Cable or Satellite? Who sucks the least? Help, please.

Can someone please tell me where I can find a decent cable/satellite company?!?! Does it even exist? Seriously, when I had Time Warner I was just fine, even though there were so few HD channels. At least everything else about them seemed fine. Well, unfortunately, since I’ve moved we no longer have Time Warner as an option. So, let’s go over the lovely experiences I’ve had since said move.

DirecTV – We were so excited (me and the bf), we planned ahead well in advance and ordered our service, including the NFL Sunday Ticket. WooHoo! I could not wait to be able to watch the Vikings every Sunday! I should have known to hang up when the girl I placed the order with was completely clueless. Oh well, I just figured I’d call back later to make corrections with someone who actually had a clue. No less than 15 calls later over the course of a few weeks and we cancelled the service – we never even had it installed!! They screwed up our installation dates and couldn’t fix them. It’s now the day before our move, and 2 days before our scheduled installation. It was the absolute worst customer service I’ve ever experienced. Basically, the company has a monopoly with the NFL games so they apparently feel that they don’t need to have good customer service. People will go with their service just because they want the football. Fair enough, I’ve written them off. If that’s the type of service they offer before I’m even a customer, it’s not worth it to me. Even if that means I have to miss most of the Vikes games.

Insight cable – We called the guy at Insight who works with our apartment complex and he was ready to hook us up with the first month free, and we can get an installation in 2 days, when our original DirecTV was supposed to be. But, there was a problem. Since the bf called first and supposedly owes them money from 10+ years ago, they put a freeze on this address and I was unable to order in my own name. I don’t owe them any freakin’ money and I’m not married so why can’t I get this service? So the guy tells us to call the regular number and order service as though you never talked to me, you may be able to get it with no problems. It worked, I was able to order and get an installation 2 days later. Now when we call the other guy back he says he can’t give us the free month deal anymore, we have to go with whatever they gave us. And yet, he convinced them to give him credit since it should have been his sale. Whatever, at least we have cable and internet when we move in. We were never satisfied with the service. Maybe they were little things but they were annoying and they added up. For instance, every time you turn the cable box on it goes to this stupid channel 1 Insight channel that has a little message about what channel a game is on. We could never figure out how to get the box to turn on automatically to a specific channel or to the last channel we were on. And once the box was turned on, it took forever to be able to change the channel from that dumb channel 1. It was like the remote had to “warm up” first or something. Picture-in-Picture didn’t work. The option was on the remote but if the TV didn’t have it, they didn’t offer the service. Annoying. It worked just fine with Time Warner. The DVR would randomly not record shows that we had set to record. And then there was the low number of HD channels, and the $8/mo for 4 of them. Supposedly there were many more coming, but when? Plus the HD DVR boxes, of which we had 2, were something like $15/mo each. Ridiculous. Like I said, we just never liked their service so we decided to finally move on to something else.

AT&T U-Verse – Yes, it’s finally available in our area!! We’ve been waiting and waiting and were about to go with something else and then, Ta da!! Cool. We placed the order for 3 weeks out, but with our luck, we decided to wait on cancelling the Insight until after installation. The guy came out and started the process of installing, although he wasn’t able to get a signal and had to come out and have someone else double check. Once the 2nd guy came out and confirmed, that was it, we were too far away from the box to get the signal. So even though we technically have the service in our area, we can’t get it because the signal wasn’t strong enough to reach us. Now we’ll never really be able to tell if it’s available to us at some point. Apparently the further away from the box, the less TV’s you’ll be able to watch HD channels on simultaneously too. Okay then, good thing we didn’t disconnect our cable TV first.

Dish Network – After some debate and discussion, we went with Dish Network (the bf really wanted to go with DirecTV whom I will forever hate). First of all, someone didn’t do his homework because had we known that we could not get local channels in HD we would have never signed a 2 year contract with them. I consider that to be not my fault. For now, we can get locals in HD through the box with the rabbit ears, but that won’t last once the digital thing starts. I don’t know what we’ll do then. Second of all, our remote stopped working within an hour after the technician left. I called and chatted online with their customer service people who, mind you, were actually quite nice and attempted to be helpful. They tried and tried to get our remote to work but no dice. They had to send us a new one. Great first day experience!! The next day the remote started working again and then stopped. We got the new remote and it worked at first, then stopped. The remote will then randomly begin working again. We have experienced this every single day for the entire time we’ve had this service. There are times when we just decide to change the box to single mode and use the remote from the 2nd TV to control the box and we just watch the same thing on both TV’s. I mean, seriously, who wants to talk to customer service every day. So I finally called again today (which is what prompted me to write this). First the guy told me that it sounded like a receiver issue, so he requested a new receiver for us. In the process, he checked for known issues for this particular box. Sure enough, there is some sort of signal crossing with this receiver and some LCD TV’s. His solution is to send us a new remote that uses the UHF signal. Supposedly, it should work to have 2 UHF remotes with the same receiver. We shall see once we receive it. But, our new problem is that we just got a fancy new remote that will not work with a UHF signal. Not that I care, but the bf certainly does. If the new remote doesn’t work we are supposed to get a new receiver. I doubt that will help us at all, since this is a known issue that occurs with “some” LCD TV’s. Right. Where is this disclosure in our contract?

I’m not sure what to do. I certainly don’t want to stay with a company that has such poor performance, but what is the better of all the evils? Plus now we’re locked into this 2 year contract and I don’t want to have to pay to get out of it. I guess these are the reasons they make you sign a 2 year deal?!? Because they know they suck, just like DirecTV sucks in the customer service department. Any suggestions? Ideas? Resolutions?

Oh, and to top it off, the week after we called to cancel the Insight service, they added their “up to 60” HD channels. Figures.

I hate my job

This is stupid, I need to change directions with this blog thing before I bore myself to sleep.

Have I mentioned lately that I hate my job? I mean literally, seriously hate my job!?! I can come to work in the morning in a good/great, even just an ok mood and by the end of the day I want to punch someone. I feel like the guy from Office Space. I don’t like my job so I’m just not going to go there anymore. Really, why should I stay late and work my ass off and get nothing for it, when I can just get by with the bare minimum and suffer no consequences for it? Bad Karma, I know, but other than that what’s the point? At least when I felt appreciated I actually got something out of it. Now, I feel like nobody really gives a shit either way. In the end I know they just see it as me being a cry baby that won’t shut up about wanting a laptop. That’s fine though, that just proves to me that they really don’t understand how freakin’ hard I work (ummm worked) for them and how much more productive I would be if I could take my work home when necessary. I’m done with those days of staying late to get everything done. I mean once in awhile it’s fine, but when it happens every week it gets a little old. I am now at a point where I feel I will never catch up, so why even try? It just makes me more angry and frustrated when I’m at the end of the day with a list of things to do that does not include the 100’s of emails in my inbox that I still need to weed through. It’s a joke, it truly is. That’s why I can smile when I say I hate my job! It’s so sad it’s funny! If only the management actually cared …

Doctors visits are no fun

I’ve got my appointment with the psychologist today. I always feel like he’s going to yell at me for not doing something that we talked about, or for rescheduling my appointments and not coming in for several weeks. I don’t think that’s his job, but he intimidates me. Well, so did the last one and there was nothing intimidating about her. It’s me, I know. I need to get over it. But I have this constant anxiety and it just builds up more and more every time I have to go talk to someone about what’s going on with me. Doesn’t even matter what doc it is, all of them make me nervous. I feel like I’m going to sound stupid or I’m not going to be able to explain things the right way, or they just won’t get it so it’ll be a lost cause. I guess it’s like talking to anyone else who does not experience these same issues. They don’t get it, and then I feel so let down and frustrated. I can take their criticism and ideas and they all sound good, but I already know they won’t work. I’ve tried them all before. It’s more than just trying to do something. I need help. And it needs to come from someone who understands how my mind works and doesn’t put me down or look at me like I’m crazy. Is there such a person? I know there is, I’ve read their books or blogs or articles before. I just can’t afford to pay them to help me out. And why is that? Because I have ADHD and can’t get my $ situation together, because I can’t get organized, because I have no idea how time works, and it goes on and on. I can start one project but then get overwhelmed by how much there is to do. Then I get distracted by something else, and something else and something else. How does one stay on track? How does one learn how to stay on track?

1:51pm: Well that was truly a frustrating experience, although I must say I learned a few things. But, the psychologist was convinced that the psychiatrist I’m supposed to see next week is really a psychologist and so therefore a complete waste of my time to go through all that re-evaluation, etc. So now I’m thinking, what exactly is my primary care doc going to do about meds if her whole point was to send me to a psychiatrist to get a second opinion. Of course I looked online and it seems to be the case that this person really is a psychiatrist (man I hope so!). Although, I’m still not quite sure what the point was since there was no real recommendation provided as far as what changes to be made with medication. Maybe he sent something to the pc doc, who knows. I’m calming down now. That experience almost made me cry.

Other than that I guess I’m supposed to pay some attention to my sleep patterns now too. So, last night, went to be around 10:30, probably fell asleep after 11pm. BF’s son woke us up around 2:30 because his knee hurt, so that was probably a good 30-60 minute interruption before I got back to sleep. Alarms started going off at 6am over and over until 7:30 when I finally got up. So how many hours of sleep does that add up to? Math sucks. 3.5 + 2.5 + 1.5 (very disruptive) = 6-7.5 hours. Wow that’s not enough. No wonder I’m tired all day long.

Just another not so manic Monday

I got to work way late today. Partially because that’s what I do, partially because traffic was bad, for no apparent reason. I mean, it was backed up and slow for a few miles, and it was already 9am. Shouldn’t these people be at work already? When I got here I was oddly calm, extremely calm. I like that feeling. Then I found out one of my coworkers is out and I have to cover for her. That took some of the calm away. I know it’s my own doing. I start to make myself anxious. Sometimes I think that I don’t know how to function if I’m not nervous or anxious. Does that even make sense? I guess I’ll be talking to the psychologist about this tomorrow, then my regular doc whenever I make that appointment, and then the psychiatrist next week. Maybe I need to try some new meds for the anxiety as well as the ADHD. This is going to be way too fun!! Haha.

12:58pm: Well, the 1 hour 45 minute meeting pretty much ruined my calmness. I shouldn’t say ruined, but the calmness has gone away now. As usual I am tensing up and feeling kind of anxious. I think that my food choices may have a little to do with it though. It is so hard trying to come up with a way to deal with everything all at once, or just one thing at a time. How do I prioritize? What’s most important? Food choices? Organization? Time management? Is it even possible to do one without all of them? They all sort of work off of each other. If I don’t eat well, I have a harder time getting focused, organized, managing my time. If I don’t manage my time I don’t make the right food choices or get organized. If I don’t get organized, I can’t really manage my time or figure out what the good food choices are, etc. It’s this never ending cycle which has no beginning and no end. And when you’ve lived an entire life without knowing how to do any of these things, it’s not exactly easy to just jump right in and start doing them. It has never just dawned on me that, hey, I know how I can organize/manage my time/eat better now! All of the information has always been there. How do I start to process and implement these things into my life when my house is a mess, I have no sense of time, and it’s just easier to eat what’s quick, convenient, and something I know I like?

So now I’m thinking, I know exactly what the doctors, or at least one of them, are going to say. Maybe you should think about writing down what you eat every day. Then you can see if there’s a pattern to how certain foods affect you. Been there, done that. Doesn’t work. I can barely remember where I put that stupid notebook/pen – because I’d have to write the stuff down at home, as well as at work. Otherwise, I can barely remember to write this journal, let alone what I eat. Okay maybe I can try it, but not until I’ve got this journaling thing down. So many things that I think about, so not enough time on the planet to remember or actually do them.

5:24pm: I have got to switch meds now. I just started reading about Vyvanse and most of the people that switched from Adderall to that one are saying they can feel a difference. I just want something that will last all day. I hope that’s what my doc will prescribe for me. I am ready to try something different before I get so behind at work that I can’t catch up. I know I need to exercise and eat better and get more sleep too, but I need some motivation. I hope the med change will give me that motivation. I’m so sleepy right now, and not getting much done at all, so I think it’s time to go home.

Seriously ...

Today I was quick to get out of bed, all it took was bf saying that he thought my “baby” (my dear darling puppy Lilly) needed to go out. Since she’s been using the floor as her own personal bathroom lately I jumped right up to take all the pups outside. The problem is that I made the mistake of going back to bed to lay down for about 20 minutes. So instead of being on time today, or even close to it, I was late again. Not that it’s anything new, but I have been doing better at getting in a little bit earlier the past couple weeks. I didn’t take any of my meds until I was in the car on the way to work. So again this morning I’m extremely sleepy. I’ll have to wait until the Adderall kicks in again before I can get any actual work done. I finally have an appointment to meet with the psychiatrist about my test results and to discuss medication options, but that’s not until the 13th. I’m also supposed to meet with the regular doc to discuss these things with her, but I don’t know if I can wait until after I talk to the psychiatrist. I may need a new prescription before that. All I know right now is that I could just lay down and go to sleep for a good hour and I would feel so much better. At least, that’s what it feels like.

This is ridiculous really. Why do I have to rely on a medication to wake me up and make me focus anyway. How is that right? Shouldn’t I be able to wake up just by waking up? I don’t know. I definitely have a better life because of the meds, but I still hate the fact that I have to take them to function. And then they don’t function all day anyway. It’s a nice love/hate relationship that I have with them.

Man I get so obsessed with what I’m doing sometimes, it’s hard to break away. Like, here I am trying to get some work done before it’s time to go home, and I happen to come across the new Overstock real estate website. So, I decide to take a quick glance, and now I can’t stop. I just keep going through the list of houses, looking at pictures, mapping them out, etc. I know I should be doing my work because I have several things I need to get done before I leave. But I can’t seem to break away. Seriously. I need afternoon meds.

Time to go register to vote. I need to get this done so I no longer have to think about it and worry about it every single day. Anxiety is hitting me like, what if I mail it and it gets lost so that I can’t vote. Or, what if I try to go somewhere to register and they lose it so I can’t vote. Then I wonder if I should do the register and vote at the same time thing. But that just worries me like, how do I know my vote is going to count, since the republicans were trying to get that shut down. I know it didn’t work and got thrown out of court, but still, how can I be sure they won’t try it again in some other sneaky way. Yeah I need to stop thinking about it and just get registered to make sure I’m registered.

Just another day

Forgot my lunch at home today. I even had a good lunch packed and ready to go. That just threw me off and as soon as I got to work I took my chips out and ate them all. As if that was necessary? I also took my Adderall late again so it hasn’t kicked in yet. I’m still a little sleepy, can’t really keep my eyes open at the moment. Can’t focus.

Okay drugs have kicked in now. I’m a little more awake and focused. I’m still just looking at my desk like, how the hell am I ever going to get all of this cleaned up? How am I ever going to catch up and actually get to a point where I have everything done? I do have people helping me today so that’s going to make things a little better. Hopefully that will actually give me a chance to get my head back above water for the first time in weeks.

Well it’s 3:29 and here we go again, medication is wearing off. I am struggling to focus and really have no motivation to keep working, even though I have more than enough to do. I would rather take a nap or chill on the couch and watch TV. Even going to the gym would be more fun than this. I’m going to try setting my timer for 20 minutes to focus on one thing I need to get done. It’s worked before, as long as I get no interruptions.

That didn’t work so much, since I kept forgetting that I was going to actual do that. I didn’t set any timers and I’m sure I didn’t work for 20 minutes straight. I think I got distracted by a couple things but I don’t really remember. As much as these meds are supposed to help me “remember” they also cause a loss of memory too. Geezus.

Alright I got a little more work done and now it’s almost time to get to the gym. As much as I’m not looking forward to that, at least it will be more exciting than sitting here. And I’ll have my gym partner to talk to, which is always fun!

Another rough one

9/24/08:

I was feeling pretty good this morning, but now I’m feeling extremely shaky, nervous, and anxious and I can’t figure out why. I’m trying to take deep breaths and calm myself down but it’s not working. I think this would be one of those times when I would immediately go for food but I know I’m not hungry so I have to stop myself from doing that. Instead, I’m drinking lots of water in an attempt to get the same effect that the food would have. It’s not really working though. Releasing tension … deep breathing … closing my eyes … calm down … I suppose I should just keep trying this and not give up so fast. Of course I want immediate results though.

Maybe I did take my adhd meds twice today. I swear I don’t think I did, but my heart still hasn’t stopped beating fast/pounding and it’s now 2:30pm. Even food doesn’t make me feel better. And then of course the more I think about it, the worse it gets. It’s turning into a rough day again. Now that I’m really paying attention to it, I think that multiple meetings which cut up my day (e.g. 10-11, 12-1) have quite the negative effect on my attention span. I mean, maybe that’s something that I can work on, to figure out how I can better manage my day with those expected interruptions. Hmmm, I’ll keep that thought in mind. Right now I have to figure out how to stay on track with all of these things I’ve got on my list today. I keep starting a task and then realizing that I was doing something else, and then realize that I really should be doing something other than that. Then I get distracted by someone or something and the cycle starts itself all over again. Kind of annoying.

Man I cannot focus today. It is taking me forever to do any little thing. Good thing I’m going to the gym so I’ll be forced out of here at a specific time. At least having a deadline might help me stay on task for a few moments at a time to get something done. I hope, anyway.

Lists, lists, lists

So this morning I’m in the shower having random thoughts about why I have such a hard time completing things on a list. For instance, the bf’s son wrote a list of everything he wanted to do over the course of the summer. It was quite lengthy but some of the items were very simple, like take the dogs for a walk, or cook out. I think some were even simpler than that. But if that’s the case, why can we never seem to check anything off of the list. How is it that we completely forget about the list even though it’s stuck to the refrigerator? I mean, right in front of us, not lost like all the other lists we make. Seriously though, it’s not this one list that I’m beating myself up for. It’s what the list represents, the hundreds and hundreds of other lists that I’ve made in the past days, weeks, months or more. Where did they all go? How many things on those lists did I actually complete? I don’t know since I can’t find them. And even once I find them (crumpled up in the bottom of my purse, or on the kitchen table or …) I’ve already started another list so now I need to transfer those things over, making my new list even longer. That is, if I can find the new list. Either that or I just decide I don’t even want to bother with what’s on there. I’ll just start over and pick the things that are most important right now. Should I keep the old list or throw it away. Hmmm, there’s another problem, paper clutter. I might want to look at that list later, like maybe after I never complete the things on the newest list? It’s like this never-ending cycle. I can’t seem to throw things away. Am I getting off track? What was my point anyway? Oh yeah, lists don’t work. Even when I know where the list is, I still don’t look at it. I can remember what was on there. Yeah, no I can’t. What do I need to get done tonight, what do I need to buy at the grocery store, what do I need to pack for work tomorrow? Okay so maybe I will look at the list, but I won’t do what’s on there anyway. I’ll just do that this weekend, or buy that next time, or pack tomorrow morning – after I wake up late and take care of the puppies, eat breakfast, and find out that I have no clothes to wear, no food for lunch (I think that was one of those things I decided I can buy later …). That’ll work. And while I’m driving to work I’ll decide that I really need to be more organized and manage my time better so that I can actually get to work on time, for once. I’ll work on that tonight. Or maybe tomorrow. We’ll see. Now what was I saying?

Rough day

Today started out with no Paxil again, after being without it yesterday. I finally went and picked it up at 11:15 because the doc said not having it for more than a day would take a couple of weeks to kick in again. So I don’t know if it’s that or lack of sleep or both that is making me feel very sleepy, antsy, anxious, stressed, etc. This is one of those bad days for me. I cannot function as normal and this is one of those days that I would be overeating from the stress, had I not started paying attention to that bad habit. I’m starting to get a headache, but I don’t want to take any meds for that since I seem to have an issue with overuse of that as well. Instead I will try to distract myself from those bad habits by forming a new one, journaling. It’s not like I haven’t tried this before, I just seem to fall off the journal wagon after a few (or less) days. But, doc said I should journal this crap that’s going on with me – anxiety, adhd – so that I can refer back to my notes and have some idea what I want to talk about next time I go in. I really need a full time computer or this will be difficult. Okay so my issues are:

Can’t sit still – right now I am swinging my leg back and forth just to stay seated
Can’t focus on one thing for more than a few seconds
Very tense; legs, arm stomach muscles all very tight
Stressed that I can’t focus and get anything done
Overwhelmed by everything I have pending
Upset with myself for not doing a better job as a volunteer
I’m just sitting here, closing my eyes and waiting for 5:30 to appear on the clock

I’m thinking that I am more overwhelmed and stressed lately because of this attempt to stop the emotional eating phase I’ve been going through. Instead of eating or popping some ibuprofen in my mouth in an attempt to feel better, I’m now stuck trying to deal with what is really stressing me out. I’m just having a hard time figuring out what my stressors are and what to do about them. I guess I sort of know what the problems are, but I have no idea where to start in fixing them. How many books do I have to read, or shows do I have to watch, before my brain starts to function in that way? I mean, I see it or visualize it, but I don’t know how to implement these ideas. I get so frustrated with myself and this adhd stuff. Why did this have to happen to me? Why can’t I figure out how to work around it? Why don’t I have the same organizational abilities that other people have? How come I haven’t been able to learn these things that just seem so obvious to other people? Like how to clean my desk or delete emails or fix my nails or whatever? It pretty much seems unfair that my brain has to work twice as hard to get half the results. Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful that I don’t have anything worse. I’m quite aware that I should not be feeling sorry for myself when there are people much worse off than me. I definitely try to keep things in perspective. I don’t know, I’m so tired of thinking about it so I think I’ll take my last 7 minutes of work and try to get something accomplished. Maybe.