being a non-conformist pain in the ass finally pays off.

so I wasted about two hourrs trying to get our DSL working tonight. I'm no tech guru, but I know enough about computers to do basic networking. I also know when I'm licked, so I called qwest tech support. was on hold for 39 minutes (our call ID box has a timer, heh) before a human being walked me through the process... she seemed surprised when I told her I was running mac os x. she told me msn (the isp) wouldn't run on a mac. I told her I knew that, and tried to explain it to the guy on the phone when I ordered the broadband... several convoluted steps later (NONE of which were on the little two page installation instructions) and a randomly assigned username and password (which I was never issued), and I have interwebs.

she transferred me over to someone else to have the msn removed from my bill, and that lady was so upset by my trouble that she gave me a $32 credit for one month's service. guess she hates it when people try to sell the msn package to us lowly mac users... so I lost much of my evening, but I got a free month of internet out of it.

now we just need to figure out how to use our dish. I spent half an hour going through and removing all of the crap stations we don't get from the guide, but they're still showing up.

it hasn't been a very productive night...