I know it's been a while, donc il faut que je bitche; I need to bitch!

Today, I finally have phone and internet working. The modems and stuff had arrived on monday, but it took until now to get it working. I won't name names, but I warn others to be careful when dealing with companies that don't offer telephone technical support. Tech support for the phone line as only available via email; via phone (9am - 6pm) for DSL. Nevertheless, there were times that neither of these services were working for me. If we weren't 'borrowing' internet from a wireless neighbour and phone from the previous tennant, I would have long since found a post office and sent things back. Instead, I have spent the majority of my waking time on tuesday, wednesday, and then this morning banging my head on the table, trying to make things work.
The tech support I received always led me to believe that I had to get the right passwords in the right place and try a billion different wire connections and re-set all the devices to make sure that they were each connected properly, even though I knew from the outset (as well as some help from my main computer tech man, K) that it was set up properly. Finally, this morning, I said screw it and just got rid of the passwords from my routers. If I didn't need a password to even connect to my modem, why would i need it for my other devices to connect to it. Magic, things were communicating and all was almost well.
There was some more stuff today when I realized that the phone wouldn't actually receive phone calls and then I had to choose between the multiple configurations that the same company offered and after the whole ordeal, I now have everything working as it should be. Chances are that if you want to communicate with me, I have already sent you my new contact info, but if not then please email me and I can send you that info. I have free long distance in Canada and the US so I can call pretty much anyone... except for my Chinese and German friends.

Anyway, I'm pissy because I'm not good with computers and I spent so much frikkin time doing this. Those who know me know that I can be a bit obsessive, and I totally have been about this. Ya, so 2 or 3 days are now down the drain; not exactly the way I wanted to be spending my time, but at least I can say that I have a better understanding of PPPoe, Routers in general, Wireless systems, DSL, and VOIP protocols. I would rather not have learned all of that, but I might as well be proud of it! The good thing is that now (knock on wood), I should be able to just ignore phone and internet aside from using them; we prepaid the yearly contract so we don't get monthly bills. I guess it works out then, rather than people having to pay their bills every month, I just spend my time worrying about it upfront and now I just enjoy the service until next year.

Ok, time for some good news. I looked at my bank account and my student loan money was deposited! YAY! I have been avoiding paying off my credit card (racked up with set-up costs) because that payment would pretty much wipe out my bank account. Financially, I now feel good. That loan money is certainly enough to last at least a few months, and it had better not take that long for my paycheques to start coming in from the university for my teaching. Also, I managed to earn eleven dollars in reward points from my PC financial MC this month! I don't know what you guys think, but I think that's amazing!

Now that I've wasted even more time blogging, I need to go get some work done before I see another day gone down the drain in the name of this bloody phone/internet fiasco!

I called my cell phone provider today to ask about canceling my phone. I have been out of contract for a few months now, meaning that I've kept the same rate but not locked in. At one point I was just going to call and cancel it for the end of the month, but I'm not completely sure about if I will be getting a landline. Long story short, the lady was super helpful. My service is currently set up to be canceled on the 6'th of September. If I call before that, I can cancel the cancellation and keep my same plan with an Ontario number.
Talking about options.. It might be cheaper to just do pay as you go which could work out closer to 10/15$ per month rather than over 30 that I'm paying now. But, because I'm planning on canceling, if I decide to stay on with them, they offered me 50% off the first 3 months of a new plan.
Hopefully my roommate and I will split a voice over IP phone for super-cheap and I can just cancel my cell phone and not worry about anything. I bought a watch recently, so I don't even need my cellphone as a clock anymore.

Tomorrow is my last day at the ballet, ever. I'm excited. Today I got my framed poster signed by some of my co-workers. I wish that it was signed by more people, but it's hard to get people to do things during the summer. Nevertheless, the poster looks fabulous and there are many a kind word written to and about me on the matte. I got to choose whichever poster I wanted from many many in the ballet publicity office. I ended up choosing one for Carmina Burana which I sang both as a child in the Winnipeg Boy's Choir and with the University Singers more recently... but the poster I have is from 2002, before I even started with the ballet, and not the time I sang with UM in 2004. Oopsie, but it's a marvelous poster. It's huge and takes up too much space, so it won't be coming with me to London, at least not right away.