The Storm

So, a storm blew through and it was a doozy. 

It was a quiet normal Sunday.  Mom and R were in the living room watching the NASCAR race and I was in my room, watching Yellowstone.  I knew we had a chance of rain and maybe a storm, but I didn't pay much mind to it.  When I heard the rain and wind starting to pelt my bedroom window I again, didn't think much of it.  It's been awhile since we had a bad storm and this one didn't sound THAT bad.  That's when my phone started to scream.

Growing up we knew to take a storm seriously when we heard the sirens going off.  I'm sure most people growing up in the 80s would easily recognize those sirens.  Originally placed for nuclear war warnings, they now serve as tornado warnings.  Back then they went off fairly often as it was difficult to accurately predict when a tornado was coming.  So we were also used to a lot of false alarms.  But now a days that warning comes primarily from our phones.  And when it sounds off, you need to take it seriously as they're much better at predicting real problems and real tornados.  

Naturally, I pause my video and check out the warning on the phone.  It isn't a thunderstorm watch or a thunderstorm warning, it's a tornado warning.  I head out into the living room and let Mom and Roy know (Mom tends to ignore her phone, even with this type of warning).  Roy immediately heads outside to see how bad the storm is and to see if he can spot anything truly bad coming our way.  I get mom to turn to the local news channel where we can get more up to date and specific information and find out that the tornado warning area is HUGE.  It's most of the county we live in.  Normally they're smaller and more finely defined.  But they had their reason.  This wasn't a single tornado, it was three.  

Now, in these modern times there are several ways they note and predict tornados.  People reporting an actual tornado is rare.  Now it's most often found via radar.  They'll see the wind stating to circle and know it's almost assuredly a tornado.  This time the radar said there were three tornados all fairly close to each other.  

The safest route would be to get into our basement. We don't have 'internal' rooms so if we're on the main floor or upstairs we're always going to be within range of a window that might blow out.  BUT, getting mom into the basement isn't something we can take easily.  She has a big risk of falling down the stairs, both heading down to the basement and back up.  The basement, at this time of year, is also cold.  So we'd have to get her dressed into warmer clothes.  And then there's the oxygen situation.  We could bring her portable concentrator but she doesn't breathe as easily on that as she does her big concentrator.  

So, considering the local TV station was saying that the tornados were all north of us and heading in a north easterly direction, we decided to stay where we were.  That's why it was surprising we didn't hear the crash.  

After the storm calmed down we stayed near the TV to make sure there wasn't another burst coming through.  R went outside to see the damage.  His report wasn't bad for us, but a large fully mature tree across the street split in half and fell.  Most of it was in the grass but the upper branches ended up in the road.  That wasn't the problem though.  The problem is that it hit the wire running in front of it.  

Those wires are evidently mighty strong as it didn't break the wire.  Instead it pulled on the pole and pulled it down with it.  And not just that pole, but the poles to either side of it.  Three utility poles.  

Thankfully, the wire wasn't electrical as those run on the opposite side (our side) of the street.  This wire was the cable/phone.  Here's a photo I took:

You can obviously see the tree and the pole, both in the street.  Yes, that's our garbage can and our mailbox as our house is right behind me in the photo.  See that wire in the street?  See how it's heading toward our house?  That's going to be the star of this story.  

The wire snaked its way across our lawn, was hanging from a branch of a tree in front of our house, and made its way up to the house peak where it was still connected.  Yeah, we didn't lose cable (which is our television, phone, and internet).  

As the storms had passed I thought it important to report the downed wire.  I wasn't 100% sure that Xfinity, our internet/tv/phone provider, was the one to report the damage to, so I reported it to the local electric utility company.  It sucks as the only way to report it is to report an outage.  I mean, there ended up being over 200,000 people without power and here I was adding to that burden, but someone had to know that the pole/wire/tree were down across the road.  

Surprisingly they came out within an hour.  Unsurprisingly they didn't do anything but put up plastic tape across the street, blocking it off to traffic.  Funnily enough, it didn't take 20 minutes after they were gone for a car to drive through the tape.  Which, when they came to the pole/wire/tree, meant they had to stop, back up in our driveway and turn around anyway.  Idiots.  

That was the fun for the rest of the night, watching people try to drive through and all of them realizing there was no safe path through.  

We didn't think much of it after that and went to bed.  I had my neurologist appointment in the morning and since it was over an hour's drive away and at 7 AM, I had my alarm set for 3:30 AM.  I got up and while getting ready for my shower could look out the window and see that someone at some point had come back and put the warning tape back up.  Unfortunately that meant someone else had to drive through it.  Me.  Our driveway sat between the tape and the pole/wire/tree, leaving me no out but to drive through the tape to leave my neighborhood.  

And yes, I did contemplate going around the road blocked by the tape, but that would mean going through a neighbor's lawn and after the big rain, I knew I'd be leaving damage behind.  

Anyway, between my leaving around 5 AM and getting back around 9 AM, someone had come out and worked on the pole/wire/tree.  I say worked instead of cleared as they didn't clear the street.  They pulled the pole out of the street, moved some of the debris, but didn't move the tree at all.  They did, however, cut the cable crossing the street.  There went our Internet/TV/phone.  

Obviously the next step is letting Xfinity know that we were without their service.  And let me tall you I HATE Xfinity.  They don't have transparent pricing and make it as difficult as possible to contact one of their representatives for a person to person conversation.  BUT, I didn't have a choice as they needed to fix their shit.  

My first try was reporting the outage online.  It should be easy enough, right?  Nope.  They now have an 'AI' virtual assistant.  The assistant can't just take the fucking message that our Internet/TV/phone is out.  Nope.  They have to walk you through diagnostics to make sure the problem is on our side instead of theirs.  It shouldn't be necessary as the fucking physical cable between their service and our house is not split in two... but I still had to listen to it try and walk me through unplugging and plugging in all the cables.  

Their system is so shitty, that on the first try it asked if I would try unplugging and plugging everything in.  I knew it wasn't that, so I said no.  It then said that this would help their tech to diagnose our problem, the problem of the physical wire being severed, and asked again.  When I again said that I wouldn't do that, it basically told me to fuck off and asked if there was anything else I wanted.  

So I did what any reasonable person would do.  I lied.  

"Would you please unplug and plug in all the cable?"  

"Yes" 

"Did that fix the problem?" 

"No"

It then said it needed to run a diagnostic on the modem.  Of course it couldn't find the modem.  That's when their fucked up system fucked up.  It simply crashed and wouldn't report that we were without Internet/TV/phone.  

So, I called them.  A similar AI virtual assistant was there too.  And yes, it made me say that I'd unplugged and plugged everything back in before it would let me report.  But it didn't understand so I eventually by screaming "OPERATOR" over and over, got it to connect me to a live person.  I'm sure the person they connected me to was a very nice woman sitting in India or Pakistan.  Her accent was as bad as you'd think and she was obviously a low level tech following a script.  I started by explaining what had happened.  Tornado.  Poles fell.  Wire cut. Naturally, she wanted me to unplug and plug everything back in.  I sat there for 45 seconds, tapping my foot, and then told her I'd done it and it didn't fix anything.  She then, naturally, said she needed to remotely connect to our modem to run a diagnostic. 

From starting the process of reporting the problem online, to getting off the phone with crazy woman, it took an hour and a half.    And what did I get?  An appointment the following morning for a tech to come out.  Oh, and she reminded me that we could still get internet by simply connecting to the xfinity wifi signal.  Yeah.  The signal that would be coming across the wire that was now split in half.  Fucking idiot. 

In the meantime, I had to deal with an internet/phone/tv outage.  The phone wasn't really a problem as we no longer get a lot of important calls through our landline.  Everyone calls our cell phones.  The internet wasn't too bad as we all had our cell phones and they were all working properly.  R and I set up our phones as wifi hotspots so we even had our computers online.  I did the same for Mom so she'd have access to her tablet.  Through the Xfinity Stream app, she could stream live TV through her tablet as well.  It certainly wasn't ideal as she was moving from watching TV on a 50 inch OLED TV to a fairly substandard 10 inch Samsung LED tablet.  But it would be enough to get through the day and at least hear what the tech had to say.  

A quick aside, this has happened before.  I don't remember exactly when, but we had to use our phones as internet for an extended period of time.  At the time Mom and I were on Verizon and had a 50 Gb limit on wifi hotspot data.  When we hit that limit, it slowed the data down so much that streaming video wasn't possible.  I called Verizon and said I needed that high speed hotspot data back and would be willing to pay whatever price they had... but they said there was no plan that offered more high speed data and that I was, more or less, fucked.  It turns out that THEY were fucked as I was able to switch our service over to GoogleFi that same day.  

GoogleFi has two unlimited data plans.  The biggest difference between them is the wifi hotspot data limit.  The less expensive one has a 5 GB limit on wifi hotspot.  The more expensive one, only $30 more a month for two lines, has a 50 GB limit.  And even then, you can buy more data.  It's expensive at $10 per Gb over 50 Gb, but it's still possible to have 'unlimited' high speed data.  And for Mom's comfort I'd be willing to have a $500 or $1000 phone bill for the month if needed.  Needless to say, I changed us to the higher data plan.  Thankfully the month switched as of this morning. I say that because in the two days we were using hotspot data, Mom used 35 GB of data and I used 36 GB.  Ouch.  

Later that afternoon, I realized I could help mom out a bit more.  I had the TV connect to her wifi hotspot and set her up with all of the streaming options we have.  Netflix, YouTube, Hulu, Disney, Max, Paramount, Peacock, Apple TV, and even Xfinity Stream.  I though this would be perfect as she could watch the live TV through the Xfinity Stream app on the TV.  But yea, Xfinity is full of bastards.  While their app on tablets and phones works just fine, the TV app requires it to stream through a connection to an Xfinity wifi.    

Now, for me and probably even for R, this would be good enough.  About the only live TV I watch is college football in the fall.  Mom could watch most of her shows through Paramount, Peacock, and Hulu, it would just be the day after they originally aired.  She could also watch any streaming service.  But that's not how she consumes TV.  She primarily watches live news.  CNN, MSNBC, and local news.  So, she was stuck watching a few of her shows on the streaming services but mostly still watching the news on her tablet.  

The next morning the tech came.  He seemed embarrassed as the problem was so obviously over his head that there was nothing he could do.  I mean, this is the type of tech that changes out your cable box, not the type of tech that puts new utility poles in the ground.  He said he'd report the problem to his supervisor, take some photos, and contact their construction team to come out and fix the problem.  He naturally had no estimate for how long we would be without service but we both agreed it was likely going to be measured in weeks and not hours.  

Figuring we were in for a major wait and not liking the idea of mom watching most of her TV through a small(ish) tablet, I decided it would be best to set up YouTube TV.  

Another quick aside, I've used YouTube TV once before.  During the pandemic when B and I were living in my aunt's/cousin's house, they came by for a visit.  We had to vacate the house so that they could use it, and instead of going to a hotel, we just got an Airbnb.  They had a streaming box on their TV but didn't have any cable television.  This was during football season and we naturally wanted to watch the game so I set up the free trial of YouTube TV.  I liked the service but we only needed it for the day.  

For the next couple years whenever I wanted to give YouTube TV a try (I occasionally try to talk Mom into ditching Xfinity TV), it wouldn't let me set up the free trial as I'd already HAD a free trial.  This was even true last autumn.  But now, when I'm willing to pay the $80 just so mom can watch Rachel Maddow on the big screen, it let me sign up for a 21 day free trial.  

Anyway, I got it set up on both the big TV in the living room and the little TV in the dining room.  Mom can now get up, put on the Today show or Morning Joe and play on her phone.  She can then move into the living room, put on the local station and play on her phone.  Both the tech and setting up YouTube TV was yesterday.  I didn't expect anything else to happen for a few days at least.  

Xfinity, however, got something right.  Not only did a construction crew come out that afternoon, they immediately started setting up three new utility poles.  As the sun set around 8 PM, all three new poles were in the ground and standing tall.  All they need to do now is run the wire to each of the poles and then run a new wire to our house.  At least that's all I assume needs to happen.  

There are a new batch of storms blowing through this morning, so it's no surprise that as of 10:30 AM they haven't come back out today.  But I expect them to come back either this afternoon or tomorrow and get it all set.  At which time I can cancel the trial of YouTube TV, change my phone plan back to the cheaper unlimited plan, and return to normal.  

I'll either update this post or put a comment in when anything changes.