Once Upon a Time... (Part 3)

After recovering from having his own jaw slam into his junk from the shock of having heard there was no job waiting for his wife in the town in which they’d just agreed to purchase a castle, the scribe could barely come up with words to express his shock and anger. Most of the words he was able to summon were variations and expansions upon the word “fuck”. Some of these he was able to keep locked in his brain for a time, but very quickly, as the gravity of the situation began to set in, they began to spew forth in such phrases as, “But we just bought a EFFing castle there!!!” What was not immediately apparent on that day in early February (nor has it become a whole lot more apparent to this day) was just what would cause Tuesday the Middle Manager to give the goodly wife the green light on purchasing a castle when there was no job for her to take at the Tri-Metro Immediate Healing Clinic. But in that moment, all the scribe could do was share and magnify the anger the goodly wife was feeling. Eventually, she suggested she should hang up and allow him time to calm down because she was at work and could not join him in ranting and screaming “fuck” at the top of her lungs no matter how much she might like to. So this she did.

Gradually, the details emerged of what the true plan had been from the standpoint of the Grand King. According to him, the first he had EVER heard about any move to Tri-Metro by Dr. Goodly Wife was during her phone call to him that morning. Beyond that, she learned that there HAD been an opening in Tri-Metro some months before, but that this position had been filled by another healer who was being moved down from a more northerly Immediate Healing Clinic to fill that void. The king would have been fine with Dr. Goodly Wife transferring to Tri-Metro, but he said no one had told him and so he and his staff filled the position from elsewhere. The king had no idea why Tuesday the Middle Manager would have thought anything otherwise, because Tuesday had been involved in the hiring of the healer to fill the position in Tri-Metro in the first place. (She would later claim she thought the healer was being hired for Asscrackton and that she was largely in the dark on most of those kinds of decisions, which conceivably might be true.) Whether she was high, stupid or just being a big bouncy “C” was not then nor today clear. What was clear, as the goodly wife pointed out to the Grand King, was that she was now in a very unfortunate situation of very nearly being the owner of two castles neither of which were in towns she would be employed in for much longer. While the king did not owe her a job in Tri-Metro, she had operated in good faith on information given to her by his middle managers and had proceeded with plans to move there. Surely there was something he could do to try and make the unfortunate situation less unfortunate.

The Grand King’s suggestion was to offer her an immediate position in Asscrackton. This was not something she wished to hear, for while Asscrackton was closer to Tri-Metro than Borderland, it was still a hefty commute and it was still a job in Asscrackton. No one wanted to work in Asscrackton. It was hellishly busy and full of surly employees, if rumors were to be trusted. But the Grand King said it would be no problem to set her up there, which would be closer to Tri-Metro, and she could have all the extra days at the Tri-Metro Immediate Healing Clinic that weren’t already spoken for. She could even have a nice raise which would combat the extra fuel expenses in getting there and maybe make the time spent in doing so worth it. And, if a position opened in Tri-Metro, it was hers and she could keep the raise. He would even put it in writing to her specifications. This sounded tolerable and even generous to the goodly wife. She later explained it to the scribe and while he was still fuming and aching in his junk, he did the math on the raise and agreed that it was in fact quite a tempting offer.

It took a few drafts to get the wording of the contract right, but eventually all parties agreed upon a set of terms and the deal was put into place. The goodly wife would start work in Asscrackton in mid-March. And, meanwhile, the closing date on the new castle had also been set for leap year day. That in mind, the scribe set about packing as much of their crap into boxes and hauling loads of it over to a storage facility in Tri-Metro in preparation for getting their old castle ready to be seen by potential buyers and to get as much of it in their new/old town. They even began speaking with the same moving company that had transported their possessions to borderland about hauling quite a bit of it back. The scribe and wife would pack and move their clothes and sundry books and crap, but the furniture and the kitchen could be moved by professionals.

At last leap day came, the papers were signed and the new castle was officially theirs. And to celebrate, and because it was the last day of the month and they didn’t want to pay another month’s storage, the two of them celebrated by hauling their crap from the storage unit to the new castle in the pouring rain.

The new castle was pretty great, albeit with a few things that needed updating in a big way. The pinstripe wallpaper in the guest bathroom, for instance, had to go, as did some of the window treatments that prevented the back door from opening properly and which infuriated the scribe, for if there’s one thing he hates its design at the expense of utility. But beyond those minor issues and some painting, the place was absolutely great. The two set about remedying the perceived flaws over the course of the following days.

In preparation for the move, the scribe had already contacted essential utilities to make certain that he and the goodly wife would be without them for as little time as possible. Not electricity and water, mind you, but the Network of Dish and the Link of Sudden for all their televisual and web of the whole wide world needs. The two companies even scheduled time to come out and do the installation on the same day.

The Network of Dish was the easiest of these installations, and happened in the afternoon. It was the Link of Sudden installation that had problems in the morning. The Link installation guy inspected the castle to find where its cable was located. Some more inspection then commenced as well as telephone device calls to Link of Sudden HQ and walks around the property. Eventually, the installation tech returned to the scribe’s presence and announced that despite the fact that the castle was wired for the Link of Sudden and had had service through them with the previous owners, the castle was now “unserviceable” for anything beyond basic cable. Apparently while the previous owners had used Link of Sudden for their television, they had not had high speed web of the whole wide world and consequently the connection from the castle into their system was over 300 feet away, which would not support web. The next nearest such node was in the yard of the scribe’s nearest neighbor, a mere 60 feet down the hill, but that particular box only contained two connection ports into which his two nearest neighbors were connected. The installation man said he was inexperienced and could not do such an installation, but perhaps someone with more knowledge than he could. He told the scribe that he would soon be called by such a tech to discuss what to do next.

After no such call was received within 24 hours, the scribe phoned the Link of Sudden to inquire as to when he could expect it. The underling on the line told the scribe that no call should be expected for the castle had been declared “unserviceable” by the first tech who’d been out.
“No,” the scribe pointed out, “the castle was unserviceable by that guy. He said he was new and that the castle might be serviceable by someone more experienced. He said they would call me.”
The underling said she understood and that she would note this in the account and request that the local dispatcher give me a call, but as far as she could tell the castle truly was unserviceable and the scribe should probably give up. The scribe reiterated to her that he really REALLY wanted this connection to happen. The purchase of the castle was made partially BECAUSE it had the Link of Sudden. He was willing to pay fees if it meant someone who knew what they were doing could come out and have a look at the place. The underling again said she would note it and that the scribe would be given a call.

After no call was received within 24 hours, the scribe phoned the Link of Sudden again to inquire. The new underling also said the castle was unserviceable which led the scribe to explain again the nature of this potentially incorrect claim and the lack of call backs. A little digging on the underling’s part and a note from the local dispatcher was discovered stating that the house actually was serviceable and that an installation could take place at my request. Nice of them to alert the scribe, no? The next available installation date, of course, was a week away and no argument would be brooked otherwise.

Because the scribe has his intelligent personal telephony device that is equipped with the web of the whole wide world and unlimited data, he is able to check his Mail of E. In order to get some of his bigger projects accomplished faster, though, he had to take his lap of top down to his former workplace at the place where they hide the books and use their wireless connection to the web of the whole wide world. He was therefore also able to hang out with his former coworkers and shoot the shit. The only former Rogue Patron he was able to see, though, was Mr. W. Perfect.

A week later, the next installation tech arrived, took one look at the wiring from road level and again announced it was unserviceable. The scribe was hardly surprised and said as much to the installer. The installer said that from what he could see there was no way to make the castle compliant with the needs of the Link of Sudden with its current setup. What was needed was to have the Link of Sudden send out a surveyor to assess the situation and make recommendations for how best to proceed. Perhaps, he supposed, the necessary cables could be connected to the power and phone pole directly behind the new castle, since they couldn’t be run from the street far beyond.

“Could you please tell me HOW I can convince them to do this?” the scribe asked. He explained that he had been phoning and phoning and begging for this very thing to happen but all anyone would say is that the house was unserviceable. Clearly, since every neighbor in spitting distance had the service, it was technologically possible to install. The intaller said it would be best to speak to someone in the Link of Sudden’s engineering department, preferably in Texas, as they could actually make things happen there. He said it wasn’t wise to call and yell as that tended to shut the underlings down and make them less cooperative.

So after the installer left, the scribe phoned the Link of Sudden and nicely asked them to speak to the engineering department, preferably in Texas. The underling on the phone did not seem to want to comply and began asking the scribe questions, which raised his blood pressure. And, after the scribe had described the issue, again and nicely, the underling said that her screen noted that the castle was unserviceable, but she could “put in a form” for the local tech supervisor to give him a call. The call could take up to 48 hours to be made, however. The scribe told her that this was unacceptable. He had been promised calls twice previously, but none had ever come. All communication with the company had been made due to his efforts alone. He did not trust that any promise of another call would be any more fruitful, so he asked to speak to a supervisor. When the supervisor came on the line, the scribe explained the whole situation again and mentioned the lack of calls and the seeming confusion on the part of their installers as to what could or needed to be done to make things work. The supervisor apologized that the scribe had not been called and assured him that she would personally put in a call to the local tech supervisor and make certain that he called. And if he couldn’t call then she, the phone supervisor, would call herself and explain the situation. The scribe, she said, could expect a call from someone before 5 p.m.

(TO BE CONTINUED...)