Day 108

My telephone problems are getting ridiculous. In hopes of having a reliable and inexpensive backup system just in case my static-prone phone lines go out entirely, I went out and got a Skype Wi-Fi phone yesterday. Seemed like a good idea at the time. I've used Skype for quite a while to save money talking to my European clients. I liked the idea that I could use a small cell phone sized device to make virtually free calls all over the world at the office, at Starbucks, at the Indoor dog park, or anywhere else there was a Wi-Fi hotspot.  There was only one small problem. I couldn't get the thing to work.

I tried everything I could to avoid the dreaded call to tech-support, but eventually I had to acknowledge that I didn't have a clue why the phone wasn't working. I made the call and ended up talking to somebody in India who I could barely understand. I spent 45 minutes on the phone as the technician walked me step by laborious step through the process of manually configuring the phone when hitting the connect button didn't work. When everything was re-configured, the guys says "now try to connect to the network." I hit the connect button again and nothing happens. "I don't know what to tell you," the guy says. "You have a good phone. Maybe your network has gone bad."

I try to convince the guy that I've been sitting here answering e-mails as I've been talking to him and that nothing is wrong with the network. He's not buying it though, so I politely thank him and hang up. I'm just about ready to take the phone back for a refund when I notice that my fingers are actually quite a bit bigger than the tiny keys. I put on my reading glasses, get a ball point pen and very carefully press exactly the right keys to enter my password. Voilà. The phone connects to Skype and everything works perfectly. I've just wasted over two hours because my fat fingers weren't hitting the correct keys.

I don't know why I was in such a hurry to get my tax information to my accountant last week either. I've been getting additional 1099 and K-1 forms in the mail almost every day. Now I've got to go back and give him all this additional information as well. Oh well, at least it's Friday.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day