I've just cut short (meaning: run away from) the last in a series of really irritating conversations following the template of, "now why was it this guy is telling me to spend more money on this thing to replace one I already own that appears to work just fine? That explanation sounds like bullshit to me, give me one I believe." Then the music stops.

So I go out to the main room, and say to Barry, who's on the phone, "by the way, the T1 to above.net seems to be down." He says, "yeah, that's probably because the carpenter was tugging on it just now." I say, "huh," and wait for him to finish his phone call.

This is me trying to be calm. "So when you say tugging, what exactly do you mean by that?"

"I mean, he was up on the ladder yanking on the thing! Like it was in the way and he was trying to rip it out! My head just about exploded!"

This is me trying to be calm. "Huh. Well, you know, that means all that wire is shot. That's how Cat5 is: if you stretch it at all, it's not Cat5 any more. What makes it be Cat5 is the frequency of the windings inside."

So I say, "Hmmm, I guess this time we should put it in conduit, like" (I point) "this flexible metal stuff over here. Do we have more of that? Where do we get that? When you buy it, does it have a string inside or something so you can pull wire through? How's that work?" He doesn't know. Let's call our electrician and ask him.

Phil says, "Oh man, you don't want to string wires through conduit yourself -- that would take us hours, and we've done it before and have the right tools."

Barry hangs up and tells me this. And I say, "Ok, what am I supposed to do with that information? Because we still need it done... Can Phil or one of his guys come out and do it tonight?"

"I'll call back and ask." ... "He's not answering."

This is me trying to be calm. "Ok, uh, I'm going home now. Give me a call if I'm going to be spending all night standing on a ladder. Oh, by the way -- we don't have enough Cat5 left either."

Oh, and somewhere in that conversation, the carpenter came over and said, "uh, I think I just nicked those phone lines again. Sorry..."