This Modern World

Waiting For Answer by Can Atacan

So last night Boyfriend comes in to tell me I have to get the electricity, gas and water turned on at my new house on Wednesday. 

"Temple's turning hers off on Wednesday and you want yours turned on the second hers is turned off so you can move in smoothly, blah, blah, blah. You can do it by phone for the electricity and gas, but you have to go in person for the water. That'll be more trouble."

Okay. So I call them this morning. I get the little recording that says the wait is 45 minutes to an hour, and if I'll leave my phone number and press the pound key, they'll call me back. So I enter the phone number:

"That is not a valid number. Please try again." 

After three tries, I hang up and call back. I learn that if I go to Entergy.com, I can do it all online. I have telephonophobia, so I go online.

I have to create an account with a user name and password. I pick a security question, etc. All good. Click continue.

So I give them my SS number and my driver's license number, my new address, my old address, blah, blah, blah.

Then it asks if I've had an electrical permit and inspection. Well, the inspector came by. So I have to give a permit number. I go look for my inspection. Can't find it anywhere. Get back upstairs and I've been timed out and logged out.

So I try to log back in.

"There is no account associated with that name."

Great. So I'll just start all over. I enter a username, password, confirm password, e-mail address, confirm e-mail address, pick a security question and a hint, and click "continue."

We're sorry. That username is already in use. 

Yes. It's MY username! The one I picked! It doesn't have an account associated with it because I got bumped out of the system before I got finished! Because of that stupid permit thingie!

So now, it's been about 45 minutes of bullshit, and I'm starting to get peeved. So I decide to call again. I have to go through all the stupid menu of:

"If you speak English, press one; If the account associated with this call is the number you're calling from press one; if you're calling about your bill press one; if you're calling about an electrical outage, press two; if you're calling to stop service, press three; if you're calling to check on a start-service call that's already been made, press four; if you're calling to move service, press five; if you're calling to start service, press six; if you're calling to give us your firstborn son, press seven......BLAH, BLAH, BLAH!!

So I press about starting service.

"Please wait while we transfer you're call. The wait is between 10 and 20 minutes."

Then I turn on the speakerphone and put it down so I can do other things while I wait and this godawful Muzak cranks out at eardrum rupturing volume on my iphone. About 15 minutes later a woman comes on the phone. I'm so excited to get someone on the phone I accidentally hit End Call. 

Fortunately, I must not've hit it hard enough, because it didn't hang up. So then I start going through all the information I've already put online with the new woman, and we get all the way to, "Will there be a dog on the premises when we send someone over?" when I notice there are two cats on top of my great grandfather's secretary, and they're knocking everything off of it. The picture of the house on the bluff hits the floor. The photo of my-dad-with-Annet-as-a-baby hits the floor.

"Hang on just a second," I say. "The cats are knocking everything off the secretary."

I sure hope she knows a secretary is a piece of furniture.

I hear this little beep. 

I shoo the cats away and say, "No, there won't be any dogs over there."

No reply.

"Hello? You still there?"

No reply.

I look at my phone. "We sorry. Facetime is not available at this time. WTF? I hit "Okay."

"Hello? Are you there?"

Nothing.

Surely she'll call me back. I'd already given her my all my contact numbers. I was mid-sentence when the call got dropped. She'll call me back, right? Wrong.

Then my realtor calls. I just want you to know I've already arranged for the permit and inspection. Oh! Well, good! 

So I've now spent about two hours of premium morning, coffee-drinking, posting-on-the-internet time on NOTHING. Argh!!!!

Boyfriend comes upstairs. 

"What are you doing?"

So I tell him the whole, awful, like-a-bad-dream-where-you're-naked-and-trying-to-get-back-home-and-can't kind of story. I'm out of breath when I finish.

He looks at me.

"Don't forget to call the gas company."