I’ve actually had three calls today on my phone. Plus one where I called myself but I’m sure that doesn’t count. All three calls were from our friend Jay the Contractor about the plumbing we’re having put in. He told me that my voice mail was broken the last time he called.

Voice mail is something AT&T/Cingular likes to screw up. I had troubles with my last phone once because Cingular CHANGED THE NUMBER you had to call and forgot to tell anyone about it. I called them several times before someone told me the new number.

Well, this time it was a mess. I called and the recorded message told me to hold down the “1” key on the cell phone. That works for every phone EXCEPT the iPhone. I finally got through to a barely comprehendible operator who told me to call Apple and gave me the wrong number. His number gave me an 1-800 number for “location services” whatever that is. I called back and got another operator who told me I had to call Apple but who then connected me with the Apple recording that told me I had to call back tomorrow during business hours.

My next try was the intarweb. AT&T’s site gave me a Flash animation that told me to hold down the “1” key (useless). Apple’s site gave me TWO documents that told me just to hit the “Voicemail” button in the phone application which did NOTHING. Apple’s site also gave me a doc that pointed me to a NON-EXISTENT settings menu to reset my password.

I finally went back to the AT&T site and found a way to RESET MY PASSWORD (it’s somewhere in my account under my phone options for the iPhone). That fixed things and got voicemail turned on. SHEESH.

I could make a list of the things that annoy me about my iPhone. It stuttered playing a podcast of Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me, it rebooted when I tried to open Twinkle and even with Wifi, 3G, and the GPS turned off it still sucks battery. But it’s still fun. It’s amazingly good for watching Youtube videos and I got sucked into watching music videos again.

I suppose that’s all there is. My uncle now knows that I know that he’s been in an accident. I didn’t get a call back from the social worker. I didn’t get a call back from the arborist I called. So life continues apace.

I spent most of this beautiful day in the basement, shredding a box of bank statements. It was 11 years of stuff my dad had saved, and I even found phone bills that had my college girlfriend’s phone number on it. 1984 certainly was a long time ago. I filled two large garbage sacks with the shreddings and took those to the dump. I also returned cans, as we do here in Oregon for the deposit, and stuck 632 pennies in a Coinstar machine. Really, a lot of effort with little visible benefit, though I do have several more paper cuts to show for my labors.

I went out and bought a car charger for my iPhone yesterday and I’m convinced the kid at the Apple Store was 100% correct in sending me to Radio Shack to find the Griffin charger that only cost $23. The cable is USB and can also be used as a data cable. I bought it when I thought I’d have to make a mad dash to Spokane to see my uncle in the hospital and didn’t think my battery would last for the 6-hour trip. I’m getting stories that everything is OK up in Spokane and my aunt doesn’t want us Portland relatives to know what’s going on yet. Like I said yesterday, they’re very private people. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for them.

I finally went to the Household Hazardous Waste station to get rid of the old paint and random poisons from the basement and my old boss was still there! She and I went to Portland State and took Chemistry together so we gossiped a bit before I left.

Unfortunately, I got a phone call in the middle of the day that added a bit of unwanted excitement to my life. My 94-year-old uncle in Spokane, WA (my dad’s cousin, really) fell down some stairs a week ago and busted up his ribs and hit his head. His neighbor called me and told me that I was the first relative she found, and that the social worker wanted to declare my aunt incompetent so they could send some aid workers that she was refusing. The thing is, my aunt and uncle are pretty independent. They don’t even want me to know that there’s anything going on. I remember my dad and uncle called each others a couple times a year and their conversation was, “How are you?” “OK. And you?” “OK.” “OK, bye.” “OK, bye.”

I made some calls and there are other family friends taking care of things up there. I think I may be his closest living US relative, but what can I do? Especially since I know my aunt and uncle told the family friends not to call us and tell us what’s happening. I just know because of the neighbor. Fortunately, it sounds (third-hand) that my uncle will be OK to go home soon and his head is fine. But I’d like to hear that from a doctor of some sort.

My mom and I were just joking that our family reunion would mean driving across town to my sister’s place or, if we wanted to go all-out, driving up to my uncle’s place. Zemblanity.

The battery life on my iPhone 3G is awfully short. All I did, really, was use iTunes and it was dead within half a day. I suppose I should turn off 3G and GPS while I’m at work because the don’t work well inside my building. I even had Wifi turned off. Ah, well, that’s what I get for buying a new toy, I guess.

I was fairly tired today because I woke up again last night. This time I had a nightmare that I was losing my job. I’m pretty sure that I’m doing OK, but every day a customer asks a question where I have to research the answer and make sure I’m not telling them the wrong thing. And every day I find out that the answers aren’t easy to find. They’re either in someone’s head, or written down on Post-it notes in another country. I told my co-worker about my nightmare and he said losing the job is his fantasy.

And since it is Friday night in the summer, I stayed in and watched Monk and Psych. They did not disappoint but I’m fairly sure this puts me on the “boring” end of the spectrum. At least I figured out how to “Twitter” from my iPhone (finally).

My sister wanted me to get on twitter. I’m not really a huge fan. I mean, really:

• I just took a crap.
• Check out the size of the nose-nugget I just pulled outta my head.
• It’s almost noon and I’m hungry.
• WHO THE %#$^ CARES?!

But whatever. I decided to try it anyway because I’m foolish and there’s a plugin for the iPhone. It doesn’t seem to work, but I keep trying it. The one for Facebook seems to be better. I still haven’t succumbed to “Super Monkey Ball” but I just go the thing.

And I’m staying up too late watching Burn Notice. That’s a twitter-like comment, isn’t it?

Finally, AT&T figured it out. I called up this morning and told them I still had problems getting an iPhone and I convinced the guy to look at my account again for my “IRU” problems. He said something like, “IRU, huh? <type type type> OK, fixed.” I asked him if it would take another 24 hours to get it to Apple’s computer and he said, “No, just wait 15 seconds and you’ll be OK.” FIFTEEN SECONDS. Well, I figured that was something I hadn’t heard from any of the other AT&T guys, and I went back to the Apple Store and now I have my iPhone! (They had a bunch sitting there for sale today, too.) So now I’m trying to figure out what to load onto my iPhone. I guess I just crashed it!

Someone told me (again) that people in Oregon are stand-offish. Oregonians only hang out with people they went to high school with. This is a great theory since both of us native Oregonians do seem to hang out together, but a hell of a lot of people here are from all over. I can’t believe all the Minnesotans brought their high school friends with them, for example, just so they could form their own Minnesota clique. I’m just guessing she’s at that age where everyone else is a breeder and can only think of their kid and soccer camp and Lego camp and basketball camp and whatever else you use to distract your kid so they don’t drive you insane. If you don’t have a kid you end up hanging out with whatever psychopath is left or those people who had kids when they were 12 and are rid of their parental obligations until the grandkids come along. At least that’s my theory for today.

So on and on I go about this damn phone. I called up AT&T today and the guy on the other end of the line told me that he saw nothing on my account that would stop me from getting a phone. NOTHING. Of course I didn’t really believe him, but I did the whole telephone version of nodding my head and saying, “Sure, I believe you,” though really I didn’t.

Jumping to the gym part of my usual daily routine, I did go even thought I was almost asleep most of the day. It was quite humid and still last night and I woke up at 2AM and had to go get a drink of water. That’s not something I do that often. Usually I can just roll over and think dark thoughts about being awake until I fall asleep again. In short, not a great night of sleep. I heard most other people had the same problem. It was supposed to be good and chilly last night and nice and cool today, but it was 91°F and that ain’t cool for an Oregonian. But I digress.

So there I was at the gym, when Devon (who stood in line with me at the iPhone launch) was complaining about how her new iPhone quit working with SIM card errors. I figured if she was going to go to the Apple Store to get her iPhone fixed, I’d go and see what they had to tell me. Fortunately for her, we had the Apple Store diagnose her phone and then went to the AT&T store for a new SIM card.

Unfortunately for me, I still don’t have my iPhone. The guy from AT&T earlier in the day was mistaken; I still had something wrong with my account. But there is good news. Even though all of the news sites like MacWorld and iPodLounge told me that Apple is out of phones and even though there was a big sign that said the Apple Store we went to was out of phones, THEY STILL HAD MY iPHONE IN THE BACK! All they could do is bring out the little bag with my white 16G iPhone box and the silicon case I chose and taunt me with it as AT&T denies my account, but still it’s back there and there’s still hope!

Yeah, I know. I really need to get a girlfriend and/or a life.

So now I’m just cheating on my days of no iPhone. I didn’t even try to get one today, though I did sit around and complain about not having one for several hours. I’m still waiting for AT&T to call me on Tuesday and I’m hoping that they clear my account. Then I’m off to the Apple store to get my iPhone. Or at least that’s my fantasy. Pretty boring fantasies these days, but at least this one is possible.

I’m incredibly tired tonight. It’s been hot, I’ve been staying up too late, and the workouts at the gym aren’t exactly restful. But it’s Monday and my obsession with Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives must be satisfied. I’m going to be a zombie tomorrow.

I’ve decided that the only fun I’m going to have from this whole iPhone ordeal is to go down to the Apple store every day and try to buy one. EVERY DAY. The Apple Store is not nearly as annoying as the AT&T store, even though I never get an iPhone from either of them. At least the Apple Store actually has iPhones and tries to get me one before they cheerfully tell me that I’m screwed.

It’s probably a futile new hobby, but it’s probably better than the Yahoo Personals ad that I have. I now have someone sending me short email greetings, but it’s going to cost me $26 to reply to her just to have her tell me that I’m not the droid she’s looking for. Or whatever. It’s intarweb dating, after all.

I didn’t get to the Apple Store today because I had to clean more of the basement. I was hoping that my sister could come to help and bring her pickup truck but she was sick and I had to go over to her place to get it. And it was 93°F today and the pickup truck seemed to have the heater on. Ah, well. At least I succeeded in getting rid of a lot more crap.

You may recall that yesterday I was told to wait for 24 hours for my “corporate discount” to clear from my AT&T account and then return to the Apple Store to buy my iPhone. The “corporate discount” was what was keeping me from being eligible for an iPhone and theory was that it took 15 minutes to clear the “corporate discount” off of the AT&T computer but it took 24 hours for that data to get to Apple. Well, I returned at 1PM, 27 hours after I cancelled my “corporate discount” and I still wasn’t able to get my iPhone. In fact, the kid at the Apple Store just told me to buy it at AT&T (who are out, of course).

I tried calling AT&T Customer Service on my Blackberry, but they hung up on me. I hoofed it over to the nearest AT&T Store and had them check their computers to see if I was eligible and they saw no reason why I wasn’t. I decided to use their phone to see if the people at the “main office” on the other end of the phone had any other ideas. Turns out I’m ineligible for the low price of $199 8GB/$299 16GB price because I got a phone within the last two years. But I was also ineligible for the $399/$499 price for people who are willing to sign up for two more years of service. I was only eligible for the $599/$699 price and they weren’t even offering that at this time. And they couldn’t find anything in my file that explained why I was ineligible. They put me on hold to find a manager.

As you can see, it took almost 23 minutes on hold to find a manager and submit a “case” so they could look into why I’m not getting an iPhone.

On the bright side, I was able to go to Borders Books again and use my discount coupons for CDs. At least Borders seems to want my money.

7:45 AM

Get in line at the Apple Store.

7:55 AM

(A friend shows up and gets cutsies.)

8:00 AM

They start selling the iPhone.

9:00 AM

(Another friend shows up and gets cutsies.)

9:30 AM

One of the kids in line ahead of me goes to the AT&T store and finds out they only have 10 more phones but there’s 30 people in line.

10:30 AM

I call 611 to make double-check that I’m not a “Corporate Client.” The written instructions on the web said that the only thing that prevents me from buying the phone at the Apple Store is if I’m a “Corporate Client.”

11:30AM

The kid in line ahead of me tells me that there’s a new rule: if you get any sort of business discount on your phone, you can’t buy the iPhone at the Apple Store. So I call 611 again and get AT&T to cancel my discount; they tell me it’ll take 15 minutes.

12:30 PM

I finally make it into the store. The computer rejects me because I’m a corporate client. The Apple “Specialist” calls AT&T and finds out that my discount is cleared off the AT&T computer in 15 minutes, but isn’t sent to Apple for up to 24 hours. I’m given a coupon and sent on my way.

So that’s what I got after waiting in line for five hours (and a year after seeing it at WWDC 2007) instead of an iPhone. A *%!&@# coupon. I should have known. Every time I got a new phone from Cingular, I had to call customer service to clear up my service. I was even told once, after being transferred four times, to just do whatever I could to get a phone and then call in to fix things because there’s no way the web site would do the right thing.

I did, however, buy an iPhone for one of the friends who got cutsies. She forgot to bring enough money.

Update – 8:30PM

I went back tonight because I’m foolish. It was only 14 hours, not the 24 hours they suggested. No joy. I followed up by going to the AT&T store and who did I see but the guy who helped me with my iPhone! He’s having troubles as well. In any case, AT&T saw no problems with my account, but Apple did. Phooey.