Customer service

Well, yesterday we were told our high-speed internet access wasn't so high-speed, and the solution to the outages was to slow it down even more.  It feels like a few clicks faster than dial-up.  Steve says it's actually ten times faster than dial-up, and that this is within the legal limits of what Quest can call "high-speed internet."  Which is depressing, because it's awfully slow.  We are taxing the limits right now, with Steve researching 1980's era folk songs on the main computer, me blogging on the laptop, #1 son watching a video interview of the 13 dwarves actors in the Hobbit movie, and #2 son playing Uncharted online on the PS3.  He's frustrated because if the game freezes, he's a sitting duck for someone else to shoot.  (What a lovely domestic scene!  At least the two girls are reading... I think).

We live in a 104-year-old house.  First house in the neighborhood, last to get internet access.  Ironically, the box that services us is a about 1500 feet up the road, but the phone lines travel over 3 miles in other directions before they reach us.  And the box is old, definitely due for an upgrade.  A closer box is 1000 feet down the road, and of course it's newer.  We found out yesterday pretty much for sure that it is not a problem with the line inside the house.  While I was at work this morning, Steve got the obligatory call from the Quest follow-up people about yesterday's service.  He told them what is perfectly true: the technician was knowledgeable and courteous and did his best, but we are frustrated with the situation.  No, we did not want to talk to the customer service department anymore, because all they ever say is to check our filters on our jacks, and we're way beyond that.  Apparently he made enough of an impression that he was given the super-secret phone number of the technical support people that the real squeaky wheels get, and he ended up calling a lady who, from Boise, turned off our DSL line and rerouted it through a newer sequence of junctions that actually brought up the speed for a few minutes.  Until yesterday's DNR order kicked in and the speed reverted to the new slow normal.  But this was at least a little promising.  Before the nice techie lady had to leave for the day, she promised to call back tomorrow morning.  And said that the old box is scheduled for upgrading sometime "in the next several months."  Stay tuned.  I'll try to have pictures of all the knitting I'm not getting done when the internet can handle them.