It’s Friday. I have spent a good part of the day waiting for Cablevision to come and do something about the cable box. Last night it started making clicking sounds then in the middle of Keith Olbermann it pixilated and froze.
A simple reboot, unplug the box, wait a few minutes then plug in again did the trick. No DVRing available. Not such a bad thing I thought. About an hour later, this time the cable box did it itself.
It stopped and started again all on it’s own.
I called Cablevision. No easy maneuvering through the phone prompts, you have to listen to everything. Don’t even thinking about pressing 1 for English before they tell you to. It will get you nowhere.
I spoke to the customer service representative from Cablevision and scheduled an appointment for today between 11:00AM and 2:00PM. At 1:59 I called up to see what was going on. They said they would call the man in the field and get back to me.
About 20 minutes later, it was confirmed the guy was running late.
He had my cell number and would call me when he was in the neighborhood. At 2:45 I get a call saying that he’s outside. I look out the window and there he is talking to another cable guy halfway down the street.
About 10 minutes later I buzz him in, all hard hat and tool belt. I offered him some water but he didn’t want any. He hit a few buttons on the box, lot’s of different screens popping up on the TV screen. He deduces that he’s going to have to swap this box for a new box.
So he goes back downstairs and comes back a couple of minutes later with another box, with the remnants of a ‘void’ sticker on the front. He sets it up, telling me everything that was on the old box is now gone.
No more Andy Warhol documentary, no more Bill on Late Night with Conan O’Brien or with Jimmy Fallon for that matter. Everything is gone. It’s a drag but what can you do.
He leaves after I sign a paper. There’s no charge for this visit. I turn on the TV a few minutes later. I start adding the favorite channels to the cable box and it’s pixilated again.
I call Cablevision again, speak to someone else again, and I am told that the guy will be back. An hour goes by. And another hour goes by.
I call again, speaking to someone else again and I am told a few instructions. Hit this button. Turn to the left. Now unplug it. Now stand on one leg. Now blink really hard. Turn to channel 500. Hit A-B-B-A on the remote control. You are the dancing queen. Turn it off. Turn it on. Show us your tits Coco.
Nothing had any effect. They tell me the guy has until 8:00PM to show up. It’s 7:04PM now. The clock, it is ticking. Harpy went through something similar with Time Warner a couple of weeks ago. I hope I don’t have the same problems.
In any event, here I sit waiting for someone who may or may not show up. He did call me earlier and I did have his number in my phone records. I texted him a few hours ago, asking if he had an ETA on returning to 616 Park Avenue. Of course it went unanswered.
I have little faith that they would show up. But I will be quite happy to be proven wrong. Again. There are still 50 minutes left.
Perhaps there will be a postscript to this entry. Or perhaps there won’t.
