Well, dear readers, I am able to write and post these here notes thanks to something called a personal hot spot. Now, I don’t know about you dear readers, but I think having a personal hot spot is too too (oot oot, spelled backwards). Of course, I had no idea what a personal hot spot was but I thankfully found out. There are a million stories in the naked city – this is one of them.
Around one-thirty yesterday afternoon there were four big ol’ AT&T trucks outside and I could see them working on the lines. This always makes me nervous because I feel that kind of thing is what causes power outages and blackouts. So, I’m merrily working away on the computer, trying to choose the last of the songs by watching stuff on the Tube of You when I suddenly have no Internet. Time Warner has had no problems in months, so I immediately thought that those morons outside did something. So, I walked right out there and confronted them and they laughed (yes, they LAUGHED) and said they’d accidentally gotten the lift thing that lifts them up to the phone lines tangled with my Time Warner cable line and it was down. I said, “Really? Well, why don’t you just fix it right now because I’m trying to work here?” They replied that they don’t fix anything that’s not AT&T. I said, “You screwed it and you think you have no responsibility?” They said they cannot legally touch anything from another carrier and that I’d have to call Time Warner and have them do it, and then apologized. I couldn’t believe it.
I called Time Warner and got a really nice lady and she told me this crap happens ALL the time and that they were right, they can’t touch Time Warner equipment. So, unfortunately the earliest she could get someone to me is this morning between ten and eleven. She said she’d put in an emergency request to the dispatcher and that maybe something would free up before seven. Of course that didn’t happen. Not having the Internet was a real problem, as you might imagine, and I was hopping mad, but then Richard Sherman came over and I had such a fun time with him that that all just went out the window for that ninety minutes. We talked about the CD were going to do, which I shall call Unsung Sherman Brothers – it will contain one complete score, one partial score, and three songs from a film musical that never happened. For the latter he only has the orchestra tracks by someone named Irwin Kostal, and so I will have the grand fun of putting vocals on those tracks. He played me those three songs and they’re classic Sherman Brothers and the film that never was will completely surprise you. These were three projects that all fell apart within a year of each other, so he’s thrilled we can finally get them into the world. I’m putting it on the fast track now. The complete score is with my audio restoration guy. The partial score is on LP and hasn’t been transferred to CD, so Doug Haverty can do that, as he has one of those USB turntables. That’s the bulk of the album. Then we’ll have the three orchestra tracks put into Pro Tools and we’ll go record those vocals in two weeks or so, which is when I’ll probably announce the CD. I think I’ll have him sign the first 100 booklets as a special thing.
So, Richard left, and then I went back to being annoyed immediately. Doug called and I bemoaned my situation and he asked if I knew about the personal hot spot, which I did not. He said you set it up on your iPhone and then your iPhone does its thing with your computer and you suddenly have the Internet. I called Apple immediately, got a great gal on the phone, and she talked me through it all and two minutes later I was back on the Internet on my big boy computer. Whew.
Prior to that I’d gotten seven hours of sleep, had a pastrami sandwich for my meal o’ the day, and picked up one little package. In the evening, I did the shorter jog, wasn’t in the mood to watch anything, and then I met Doug Haverty after his show. I had that three scoops o’ stuff thing – two scoops of chicken salad, one scoop of egg salad, which is pretty calorie friendly, especially as I only ate about a third of the scoop of egg salad. We shared a little coffee cake thing for dessert.
Today, she of the Evil Eye comes, so I’ll be up by eight-thirty. I’m if I’m feeling it, I’ll do a jog, and that would get me back home by about nine-forty. The Time Warner Man is supposed to be here between ten and eleven and obviously I’m stuck here until then. Then I’ll go do some stuff, then come back home, finish the last of the song choices and hopefully be fully cast. Then I’ll perhaps have a nice meal somewhere fun.
Tomorrow I have a work session with Kay Cole and John Boswell, and I have to do a show order, begin writing commentary and finish writing two sets of liner notes. Next week is hugely busy.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, jog, get my Time Warner back up and running, do errands and whatnot, hopefully pick up some packages, finish song choices, and then have a nice but calorie-friendly meal. Today’s topic of discussion: What have been your most heinous computer and Internet problems? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy that I now have found my personal H spot.