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Ah… well let me explain to you how this is possible in so many ways…

I posted recently about my cell phone dilemma. Well, I finally decided I would transfer my phone to Ryan’s parents’ family plan. They have an extra line that would cost me about $25/mo. I figured, at that price I’m willing to live with a cell phone. And deal with yet another cell phone company. I don’t know though, after today I am swinging back into the ‘All cell phone companies are nefariously evil, don’t give them your money’ camp. (I love the word ‘nefarious’. It should be used much more often.)

I decided this morning I would finally take care of this phone thing before work. My crap Verizon Razr is dying, and Ryan’s is pretty much dead, and it just needs to be done ASAP. How hard could it be? I just needed to go to the Sprint store and they could port my phone # over to the Sprint account, no problem. Ha! I should have known. I am always thinking these impossible things are possible. Impossible things like cell phone companies being competent. Impossible things like me being able to interact with customer service without getting sofa king pissed. (If you don’t get ’sofa king’ say it fast 5 times and you will get it.)

I get to the Sprint store right at 10AM when they open. There are already 6-7 people in line in front of me though, so I wait. I wait 30 minutes. They finally call my name. I explain I want to port my phone #. They say sure! No problem, what is the account #? I give said account #. This is where it starts getting dicey.

Retarded Sprint Dude (RSD): “Oh, I’m sorry, our computer system is down and we can’t access that account.

Me: “Hm… okay well then why didn’t you say that the system was down when I came in instead of making me wait 30 minutes?!”

RSD: “Oh, well, not ALL the computers are down, so we *might* have been able to access your account! BUT - you can call the Sprint customer service on the phone and they can help you!”

Me: “Wait, so I can do this over the phone and I didn’t have to come in the store?”

RSD: “You can do everything over the phone.”

Me: “So why did they tell my mother in law that I had to come into the store to do this??!!!”

RSD: (totally ignoring my question) “Well if you call them they can take care of you. Otherwise you have to wait four hours before our system in the store is back up.”

OK. Great. I just wasted 30 minutes waiting for someone to tell me (a) I didn’t have to come in at all, and (b) they can’t help me.

I call Sprint immediately (while still in the Sprint store):

Crappy Sprint CS (CSCS) : Hello, thank you for calling Sprint customer service. Our computer system is currently updating. Please call back in 2 hours and we will be able to help you.

Wow. Okay. Their computers are ‘updating’ eh? Yeah right.

I call Sprint back at 1PM.

CSCS: Hello welcome to Sprint Customer Service. How can I help you?

I explain what I need to do, give the account #.

CSCS: Please hold for a moment.

I hold for 5 minutes.

CSCS: Okay I can do that for you. Please hold.

I hold for 5 more minutes.

CSCS: Okay I need your Verizon account number and password to transfer your phone #.

Me: Crap, I don’t have the account number. Can I call you back?

CSCS: We can call you back in 5 minutes.

Me: Great!

I call Verizon and get the account number. I wait 15 minutes. No call back from Sprint. I call Sprint:

CSCS: Hello, thank you for calling Sprint customer service. Our computer system is currently updating. Please call back in 4 hours and we will be able to help you.

And that, my friends, is why I hate Sprint, and I don’t even have their service yet.

UPDATE (3/26/08):

After:

1 trip to the Sprint Store,

7 phone calls to Sprint Customer Service,

and 2+ hours of my time over 2 days…

I have (finally) successfully ported my phone number to Sprint.

Thank the Lord. (I am NOT being sarcastic.)

For the last few weeks Ryan’s ban on corn syrup products really hasn’t affected me all that much, in the sense that I’m still using plenty of ketchup on my fries… he just can’t eat any of the ones touching the ketchup… but on Saturday night we steamed an artichoke. You can’t eat artichoke without mayo. And most mayo has some corn syrup in it, including the one in our fridge. So, Michelle and I made mayo… so that we could make the herb-caper mayo recipe in bon appetit magazine, so that Ryan could eat the artichoke.

Mayo is really easy to make, actually. It only requires egg yolk, lemon juice (or vinegar), oil, mustard, salt and pepper. It does take a bit of time though, to emulsify the egg/oil mixture into, well, a mayo-like consistency, but in any case it was messy but quite tasty.

The herb-caper mayo was just mixing in dill, chives, capers, and some mustard into the mayo. And, we just happened to have both dill AND chives. I needed chives last week for risotto, and for some reason the phrase ‘Ryan, can you pick up some chives for me at the supermarket’ somehow translates into ‘I need to buy dill for Hayley’ in Ryan’s brain… so we had both. Anyway. YUM. Artichokes with fresh herbs and mayo is delicious!

We had a lot of mayo leftover and needed to use it up within two days (per Joy of Cooking) so last night I made potato salad. YUM. Potato salad with fresh mayo is also delicious!!

Conclusion? Homemade mayo is awesome.

PS. Just as a side note, since I’m talking about food, I would like to add that Berkeley Bowl is awesome too. I’ve been there so many times but every single time I go, their produce department never ceases to amaze me.

PPS. Pee wee avocados are also awesome. (Yes, that is the real name) You can find them at the aforementioned awesome Berkeley Bowl.

Okay, so curiosity and procrastination compelled me to click on a google ad in my gmail window… and… well just check it out: www.stemaid.com

Just to get you started, the very first statement they make on their welcome page is the following:

“Stemaid proposes safe, easy and effective Stem Cell Therapies for many conditions, in a perfectly legal environment.”

I dunnos about you, but it seems to me that if you need to justify the legality of your product… you might have a problem.

Ever wonder why the average person is freaked out by stem cells and cloning?! Because of crazy ‘companies’ like this!!!! Don’t believe me yet? Okay, okay, the stuff seems harmless right? The website looks relatively professional, and I’m just trying to figure out why it all just seems ‘off’… when I see this blurb about cloning:

“Almost six years ago, Rael, the well-known spiritual leader of the Raelian Movement, the world’s largest UFO-related organization numbering nearly 70,000 members in almost 100 countries, founded Clonaid, the first company offering to clone human beings. In this book he explains how todays cloning technology is the first step in the quest for eternal life… Click here to download this fascinating book free…”

What?! UFOs? Raelians? Apparently Stemaid has a sister ‘company’ Clonaid, check out their pdf entitled “Yes on Cloning” and the wikipedia entry.

I guess I just haven’t been in touch with how important UFOs are because I’m still finishing my phD…

This pretty much sums it up:

I heart phD Comics.

This is me and tokidoki:

This is Ryan (Ryan being the one in the green shirt):

I would like to point out, however, that I have not purchased a new tokidoki item in almost three weeks… and have been under budget every week since the new year… yay for me!!!

I have previously mentioned the awesomeness of the AR-15 (see #22), but this custom job is even MORE awesome. Courtesy of riflegear.com, who had it made for his wife.

PS. The awesomeness of this rifle has not been lost on the media, as they have now prominently featured it as the next ‘big threat’ to the safety of our country… the irony is awesome.

PPS. The authenticity of the rifle can be verified by clicking on the link to riflegear.com, he’s posted a few pics of his wife using it at the range. Is it wrong to be jealous?!

Come try our beer and play some Rockband on Friday…  9:30PM our place.  Everyone (who knows where we live) is welcome.  BYOB if you’re worried…  ha!

I’ve been contemplating giving up my cell phone. Ryan wants to switch over to his work phone, because (a) it would be free and (b) his razr sucks. The problem is, he’s the primary account holder on our Verizon account, and Verizon sucks and won’t let us switch names on the account, so I’d have to sign up all over again on a new plan with them… which means I might as well switch providers all together! (Why should I give them my business when they don’t want my business?!!) I used to have a fantastic plan with the Identity Crisis Company (AT&T/Cingular/AT&T) but of course now all of the big cell companies basically have the same crap plan for everyone.

So, I’ve been thinking - do I REALLY need a cell phone? I mean, gosh, I’ve had one since maybe freshman year of college… pretty much 10 years. But I never really pick up my phone anyway (I’m sure most of you can attest to this) and I’d probably get a land line instead. Plus, the thought of not having a phone sounds rather appealing. If someone really wants to talk to me, they can email me. Or call my work line. Or Ryan. Ha!

Besides, no one really calls me anyway, except Ryan and my parents. Ryan actually sounded kind of excited at the thought of saving even more money (going from a $100/mo cell phone bill to $0) but his face fell a bit when I asked the real question: Can HE survive if I didn’t have a phone?

Maybe I need to do an experiment - one week with no cell phone. What do you think?!