Sunday, April 10, 2005

Phone franticness

Okay, being organized isn't my strong point. Posting 'multimedia content' on this weblog will take some time, partly because I haven't figured out how to upload different sound and picture files. Also, keeping up with my constantly overflowing voicemail box is a full-time job in itself.

Plus, my phone line is dead right now, so I don't have internet access from home. Strangely, the line cut out Friday night, while I was having an unusual and interesting conversation with a friend. Bell Canada is coming Tuesday to do repairs.

[Edit: I was having notable problems with phone/internet/weblog connections over a two-day period, and I went to various lengths to access my weblog. I even asked some small stores if I could briefly try their internet. Then, I finally ended up at George Brown College and was able to get through - funnily enough. On this same day, I was to meet up with the friend (mentioned above), but it didn't happen, due to an unexpected 'emergency with the water mains' at this particular building. When we spoke by phone later on that day, my friend described someone they ended up meeting that day, 'who's just as paranoid as you' (ie, me). Everything described about this person was strikingly similar to my own situation of feeling under high threat and overwhelmingly oppressed, while wanting to challenge the system. The Ministry of the Attorney General was referred to several times. In my own case, I suspect government surveillance and corruption would be exposed on a large scale. This friend does *not* believe I'm being surveilled. As I feared, when the phone suddenly disconnected, they thought I had purposely hung up. I'll post a transcription of their subsequent phone message to me, shortly.]
I had called Bell on Thursday, April 7, to request a wiretap check on my line. The next day my phone service goes dead and a technician is not available until 4 days later. On Wednesday, April 6, I also had to clear up several incidents of overbilling on my account. Another time, I spoke to a Bell CSR and she suggested I add a feature. Throughout the conversation, I told her how important my voicemail box is, as I had saved over 20 messages there. The following day, my entire voicemail box was erased.

Uh, perhaps my discussions about digital monopolies and privacy concerns have ticked somebody off...?

My mother's phone line also had no dial tone, just two weeks ago. For three days, leading up to her birthday, she was unable to make phone calls, and likewise, nobody could call in. There are other anomalies around this whole event, which I may try to explain later.

[Edit: For a period of two years, when the harassment was most intense, there would be a variety of problems at my mom's place - from a broken front door lock (steel piece split right in half), to a vandalized shoe brush on the front porch, to dead car battery several times, to power failures, to plugged and overflowing toilet (my mother actually broke down and cried, which she is not prone to doing, simply because so many things seemed to be going wrong), to a stereo that would randomly come on - it has not done so since, to countless computer/internet difficulties, and so on. Why the toilet? During my first 5 years at my current apartment, I experienced blatant harassment from my landlords, and one 'problem' was a deliberately plugged toilet. I believe my surveillers were emboldened in their 'cat-and-mouse' tactics of wearing down one's resistance.]

Getting back to my own phone and internet challenges, last Wednesday to Friday were all very eventful days. For example, I had much difficulty accessing my weblog account with Blogger.com, and I even went out of my way to try posting from different places. Wonder if anyone else was having this same problem? There was no mention of it on Blogger's homepage, nor in their forums. My frantic attempts to post info were useless. I have screenshots of this unusual problem.

More details about phone connections and other communications adventures coming soon. As always, thanks for your patience in reading this piecemeal web journal.