Zrathy-Smileyckett's A Series Of Irritating Events

[zrath]

Zrath-Smiley was not a happy Kzin.
Oh, it wasn't the fact that his stint at Naughty Dog was ending.
He knew this was a contract position and it was only meant to last until some indeterminate point in September.
That indeterminate point turned out to be Friday September 16th 2005. He was perfectly okay with that.
And it wasn't the fact that the head programmer had given him and the few people who still bothered to show up
a new version of the European "Jak-X" game to test on Wednesday the 14th, after the QA department had luxuriated
in three blissfull days of watching movies and playing videogames of their own choosing.
They were still being paid to test after all, so it was totally acceptable.
No, he wasn't happy for entirely different reasons.

For one thing, his websites stopped being accessible in the afternoon of Friday the 16th.
He had new data to FTP to these sites and was therefore angered.
Several e-mails were sent to his webhosting company, which he believed was to blame.
A talk with a friend showed him to be in error and that the DNS server was likely at fault.
An e-mail was sent to his registrar, asking if there was any problems.

As Saturday the 17th rolled around, the websites persisted in their refusal to being accessible.
More e-mails were sent, as the previous e-mails had not received any answers.
Saturday was the Kzin's self-designated "day off", so he left in the company of his friend Warren (no LJ)
and his roommate Erick (aka "The Other Erick") to attend the "Route 66 Rendez-Vous" in San Bernardino.
This event involved many automobiles of a bygone era, modified and "hopped-up" into screaming, snorting, and in
some cases, fire-belching high-performance beasts of the road. This was all music to Zrath's parasol ears.
Two rolls of film were exposed to these wheeled creatures and photos will be forthcoming once the rolls are processed.
This event took up the bulk of the day, so the Kzin returned at a very advanced hour.
The websites were still impossible to reach.
The e-mails were still unanswered.

Sunday the 18th made its presence known, but our Kzin ignored it for as long as he could.
He had done a tremendous amount of walking the previous day and was still recovering.
Eventually, he awoke and arose at the stroke of noon.
The e-mails were still unanswered.
The websites were still unaccessible.
He ran various errands and took care of a few things.
At around 5 o'clock in the afternoon, the websites suddenly became accessible.
But Zrath couldn't FTP to them for some reason. He decided to wait a little longer.
And then, the DSL line went dead.
A lesser Kzin would have screamed and leapt at this point, savaging the nearest objects to shreds.
The temptation was rather great, but Zrath just sighed, and fiddled with the DSL modem for a while.
When that didn't correct the problem, he called SBC technical support.
After dealing with a machine that pretended to be human, and the usual dreaful hold music, he found himself
connected to a very obviously Indian gentleman (as in, from India) by the claimed name of "John".
Welcome to the world of outsourcing. The two new roommates, K and M, were not familiar with "outsourcing",
so the Kzin cupped his paw over the phone and gave them a quick aperçu of this new business practice.
The man from India seemed unable to process the simplest questions, so a supervisor was requested.
After several long minutes of hold, a suspiciouly similar-sounding Indian man got on the line,
claiming to be a supervisor named "Jude". He seemed to be able to process more complex questions,
but ultimately, it was determined that the DSL line had indeed been shut down for nonpayment.

Zrath: "Nom de dieu de bordel de merde de fils de pute de couilles de conasse!!!"

F, whose responsibility it is to pay utilities, was promptly contacted on her cellphone.
The other roommates were also appraised of the situation. F had been dragging her feet, not paying the
DSL/phone bill for a while now. There was only so much the Kzin could do, short of physical abuse, to get
F to pay the bloody bill. At any rate, F promised to handle it soonest on Monday the 19th.
The Kzin took care of a few offline things on the computer, then watched a movie.

And before he knew it, Monday snuck up on him! So he dove under the covers and snored mightily for a while.
Eventually, he woke up. F was already gone, hopefully taking care of the DSL bill.
Zrath busied himself with various mundane tasks too boring to recount here.
Eventually, F returned and took care of the bill by paying it over the phone.
DSL service was restored at about 6:30pm tonight.
And yes, both of the Kzin's websites are accessible.
And only one e-mail was replied to, the one sent to the registrar.
It was a form e-mail with no real useful substance.
Outstanding.



Well, that's enough of that.
I'm definitely no Lemony Snickett, but I hope this was somewhat entertaining to read.
The next post will be more straightforward and normal.

Choice random quote from this weekend:

Zrath, eyeing his plate of bangers and mash: "What kind of carrots are these?"
The Other Erick: "They're medium carrots."
Zrath, alarmed: "Oh My God!! These carrots are reading my mind!!!"

Comments

[zeeth_kyrah]

And thus the lessons are learned: bad service recieves no reward - but often no penalty for a long time because everyone else does just as bad a job. And also, make sure the bills get paid because businesses act faster than people.