To phone or not to phone

Yesterday I got the call I've been hoping for; or rather, I got what at first appeared to be the call I've been hoping for from the phone company.

The guy asked for me, then said he was the one who had processed my application for a phone line back in July. He went on to say that, the following week, he had been involved in a car accident, and ... well, you can see where that's going. I'm a little skeptical as to how the absence of the person who took my application, entered it into the computer and printed out the work order for me to hang on my house, translates into the application not proceeding, but whatever.

He said he had heard that I went in to request a transfer of the as-yet uninstalled phone line to a new address, and that I was mad about it.

Now, I did request the transfer, and I did tell the guy that the line hadn't been installed, but I wasn't mad. Nobody in my neighborhood had phones installed, and many of them had been waiting longer than I had. Some of them years longer. I only put in the application because it looked like there was some utility work going on in the neighborhood back in July, but I wasn't surprised that it never happened.

Anyway, this guy apparently feels personally beholden to me, and while I did tell him I wasn't upset, I'm certainly not going to discourage him from doing what he can to get our phone hooked up in the new place.

He asked for the exact address and I started to give it to him - with no street names or house numbers, it's really just a description from a known starting point. So I told him, from a particular condo development, it's 50 meters south, 100 meters west, and 50 meters south.

And he said, "That can't be. That's not a paved road."

And he's right.

We determined that I do, in fact, live on an unpaved road, and that he knows exactly where it is. He said he'd just stop by that afternoon and get the information. Talk about personalized service. Or a small country.

Except, the one thing he needs, besides the address, is the number of the electric meter at the new place, not the number of the next door neighbor's meter, which is what I provided to them when I went in to request the transfer on the 10th.

It's not as simple as looking at the meter itself, because there are seven houses on our tiny little cul de sac, and all the meters are installed in a row halfway down our (unpaved) country lane. And our electricity is currently shared with, not the house next door, but the house next door to that.

I have no idea.

Anyway, the landlord said he'd stop by yesterday to show me which is our meter, but he didn't. The neighbor whose house shares a meter with ours (who, by the way, is very nice) says she doesn't get the bills directly, but that the landlord picks them up and either pays them or bills her or something; anyway, she couldn't help.

So now...who knows. I tried calling the landlord back today, but a child answered the phone and said the guy has a new number. And the new number wasn't available.

Anyway, I still think it's a net positive; getting a proactive call from anyone at the phone company shows that things are happening, and they're still installing phones all over the old neighborhood; in fact, they're done with this particular street and a couple of blocks closer to the new place.

So, here's hoping.