2003-02-28 - 8:31 p.m.
Hed: Mean Corporation Eats $15
When I tried to use my cellular phone this morning, the phone wasn't working. "This number has been disconnected or is not in service," the automated woman said when I dialed my official voice mail hotline. Oh shucks, I said, looking at the useless phone in my hand.
I don't deal well with technical difficulties, paperwork, bill-paying, and other life trifles. That's how today's phone problem started: I hadn't paid the bill on time, and hadn't paid the bills for the previous two months at all. You see, I'm one of those "big picture" people who can't easily perform such common activities. But Swinton, my personal assistant/butler/psychic/housepet, was off on vacation, so I was forced by circumstance to handle the matter myself.
Got on the phone ("the landline," as modern parlance prescribes) and called up the phone company, whose name rhymes with Surprisin'. Had to give my Social Security number, phone number, number of dates had since the millenial turnover ... many, many numbers. Finally, the guy on the other end of the line (yes, a real man!) asked me what was wrong.
I told him my phone wasn't working. He told me it was because I hadn't paid my bill for two months. I said I had mailed my payment the day before (this was true). He said that since I was a customer for almost a year, he'd turn my phone back on. I said thanks.
"It will cost $15 for a turn-on fee," the man said. Shouldn't have thanked him so soon!
"What? $15? You people already have $250 of my money in some mysterious holdings account from when I first signed up for your service." This is also true: For whatever reason, Surprisin' makes you pay $250 when you first subscribe to their plan. They say they'll refund the money when your subscription runs out, but if they really stay true to their word, it will be ... surprising.
"Well fine, then," I said. "Take your damed $15. Your stupid corporation sucks." Click.
The point of this story is not "pay your bills on time," but "wow, I'm mellowing." Two years ago, I had to call the Apple Computer corporation to see if they'd fix my laptop screen for a reasonable sum. I had broken it by, uh, sitting on the computer. While shaving my legs. In a public square. In Prague. See, I had worn pants during most of my trip, but it was sunny one day and I wore a skirt. By that point my legs were turning gray from all the hair accumulating on them, so I walked to the Tesco department store and bought a six-pack of razors. Without a public restroom in which to perform my feminine ritual, I had no choice but to do it outside, near the Tesco entrance, in a tiny square decorated with a dying tree and several chicken stands.
If you knew this square you'd understand why I wasn't so self-conscious about shaving my legs there. As a favorite hangout among drunken Czech men with beards, druggy-looking youth, and part-time pick-pockets, this little plaza had an ambiance of filth and puke. As I shaved, most of the people passing by were either too focused on getting to the nearby metro station to notice me, or were cross-eyed and gazing lovingly at the stains on their clothes. At night, rats as big as terriers would scamper about the bushes. They were not timid, but acted as if they owned the place. Essentially, they did.
Perhaps I should also say that if you knew me at the time the computer-sitting occurred (September 2000), you'd understand why I was shaving my legs in public like some Lola Granola (anyone who knows this literary reference should send me an email � you could end up in my will). My reason for being in Prague � to protest the World Bank and International Monetary Fund's annual summit � says it all. You might remember that this was the demonstration where kids threw cobblestones at police and caught some of them on fire by tossing Molotov cocktails at them. Come to think of it, a lot of things got broken that week.
My big mistake was sitting on the computer to shave. I did it to avoid sitting on bird poop and other types of poop. And I didn't even put all my weight on the thing ��just sort of half-sat on it. When I was done shaving I didn't even check on the computer to see if it was still alive, because it seemed so likely.
When I ended up at a nearby coffee shop several hours later to write some stupid article on why corporate globalization was destroying the planet (it still is, I just don't write about it anymore), my computer screen appeared divided in three, with a big, black smear right in the middle. "Hey, look at this," I said to two Americans (Prague is half-American) sitting by me in the cafe. "This doesn't look good, does it?" It sure didn't, they agreed. The next day I took the computer to Prague's sole Apple outlet, but the man there said it would take three weeks to send the thing to Belgium to be fixed. I only had two weeks to wait.
So I brought the broken computer home, determined to get it fixed upon my return. But first I had to run off to Philadelphia to help the Kensington Welfare Rights Union set up their World Summit to End Poverty. You didn't hear about that event because it occurred right in the middle of Chad-mania, the Gore vs. Bush fiasco. KWRU is an organization of poor and homeless people, and the folks who volunteer for them tend to be students and young people who have little or no money. It's all about experience. At the time, I was a young person with little or no money, but I wanted to help KWRU pull off their event. I also wanted my computer to be fixed. So I called the Apple people.
The man at Apple had some bad news: It would cost $650 to repair the screen. This was nearly half the computer's original price. It didn't make any sense to me. So I began swearing at the man. You can imagine which words I used, and which anti-capitalistic soundbytes. At the end of my tirade, I apologized: "I'm not angry at you, sir, but at your stupid fucking employers. Sorry for my tone. Have a nice evening."
At least with the Verizon guy, I didn't use the F word. A little bit of progress in a regressive world.
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Things are going to get a lot worse before they get worse. � Lily Tomlin |
