Serious As A Heart Attack

If you read my last blog post, then you know that I wrote this post about Netflix and a coin toss, emailed it to myself from work, and never received it in my personal email. I still don’t know who I sent it to. Hopefully not the CEO of the company!

Of course, now I’m reading the post and I’m thinking it’s probably not as funny as I thought it was when I was furiously writing (during my designated break times only, of course) that day and I feel like the build up might be better than the result. Unfortunately for you readers, I’ve got actual plans outside the house tonight (as I’m writing this prologue) that involves putting on real pants and “peopling”.

Therefore, I have no time to write something completely from scratch at this late hour so it’s the Netflix blog post for you!

Ever since The Husband Dude and I cut the cable cord, we’ve become subscription TV addicts like the rest of the world. To date, we have Sling TV, Netflix, Hulu and The WWE Network because the boys love their “rasslin”.

It’s probably one of the smartest money decisions we’ve ever made. Even with one of the higher priced packages on Sling TV and all the other subscriptions, plus high-speed internet, we’re still paying $100 less per month than when we had digital cable. We use a cheap antenna like this one for our local channels and it works great!

Cutting the cable cord was interesting, though. I wasn’t sure I would be able to convince The Husband Dude because he and the boy are both TV addicts. We had the big digital cable package with the whole house DVR system (at that time, we had a TV in the living room, in our bedroom and Shane had one in his room). It was awesome in that you could record shows and watch them anywhere and you could pause and fast forward live TV.

It was NOT awesome in that it, combined with our high speed internet, was costing us close to $300 per month and we didn’t even have the premium movie channels like HBO or Showtime. Plus, the customer service was horrible and when something would go wrong that the techies couldn’t fix on the phone, you’d have to sit at home for a window of time because there’s no such thing as an appointment. It’s “we’ll be there some time between 1:00 p.m. and the apocalypse”.

Now, one thing you need to know about me is that I work customer service in my “day” job. Nobody has more sympathy for call center workers than I do, because even though I’m not technically considered a “call center” employee, that’s basically what my job has become. I have to deal with rudeness, craziness, arrogance, entitlement, and ignorance. Usually, a combination of at least three of these.

So when I say I have great patience with people I’m dealing with as a customer, you can believe that I probably go above and beyond the typical customer with my level of politeness, tone, and empathy.

But I am still me. And I’m nothing if not honest. When I feel a company is consistently not providing customer service, I’m not going to tear the low level employees a new asshole, but I’m not going to mince words either.

One of the problems we consistently had with cable was that every time they would introduce a “newer and better” upgraded DVR box/system, the old one would start acting up. Funny how that works.

The Husband Dude and I are “use it until it completely wears out” kind of people. Cars, furniture, appliances, all of it. We probably won’t even move from this stupid house until it finally falls down around us.

We didn’t see any reason to make one of those open-ended appointments for a guy to show off his butt crack while installing the latest, greatest technology when the one we had was working fine. Until it didn’t.

And then, when you call to get something fixed, they try to upsell you even more. That’s where I draw the line.

Customer Service Rep: Thank you for calling <insert name of cable company here>. How may I help you?

Me: My DVR won’t play back anything I’ve recorded. The pause and rewind/fast-forward functions are working on the live TV but I can’t play anything I’ve actually recorded.

CSR: I’m so sorry to hear that. I’m going to send a signal to your box to try to diagnose the problem. While I’m doing that, would you like to hear about our great <insert name of cable company here> Home Security System?

Me: I can’t trust you with thirty episodes of Criminal Minds. Why would I trust you with my family’s security?

Long pause.

CSR: I really can’t argue with that logic.

After all this, and after doing some research and finding ways for us to be able to watch all of our favorite shows, I finally convinced THD that we should cancel the cable. That’s when suddenly, my business became the cable company’s priority. That’s when they transfered me to a higher paid employee that I don’t feel as bad about being rude to, because basically, that’s what they get paid to do.

Higher paid “authority”: We’ve appreciated so much having you as a customer and we hate to see you go. We’d like to offer you one year of cable at the discounted rate of blah, blah, blah.

Me: Ummm…I don’t want to be rude, but I’m going to be rude. If your company really cared that much about keeping me as a customer, you’d offer that rate all the time and not force people to play this song and dance with you to get a lower rate. You know damned good and well that most people are not going to bother and will just suck it up and pay a higher rate. The fact is, I’ve called on a couple of occasions asking for any deals or rates that might be better than the one I had, and all I got offered were packages with fewer channels to reduce my monthly bill. And by the time you add back in your fees and extra charges, the discount isn’t even worth the time I took to make the phone call. So, I’m sorry, but your offer is too little, too late.

BEST. DECISION. EVER.  

Of course, cutting the cable cord didn’t eliminate the age-old problem of couples agreeing what to watch.

The other night, we had a couple of hours and no “regular” shows on, so we decided to watch Netflix. The conversation went something like this:

Me: What was the name of that movie we were talking about the other night?

THD: Which one?

Me: The one that you said you had never seen and I said it’s a must-see and everyone HAS to see it.

THD: I don’t remember.

Me: Me either. Wasn’t it a 90’s movie?

THD: Probably. My gap in movie watching was mostly in the late 80’s and early 90’s because all I was doing was working.

Me: I was in college. What did I see in college that I thought you needed to see?

THD: We should really write this stuff down.

Me: Are there any vigilante movies on here? I love a good vigilante movie. Angry men blowing shit up and beating up bad guys.

THD: How about that movie I was talking about? The one about the preacher from here in Tulsa who got kicked out of his church?

Me: Meh. Maybe. But I really want to watch somebody get angry and blow some shit up.

THD: I’m sensing a pattern.

Me: Here’s one. “Hostage”. It has Bruce Willis in it. He’s an angry guy. I bet he blows shit up.

THD: He’s also going to be in the new remake of Death Wish, isn’t he?

Me: Oh yes! I forgot about that! More angry vigilante stuff! I love Bruce Willis!

THD: So what’s it going to be? The based on true events movie or the blow shit up movie?

Me: Well you know what my vote is.

THD: Let’s get a coin.

Shane (walking through the room): You guys are actually flipping a coin to see what you’re going to watch?

Both: Yes!

THD: Ok, heads for Hostage and tails for Come Sunday.

Me: Wait. I want to see the coin first.

THD: *blinks*

Me: *blinks*

THD: Why do you want to see the coin?

Me: Because I have to confirm it does actually have a head and a tail.

THD: Are you serious?

Me: As a heart attack.

THD: You really don’t trust me?

Me: I trust no one in a coin toss.

THD: You know we’re really just tossing the coin to see which movie goes first. You realize we’re probably going to end up watching both.

Me: I still want to see the coin.

THD (showing me the quarter): It has a head and it has a tail.

Me: Ok.

THD (flips the coin – starts to reach over to look at it).

Me: Don’t touch it!

THD: This isn’t Friday Night Lights. We’re not flipping to break a three way tie to see who goes to the State Championship.

Me: I don’t care!

We both lean over and look at the quarter on the floor.

Me: Heads! Hostage! Bruce Willis blowing shit up!

THD: You NEED the church movie after this. Seriously.

 Stay weird, my friends. Normal is boring.