederly woman answered the door. She showed me to the bedroom and said that last night this TV would break into wavy vertical lines. I couldn't get it to happen again, but I told her that this was probably a sign that her TV was going to give out. She joked about how she just got a new flat screen from her children for Christmas and she doesn't think she could get another new TV so quick. On the way out she offered me some candy.
My last job was only a few blocks away. This was a large house. They were remodeling the front of it. A guy answered the door and showed me his TV in the bedroom. It didn't have any signal. We checked the basement, and still no signal. We looked outside and I could see that someone had disconnected the line. I went up there and there was a note from one of our network techs saying to call him before hooking it back up. I called him and he said there was some noise on the line that was backfeeding into the network. But I checked and found nothing. So I hooked it back up. I gave the guy a new box, because he didn't like the way the old one looked. We talked about about the house. He said it was built in 1896. He showed me a picture, showing only the house in a field, with a trolley line being built in front of it. He said this used to be a town called Mapleton and the street out front was the mainstreet. He even found an old token for the trolley in his garden out back.

My day started at a town home complex a friend of mine lives in. The door was answered by a middle aged guy, it seems he had just got up. He had two TVs in the living room, and I guess two upstairs. Though he only had a problem with one TV downstairs, the one with the box. He said he was missing a bunch of channels, but they were all coming in now. They were breaking up a little bit so I decided to take a look anyway. I saw a suspicious looking cable, so I replaced it. The guy himself seemed friendly. He said he didn't have to work today but the complex pays him $15 and hour to shovel snow off the walkways, so he might earn a little extra money.
The next job was in an apartment complex on the other side of the street. The door was answered by a young African man. There were porno movies strewn all over the floor. He was on the phone with the police. He said someone hit his car last night and gave him some insurance information, then drove off. But when he called the insurance company, the guy didn't have nay insurance there. The police said they couldn't do anything for him. He was mad. I was here to install the phone. The job itself looked pretty easy. But when I got it all hooked up it wouldn't sync. I checked outside and couldn't sync out there either. So I had to turn the job over to our network people to fix.
The next job was in resort town. The door was answered by a young guy. He said he didn't know what was going on, he was just visiting. He's in the process of moving here from St. Louis. The notes on my paperwork said that not all of there phone jacks were working. I looked around and tested every jack and found some weren't working. I was able to get them all working except one. Either I was missing something or the line had been somehow damaged, because it would not tone out. Eventually I had to give up, because I had more work to do. I told the guy what was going on and went on my way.
The next job was at the headstone shop across the street from the cemetery. I was here because the guy's Internet wasn't working. The guy was nice, it looked like he worked here alone. I asked him how business was and he said, "Dead." The modem was working fine. But his computer couldn't get on the Internet. I told him he must have a virus and he needed to take his computer in to geek squad or something.
After lunch I went to the ghetto apartment complex. The door was answered buy a young black guy who was literally smoking a joint while he opened the door. I was here to install an HD box for his fancy HD TV. Which I did. The funny thing is I went back to the van to get the box and when I came back he had lit some incense. Isn't it a little late for that? I ended up hooking up his surround sound as well. In the end he was very happy.
Then I headed to an apartment building near the hospitals. The door was answered by a guy in his 30's. He was nervous, the type of nervous person who talks a lot. The floor was tiled and everything the guy had was on rollers. It was very cluttered, in fact before he opened the door I could hear him roll something out from behind the door. He was having a problem, where the phone would cut out on him when he called one number in Albuquerque. It was obviously not a problem here so I called up tech support and they put a ticket in for it to get fixed in the system.
My last job was a house in the same neighborhood. It was an L shaped building broken into several units. There was an old black lady here. She was complaining that channel 24 was coming in quieter than all the channels. And it was, but there was nothing I could do about that. It had to do with how they broadcast, which I told her and then I left.

After our weekly meeting I heaeded to my first job. This was a duplex. An older woman lived here. She seemed slightly paranoid. She didn't really know what I was talking about either. I asked her where her modem was and she said she didn't have one. But eventually I found it. She was watching the footage of Roger Clemmons on capitol hill. I was here to install the phones. Usually I would replace the modem with an EMTA. But this time it was easier to work out of the crawl space. There was a ladder that descended to one part that was actually about 8 feet high so I could work standing up. While I was working down there she got a call. From what I could gather from the conversation I think she was talking either to the Mayor or the Governor. She was talking about how the person she was talking to needed to get a make over or something because they are going to be getting a lot of face time and needed to represent the taxpayers. She also metioned to the person that she has worked with Tom Brokaw and The Clintons back in Arkansas. I finsihed the job and went to my next job.
This job was a big house. There was a little old lady here. She said she wanted a new cable outlet in the kitchen. They just got a flat screen TV. So I drilled a new hole and ran a line. She was very nice and talkative. She talked about how she can't keep up with these technologies. We also talked about how over the air signals are turning digital. The job didn't take too long. As I was leaving her husband arrived driving a Jaguar. He looked as frail as she did. They were both happy when the job was over.
After lunch I went to a house not too far away. This house was getting remodeled. There were a lot of guys here working on the place. I was met at the door by a midget with a Eastern European accent. She is the nanny. She didn't know what was going on, so I had to refer to my notes. Which told me they wanted the drop reworked. They laid a conduit from the house to the pole, with a wire running through it, so I had to attach cable to one end and pull it through to the other. Then I also took down the old drop as well.
The next job was a house further north. The door was answered by an elderly black woman. She said she just got back from Dialysis and she was tired. She has obviously been losing her hair. I didn't ask what exactly she had. She would constantly lock her door everytime I passed through. I felt bad every time I had to leave or come back in. I was here to install TV. Which I did. It wasn't too hard. She used to have satelite. She kept talking about how its supposed to snow tomorrow. And she would talk about Ellen, which was what she was watching. There was some chemisty teacher on the show.
The last job was a couple blocks away. There was an elderly black man here. He said he was 80 and he was obviously slow. He couldn't remember why I was there. He said his wife is in charge of these things, but she was doing something at the zoo and wouldn't be back until late. I had notes about some error from the TV but it wasn't happening. I couldn't recreate the problem so I canceled the job and left.

My day started with going to the shop. I needed to get some more modems. I've been going through a lot of them lately. My first job was in plastic land. There was a young woman here with her child. She was complaining about phone issues. She said in the middle of a phone call she would hear a sound like someone pushing buttons and then an echo like sound as if someone is listening in. This is the first time I had heard of something like this so I wasn't sure what to do about it. I asked to see the EMTA. It was on the third floor. She said her sister in-law was in there sick. I checked out to be alright. So I looked in the basement and found the splitter. Each of these houses in plastic land has a built in splitter, and all these splitters are really bad. So I replaced the splitter and hoped in the end it was the problem.
I then headed into the land of scrape-offs. This was a large and very nice house. The guy met me at the door and started to complain about the fact I got there at the end of the time frame. I was about to tell him I just got the job, but he asked how long it would take to fix the problem. He explained the problem he was having with his DVRs and I told him at least 30 minutes. He told me that wasn't good enough and said he wanted to reschedual.
The next job was a apartment building to the east. I was met at the door by a middle aged man. I was here to check on his Internet. His modem wasn't working at all. I reset it and it started working again. I explained to the guy what to do in the future, and that this might be a sign that his modem is starting to go out.
The next job was an apartment complex further to the east. The place is usually pretty ghetto. A black lady answered the door. The place was so cluttered it was hard to get around. I wouldn't say it was dirty just cluttered. She was here watching her grandson. She was missing some channels. She also said the TV in her room was fuzzy as well. I went immediately to the splitter which was near the water heater and replaced it. She said I was the third tech there and the first to get it right. I guess no one knows where to look for splitter.
After lunch I went to the retirement community. There was an old lady here. She told me when I entered that everything is fine now, but nothing would work last night. She then asked if I could set up her universal remote. It's one of those large one's that almost looks like a novelty item. She said she had bleeding in her eye which affects her eyesight, which is why she needs such a large remote. I tried to set up the remote for her, but I couldn't find any codes for the cable box or her VCR/DVD player. So it would only work her TV, which was pretty useless. So I had to help her understand how to use her other remotes.
The next job was in the same neighborhood. I had actually been here before. This was the place where a woman who was both deaf and dumb lived. When she tried to talk it sounded more like a squak. I was here to check on her phones. She had this machine which she types into to have conversations with people and it wasn't connecting. I looked at things a bit and thought it must be another machine she had. This was for emergency resonse. She would push the button on her neckless in order to test it. She pushed it twice. She then motioned me to take it into the other room. As I was setting it up in the other room two EMTs show up. I appologized to them and told them that we were working on the phones, so they left. As we were finishing up two firemen showed up and I had to apologize to them as well.
Afterwords I had a job in the apartment complex across the street. This place is pretty ghetto. The job itself seemed pretty confusing. It was a downgrade and as far as I could tell I needed to do nothing. I just opened the job and closed it. There was nothing for me to physically do.
I then did some call backs to my jobs from the previous day. One such job, the one at a busy intersection that had dirt patch full of dog shit rather than a lawn, said that they had no service since early this morning. So I headed back there. I thought that the squirrels could be back, but I didn't think they would chew the lines up that quickly. Once there I saw that someone came by and disconnected the whole building. This is an apartment building. They ment to disconnect only one unit but did the whole building. So I corrected that and picked up one more job.
This job was on the way home. This was another downgrade. But this one I had to put a filter on. Once up the pole I noticed that not only their line but their neighbor's line both had been chewed up by some squirrels. So I fixed the lines and went home.

When I left my place yesterday I saw that my first job had canceled. So I called in and got a new job. This job was at a nice brick house. An older woman answered the door. She showed me to her modem. It was having trouble seeing the computer and handing out a good ip address. I replaced the modem, but as I was trying to set the new one up, I was still getting a bad ip address. I figured it was her computer, so I used my own. It turned out her computer can't pull a good ip addresses when plugged directly in. So I set up the new modem and hooked up her wireless router and everything was fine.
The next two jobs they gave me both ended up canceling. So I got one more for the morning. This was in plastic land. The nanny was here with a child. She was rather tall, almost amazonian. They were having trouble getting all their options on their TV. I figured it was a bad splitter, but I had a tough time trying to find where the splitter was. This was because they were in the process of having the basement finished. I was affraid they may have covered it up. I eventually found it and got everything fixed. As I was finishing up the nanny asked if I could help her figure out how to use the can opener. It was one I had never used and it took me a little while to figure out, but I did it and then went to lunch.
My first job after lunch was a raise cable. This was an L shaped building that is divided into two units. I had a note on my paperwork saying no one was home, that the work was outside only. I looked around and found a cable hanging off of the front porch. I had to get on the roof to tie it back. Then I headed to the next job.
The next job was in the same neighborhood. This was a building that had been divded into at least four different units, right at a busy intersection. The front lawn was more of a dirt lot with dog shit scattered all over it. An older black gentleman answered the door. He seemed a little out of it. His daughter was sitting on the couch texting someone but quickly left. He said nothing was really working. I went around out back and found that squirrels had been chewing on the lines. Squirrels are the mortal enemies of cableguys. I replaced the parts that the squirrel had chewed up and that fixed the problem. Though it will probably happen again.
The next job was in the same neighborhood yet again. The place had a terrible smell. Almost like a city dump. The front yard was mud interspersed with toys. The door was answered by a young black man who looked like he just woke up. There was a little girl here and a woman who was in a bed in the back. She never got up. There was also a little yip-yip dog inside and a much bigger dog outside. The place was dark and had the heavy feeling of depression. I wondered if they might both be jobless. He showed me to a TV with a DVR and said it wasn't getting a bunch of channels. The little girl came in and said that their is food. The guy, confused, went out there. I looked around and replaced a splitter, then decided to look outside. As I passed back through the front room there was a Native American woman here along with a couple more kids. The guy was eating a Whopper. I checked around back and found that their big dog had been chewing on the cable lines. I replaced the lines and came back inside. This time in the living room were two young black men. The Native American woman and all the kids were gone, while the guy who let me in was now passed out on the couch with an empty Whopper wrapper next to him. I went past the guys and to the room with the TV. I checked an everything was fine. I came back out and now noticed that the phone was off the hook next to the guy who was passed out. The two guys were gone, but I could here noise coming from one of the other bedrooms. I woke up the guy to get him to sign and left.
I was given one last job. This was an apartmetn complex way to the east. I was told that the previous tech got sick and had to leave. This made me wonder whether or not I really wanted to do this. When I showed up the door was answered by a black woman. She was mad that the other guy left and said that he was just lazy and didn't want to do the job. That wouldn't necessarily suprise me if it was the case. She was moving in with her mom. She kept mentioning that she just moved out of a 5 bedroom place to this two bedroom apartment. I couldn't help but wonder if this ment she had been foreclosed upon. They wanted a TV in every room. Thankfully there were already some holes drilled in the walls that allowed me to run cable easily. Eventhough I was here to install all three products, it didn't take too long. After a while the woman started to complain about feeling sick. She seemed a little dramatic. Onced I was finished I went home.

My first job was in the retirement neighborhood. There was an old woman here. It was booked as a trouble call, but really she just wanted to replace her broken phone with a new pink one. It looked to be in support of breast cancer. She was too timid to do it herself. She was scared of messing it up, so she wanted me to do it. It was a very easy job.
Next I stayed in the same neighborhood to do an Internet install. There were two guys here. An older gentleman who looked to be a WWII vet. The other younger, possibly his son. The place was a mess. At first I thought they were still moving in but after a while I realized they had been here a while. They were switching from dial up. They wanted me to set up their router as well as their Internet. I was happy to oblige, but it took more time than I thought it would.
Next I went to resort town. This was the fourth time I had been to this specific place. Third in the past month. There is a little Jewish couple here. The guy was having Internet problems yet again. It looked like the chord for the modem wouldn't stay in so the slightest jolt would unplug it. I put in a new modem and left.
For lunch I headed home really quickly and then I headed to an equipment pickup. This was in an apartment complex I frequent often. There was a young woman here, the place was boxed up. She was moving to Las Vegas. Her husband is already there. They moved here about 6 months ago but he couldn't find a job. So he found one in Las Vegas and they are moving there. I picked up the equipment and left.
The next job was back in resort town. There was a young man here. He looked to be a Marine. He mentioned his wife was asleep in the back room. He was having problems with his modem. It would keep cycling itself, so you couldn't stay on the Internet for more than a minute or two. I replaced the modem and that fixed it.
The next job was in a high rise apartmetn building. This one has a large immigrant population. This particular job was at the place of a possibly African man. His internet had been disconnected. It turned out he was accidentally disconnected. His line was was labeled wrong. I didn't understand why at first. But I think it was to cover who ever did the install. Since he had Internet only there needed to be a filter that blocked the television signal, but he needed channel 10 to see who is in the lobby, and I had to leave out the filter for him to get this. So I think a previous tech labeled it differently in order to not get in trouble. The man showed me his satelite dish and said he only had to pay for it once, and no monthly charge and he showed me some soccer and the channel Aljazeera. After words he tipped me and I left.
I then headed to another apartmetn building. I called and was not able to get a hold of anyone. I got into the building, but still no one answered the door. So I called it not at home. Once I left the guy kept calling me. I wasn't intersted in answering or going back. I had already picked up a new job to replace this one.
So I picked up another job. This was in an apartment complex for retirees. I was greeted by a middle aged woman. I didn't think she really belonged here. Then when we got inside I realized she lived here with her mom. I was here to install the Internet. This unit was not labeld in the box, so I had to spend a while trying to track it down. I had to work out of the old woman's closet, because that's where all the lines in the apartment came together. Once I found that spot the job was easy.

They had me south east yet again today. My first job was an apartment building next to the university. The door was answered by a little Asian woman. i could tell her English wasn't too good. She could understand what I was saying fine, but it was a little difficult trying to figure out what she was saying. She already had Internet. I was just here to set her TV up. Which was as simple as replacing the filter outside. I wasn't there for very long.
The next job was a house a little east. Or at least I thought it was. I showed up to the house I had on paper, but the guy who answered the door had no clue why I was there. I called the number I had only to find out it was in fact north not south. There was a young here. They already had TV and Internet. I was here to install the phone. It was real easy, I just put it where the phone was and I was done. The guy was cool, he works at a fancy restaurant downtown. He said him and his girlfriend are food fanatics. We talked about food for a while.
Then I took a long lunch. Afterwards I went to my only afternoon job. This house was in the same area as the last one was supposed to be. There was a middle aged woman here. This was the same as the last job. I was only here to install phone and they already had Internet and TV. The only difference was that she had an alarm. This totally fucked me up. I spent my whole afternoon here trying to get the phone through the alarm first and then through house. I ended up running a bunch of phone wire around this room in the basement. I figured she wouldn't care, since her teenage sons have taken over the place and their shit was everywhere. I was wrong. She made me tuck it under the carpet. While I was there a carpet cleaning guy showed up. All he did though was walk around and spray shit on the floor to make it wet. Then he left. I want that job!

Ninja Warrior is the best show ever!

My day started with an Install at an apartment building. I was here to install all three products. As I drove up I saw a rabbit hopping around. I'm not sure how it got here, but I doubt it could survive for very long. There looked to be two young girls living here. The one who let me in was faux-punk looking (a la Fall Out Boy), and talked like a valley girl ("Like, my father knows all about that that stuff, so it's totally cool"). It was very annoying, especially when the odds are she never lived in California. The job itself was pretty easy, I set everything up in the same corner, which made my life easy. They didn't have everything yet either. Once I had the TV working she just sat there and watched Planet of the Apes, while I worked.
After that I did another install. This was in an apartment building for retirees. There was an elderly couple here moving from one unit to another one down the hall. The woman must have been hard of hearing because I was having a difficult time communicating to her. Nothing was moved yet. There was some handy man here fixing the garbage disposal. The job itself was pretty easy, mainly because nothing was moved yet.
After lunch I had a video install in my neighborhood. There was a young guy here, he was playing PS3 when I showed up. This building looked new but, it turned out to be renovated. And somewhere in this renovation process they cut the cable and did not put in a new outlet. So I had to drill a new hole down into the crawlspace. When I got down there I saw the cables, but there were six units in the building, I had to crawl through a couple furnaces (talk about an obstacle course!) to get to his unit on the end. Once that was finished the job was cake.
My last job was a house to the east. The guy here was just getting phone, he already had Internet and TV. The phone wiring was relatively new as well, so the job was cake. We didn't talk much , I was more interested in just going home.

They had me in the south east part of town today. I started at an apartment complex. It took me forever to get there because the roads were terrible and the traffic was as well. The guy here was old and grizzled. He lived here alone. He told me he was a student. He was one semester away from getting his degree in welding and fabrication. I thought that was interesting. He said he had 6 semesters involving every type of welding you can think of. Now he's on his last class, which is pipe welding. I was here to install Internet and TV. The job didn't take long at all.
Next I had another install. This was another apartment complex. There was a little Korean woman here. She was obviously moving in, there wasn't much in the way of furniture here. I was here to install Internet and TV as well. The job went by pretty quick. Then I went to lunch.
After lunch I went to a house further north. There was a short round Hispanic man here. My notes said there was a couple channels missing. But the guy didn't know what channels they were. I looked around and outside found the longest line to a house I had ever seen. I couldn't even see the end. I hoped that wasn't the problem, and thankfully it wasn't. It turned out to be the small cable on the back of the box.
The next job was a apartment complex further east. In the next town in fact. The door was answered by a young woman. She said the problem was the ethernet cable kept coming out of the computer. It needed to be replaced. It also sat rather loosely in the computer. So you had to wiggle it to get an internet connection. I told her to get the port in her computer fixed. It's a brand new apple and I knew it was under warranty.
The next job was in the next apartment complex over. A large man answered the door. His Internet wasn't working at all. My first suspicion was that it was the modem itself, but the cable to the modem looked suspicious. So I replaced the cable first and sure enough that fixed it. He was happy and I moved on.
I then went to my last job. This was in a ghetto looking apartment complex. I was here to install the Internet. There was a young Hispanic guy here with his kid. He wanted to set his computer up in his bedroom. But the only outlet was in the living room so I convinced him that he needed to move it to the living room. He already had a signal which made my job easy. I finished the install and went home.

My day started at a apartment building near where I live. This is a fancy building where each floor is divided in half. I was here to install a DVR. There was an old couple here they were very nice. They had a 270 degree view of the city which was beautiful. The job was easy. As I was leaving though I got called back because I didn't change a setting on the box. But that wasn't too bad.
The next job was a building a little further north. There was a note about the box falling out. I took a look and sure enough the cable box in the back of the building was falling off, but this was not something I could do, so
I turned it over to post-wire.
I then headed to a retirement home to the north. There was an old black guy here. He was having trouble working his remote. Apparently he has never really dealt with one before. So much so that even though he already had a VCR I still had to explain to him that the triangle is play and the square is stop. So I explained everything to him and left.
The next job was an apartment complex. Who ever did the install plugged the phone directly into the back of the EMTA instead of going through the phone wiring in the apartment. And the customer wanted to plug a phone in the other room. There was a big guy here who needed an oxygen tank and his daughter whom I believe was retarded. She talked like my 6 year old little sister. I had to get into her closet in order to set up the wiring right and move out a bunch of little paper bags and empty plastic bags of candy. After I finished the job I went to lunch.
After lunch I went to another apartment complex. There was a young guy (whom I believed to be gay) and a young woman here. They had no Internet. I checked outside and found that one of their neighbor's had disconnected the customer and connected themselves illegally. So I cut that line and hooked the customer back up. They were very happy.
As I was leaving I got called by dispatch. The guy at the retirement home can't get anything to work. I tried to call him and walk him through it. I didn't work so I said I would drop by later.
The next job was up in plastic land. A guy meet me at the door. He said his kid was sleeping. He wanted me to check out a problem he's been having with his TV. I linked it to a bad splitter, though he wasn't convinced. I replaced it and then none of the TV's were working right. I looked around for a while and found nothing else wrong. I eventually called in to dispatch who said there were problems in the area. So I told the customer and left.
Then I went to another place in plastic land. I was to hook up an extra outlet. Thankfully everything around here is pre-wired, so it was a very easy job. The young woman who lives here met me at the door, and I was in and out quickly.
Then I headed to my last job which was a house to the west. The woman here asked me to take off my boots, which I was not happy about at all. Their modem wasn't working at all. There was a signal though. I checked out side and saw that the line to the house needed to be replaced. Which I did, but it wasn't easy. After words I went back to the guy at the retirement house. And I explained the remote once again hopefully this time he got it.

My day started at an apartment building near the hospitals. I accidentally entered the wrong room number in the intercom, but the woman I got let me in anyways. I went to the apartment and the door was answered by a woman who was feeding her kids breakfast. Their TV was working but their Internet and phone were not. She said she's been having problems with all three. Then the woman who let me into the building showed up. She wanted to make sure I was legit, and she didn't just let in some imposter. It also turned out that she was having some problems as well so I said I would drop by when I was done. I looked around outside and found that the way things were hooked up out here was pretty messed up. So I rearranged it so it was more equitable. This got everything working again though the signal was still pretty low. Afterwards I checked on the other woman. I replaced the cable from the wall to her TV and that fixed everything.
The next job was a town home complex to the east. A woman answered the door. It looked like she had some sort of foot injury. She was hobbling around. She complained htat her Internet was slow. I checked and it didn't look bad to me. In fact I could find absolutely nothing wrong. So I replaced the modem, to give her a piece of mind. She said it was much faster. The whole time I was there she questioned every little thing I did. I don't know if I was making her defensive or if she is just naturally that way.
The next job was an apartment building closer to downtown. A young woman let me in. I was here to install the Internet. To do so I needed to get to the roof of the building, so she went and tracked down the maintenance guy, who turned out to be this crusty old guy, who gave me the combination I needed. After that the job was a breeze. We talked about the fact that she is from California. She said she took a spontaneous road trip on day from California, and when she got here she just stayed. She's been here ever since. She works at one of the local hospitals.
The next job was an apartment building near where I live. There was a young woman here who said that nothing was working. I checked in the box outside and everything was hooked up fine. I took me a while to figure out that the whole building had been disconnected. The previous day one of the tenants had been disconnected and the moron who did the job disconnected the whole building instead of the individual unit. I called into dispatch and had them give any other jobs tied to this building. Strangely enough there was only one other unit who had an appointment for the day. So I killed two birds with one stone.
I then skipped my lunch and went to my next job which was in the same neighborhood. This was an outside only job. The notes mentioned that the cable was damaged on the outside of the building. I look and found no damage anywhere. I then looked in the cable box and found some old filters that need to be removed and a suspicious connector. I hope that's all that needed to happen.
I then found a bathroom and headed to the next job. This was in the fancy shopping area. The door was answered by a short round man who hobbled around. He showed me to his computer which was acting very slowly. This room was filled with comic books. He said he had been reading since the 60's. We talked about various comic books and authors as well as some of the movies coming out based on comic books. The problem with his internet was definitely the modem, so I replaced it and went on my way.
Next I headed to an apartment complex to the east. The door was answered by a black man with a thick accent. I couldn't make out what the accent was at all, but he was watching the Spanish stations, so maybe he was from the Caribbean or something. His Internet and phone were not working at all. I turned out that the outlet it was hooked up to, was not activated. The strange thing is that he said it was all working last night. Yet I cannot see how this had gotten disconnected. I don't know how it could have worked or have even been set up in this first place. But I got it running and moved on.
Then next job was was an apartment complex a little further east. This place is pretty ghetto. There was a black woman here with her kids. I saw no furniture. One of her kids was running around naked. She screamed at the other ones to put some clothes on her. All the while she was on the phone with someone. I was there because her EMTA wasn't working at all. I replaced it and took off.
At this point I really wanted to just go home and watch the super bowl, but it was still early so I called dispatch and they gave me a job on the west side of town. This was a crappy town home complex right next to the warehouses. The door was answered by a kid. There was no furniture except a TV and a phone with Dora the Explorer stickers all over it. A large Hispanic woman was sitting on the floor with another kid. She never left that spot the whole time I was there. At some point a man came down, who I assume was her husband. I got the impression he didn't speak any English. I was here to look at the phones. There was an issue with the wiring in the unit. I asked how many phones they were using and she said just the one, so I plugged it directly into the EMTA and was done. I packed up my stuff and went home to watch the game.