I’m having troubles with my internet service.

Once again.

I called the New AT&T, wishing it were still the old AT&T — at least then, you could get a human being on the phone and they’d actually do something.  They did some diagnostic tests while I was on my cell phone, being sure to give me the high-tech name for each test they did.

(Was I supposed to be impressed?  Hey, here’s what would impress me:  keep my internet service up and running for longer than thirty-five seconds at a time this afternoon!)

Then they claimed that there must be a problem with my line because I wasn’t in sync.

(No idea what that means, exactly, but I assume it has little to nothing to do with that old boy-band.  At least I hope it doesn’t.)

The woman then says someone will have to be dispatched to check the line.  Well that’s certainly fine with me.  Then she checks her appointments and offers me my choice of two four-hour blocks of time.

Four hours?

I certainly understand that they can’t necessarily nail down a specific time, like 3:15pm, for instance.  But they have to be able to come up with something better than somewhere between 1:00pm and 5:00pm!  Who can stop their lives for four hours and just sit around the house waiting for someone to show up?

My boss is great about letting me run home whenever I need to, since I live close to work, anyway.  And my schedule is such that I can take my lunch hour really any time of day.  So there’s never any set time that I’m home.  (Makes it tougher on burglars that way, too!)

But a four-hour block is a little much.  Besides, I don’t think my dogs are going to stop barking long enough to open the door and make friends with a stranger.  So I set an appointment for next Saturday.

That will give me a week to get the apartment presentable for someone to come inside and have a look around.

And yes, you and I both know that whatever the problem is, it’ll be something that is fixed at the poll, and doesn’t require anyone to set one foot inside my door.

They’re certainly not fooling me.  I’ve been around this block before.