My fiancé and I are pretty happy with our phone service, and we’ve even got a nice cordless phone, rather than the BT phone that was in the house when we got here. The range of services offered by our current provider are certainly better than some! See link included. Hehehe And whilst we don’t need phone systems for a business or anything like that, we do like to ensure that our phone is reliable and won’t cut out on us willy nilly.

Anyway, so we want to change our phone number, because there’s too many people who have the number who we don’t want to have the number. We’re just hoping that when we call up on Monday to have the number changed, they don’t charge us heaps and heaps or making us buy some digital dect cordless phones or something lest they just not change the number. Our phone company seems to sometimes enjoy ransoming certain services, at least, that’s what it feels like when you call them to ask for something.

They’re not a bad company, really, but their customer service leaves a lot to be desired. They were bought out a while back and whilst they’ve since been easier to get on the phone, they’re seem a little more big company than they did before, if that makes sense.

Anyway, onto good things! Knitting!!! This pattern is a funny little pattern. It’s a Cat Hoodie. Now, that’s a very cute idea, and I really want to make one. Seriously, can you see how cute the cats are in their little hooded jumpers there? I know many of the kitties don’t like to wear their little tops there, but they look so cute, and I’d make one for each of my cats just in case they’d not mind wearing it. Perhaps not unsupervised, just because they could get caught it in or get it caught on something and get stuck, but when I’m around, I’d love to see them napping in a nice little handknit!

Whenever I’m out, I have my mobile phone in the front pocket of my leather back pack. I hear it ring probably one in five time, I’d say, and that is so very annoying. My fiancé will try to ring me, and will have to try over and over, because if there is any noise at all, as in people talking on the bus, I’ll not hear my phone. It’s so vexing!

I’ve got the thing as loud as it will go, it’s just not that loud a phone. It made me consider getting a new phone, even though my phone is less than a year old. I went into a store today to get an idea of what’s around and for how much, and let’s just say that no, I won’t be getting a new phone – I knit myself a lanyard instead! – and sheesh, now I remember why I shop online!

I go into the store, and I’m greeted by an older fellow who works there. I tell him why I’m there, and then he proceeds to show me a selection of mobile phones, stressing which ones had mobile broadband. I told him I didn’t care for a broadband connection on my mobile phone, as I already had a very good broadband connection on my PC at home.

He takes this as a chance to start talking about their broadband plans – mine is far, far better – at which point he switches direction again and starts trying to sell me home phones, Panasonic cordless digital phones to be precise, and I start to really chuck my ‘nana and just want to get out of there. He’s going on and on trying to sell me business and office telephone systems, and all really fast. He spoke so quickly I didn’t have a chance to get a word in for ages, and by the time he started going on about how crappy BT’s services were in comparison with theirs and at this stage I put my hand up so he stopped, said “this is ridiculous, you’re a terrible salesman and very rude” and left.

Goodness me it felt great getting out of there like that! So bold! Now, for a pattern, today it’s something phone related, but also something spinning related! A pretty little purse and phone cozy made with handspun! Perfect!

First off, let me just say, I’m back! Yep, I was all sick and stuffed up for the last two weeks, and couldn’t bring myself to do much of anything, but in the last few days I’ve started feeling great! I’m even doing some very belated Spring Cleaning! Well, I figure it’s spring on the other side of the world, so it’s all good.

Now, not this weekend just past but the one before that I noticed a rather alarming slow-down in my internet connection. I say alarming because my fiance and I have been playing a new MMORPG, Aion, and we’ve been freaking loving it! More on that story later – yes that was a Dead Ringers reference. It’s been slowing down to the point that we thought we had used up all our allotted downloads, and were in fact now on dial-up speed. We checked, and though we were close to our limit – from downloading Aion in the first week of the month – we weren’t over it, and after an hour or so our connection seemed okay again. During the week I called and upped our download limit so we won’t run out of MB before the end of the month, and I plan to just take it back down to normal the month after that.

The same thing happened this weekend, so I checked online thinking there was no way we would have reached our quota – now at 50 gig per month from 25 gig – and I found that we were dreadfully close to 25 gig, and that the service hadn’t been changed… even though I ordered it on Monday and here it was Saturday afternoon…

So I called the company again! Now, this is my phone, cable TV, and internet all rolled into one. So I was on hold for 20 minutes, and their hold music is incredibly loud and offensive rock type crap that was so loud, I had to turn my phone down to almost the lowest volume setting. When I finally got to talk to someone, they were so friendly and chipper that I felt rather bad for being as hostile as I had been on the phone. They checked our line and found some irregularities, so they were going to send someone out to fix it on the Tuesday, and they sorted out the downloads being upped. It’s enough to make me want a damn SDSL internet connection, but I’ll stick to what I’ve got, because I can’t afford anything else, and heck, cable broadband should be good enough!

I went with this company because they weren’t one of the mega telecoms companies, thinking I’d get better service, and it was that way for years, but since they were bought by a new company, they haven’t been as good. They’re probably a subsidiary of BT by now, and I really didn’t want any of the BT home phones packages. I’m not saying they’re bad just because they are a big company, just saying I thought the customer service on a smaller one would be better.

I’ve become so anti-social that I have having a telephone system at all, but I suppose it’s necessary so I’ll keep it, but goodness I just want a quiet weekend where everything continues to work!

Okay pattern for today has to be electrical inspired… Captain Capacitor is the right way to go, I reckon!

I don’t want to spend a heck of a lot of money on any new cordless phones, I just want one that’s not so quiet I can’t hear it when the phone rings and I’m not in the same room. Seriously, the phone is connected to the modem, so it’s in my fiancé’s study. If we are in the lounge, the room next to my fiancé’s study, and are watching TV or a movie, we can’t hear the phone until the person is either leaving a message, or more likely even after that when the machine plays a few seconds of their hang-up sound.

Beep, beep, beep. Yep, then you know you’ve had a call. You go out there and think, should I call them back right now? Should I leave it? And it’s all very annoying! So anyway, I was perusing the net, because I don’t want to go out shopping with no idea, and there are a few that look nice, but I wish I could ask in store “Can you make it ring?” I’d feel rather uncomfortable asking that, though, so yeah.

I’m just glad that it isn’t anything else! Have you seen the price of new computers at the moment? I mean I’m really glad I don’t have to fork out that kind of cash! Fax machines too! I’ve never used a fax machine, and I don’t really care to learn. They seem very outdated now, to me. Office equipment in general is really expensive, so I suppose I should just be glad all I’ve got to get is a new phone!

Okay now for a knitting pattern. This pattern went up sometime today or yesterday, and I just think these little fingerless mitts are very, very cute! Could be a better colour, I’ll grant you that, but I still think the pattern is adorable!

Now, what I was going to write of today. I have been considering for some time the idea of selling my wares. Little things I make, wheat packs, knitted scarves, certain items of clothing, that sort of thing. What I have been pausing about was whether it was worth it to do this out of my home to people in my community, or to do this online. If I do it in my own community, then I have to get a secondary phone line specifically for that, I don’t want to tie up a phone that my fiancé has to share with me. That would also mean another phone, and having to decide which of the telephones and cordless phones to choose between. I hate having to find those sorts of things! I just asked my fiancé and he said the Panasonic KX phones are alright, especially the ones that come with an inbuilt answering machine, so I would never miss an order and I wouldn’t have to get any call logging or anything. I don’t know how to get a second phone line set up in the house, I would have to ask a telecoms companies about it.

Then there’s the net option, which I will include in the next entry, as I don’t want this one to be mammoth sized!

As for today’s knitting pattern, I think it will have to be a cute little cap with leaf motif. I can’t wear these sorts of hats, I look ridiculous, but they are still cute.