Rain Delay and The Great Time Warner Caper

In the City, Time Warner Cable is king, emperor, or el presidente for all of your cable television needs. As a result, you are at their mercy when it comes to getting things fixed or having problems solved via their customer service and/or support. Generally, this makes New Yorkers hesistant to give them a call when a problem arises for fear that you will either wait on the phone for three hours with no help in sight or by the end of the phone conversation, you will have signed up for the 300 dollar all channel mega package simply to get someone to come out to the house to check on the cable box. There are also Time Warner stores where it is rumored that some have entered and never returned.

With this frame of reference in mind, my old roommate and I signed up for Time Warner cable when I first moved to Brooklyn almost two years ago. Everything was going great until one weekend, approximately three months into my stay here, when the remote control stopped working. At first, I thought it was the batteries but after buying new Double A's and slapping the remote control around a bit, I realized that the remote control was definitely not working. (Note: I do not have a degree in engineering but I am wicked smart.)

The next attempt to fix this problem occurred when I asked my old roommate to get the damn thing fixed by having him call Time Warner to figure out the proper course of action. The old roommate is a very talented actor and a great guy, but he is definitely not the most responsible person on the earth or the type that would get it done. Further, to get him to do anything, required that you light the equivalent of a bonfire under his ass (another cliche, ugh). However, I figured that he needed to do it because the bill and the account was under his name. Needless to say, to this day, I am still waiting for him to make that phone call and since he has moved out, I doubt that call is forthcoming.

Of course, he moved out almost ten months ago and as of last night, the remote was still broken. During that time, I got used to the fact that I had to actually get up from the couch whenever I needed to change the channel. (Although many times, I considered fashioning some type of stick that would allow me to remain seated.) Additionally, once the account switched over to my name, I dreaded the fact that I would have to contact Time Warner in order to correct this problem because of the problems delineated above. Moreover, I heard that the lines at the actual Time Warner stores were worse than the one that the masses wait in order to get into Space Mountain at Disney World. (Note: I was going to make some reference to them being longer than a bread line in... but see no matter what follows that opener is either racist, anti-semitic, or makes you just sound like you are an awful person. Ironically, by not doing it but explaining what I was going to do has just made me look like even worse of a person.)

The point of this entire entry is that this morning, fresh from a sober evening of sleep, I left the house in order to head into the City to end this broken remote control stand off once and for all. I was ready to wait in long lines and for many hours as I had my bottle of water and 30 GB Mp3 player. Time Warner would not win, I would outlast them and their tyrannical rule.

After getting lost, I found the Time Warner store on East 23rd between Park Avenue and Madison and entered prepared for the worst. Stopping at the security guard, I explained to him that I needed to speak to someone about fixing my remote control. (remember I am back in New York City and not Las Vegas so there is no double meaning in that statement) The security guard directed me to the back of the dimly lit store to a series of windows with Time Warner workers waiting to help me.

Confused, I approached the windows, glancing around in search of a line, a number dispenser, or any indication that I was about lose ten hours of my life to Time Warner. Instead, there was no indication that there had ever been a line or an type of unnecessary expenditure of time in this store i.e. no sleeping bags, garbage, or tents.

And so I approached the window directly in front of me and sheepishly said, "My remote is broken."

She responded, "Sure, no problem, I just need the old one."

I stared at her for a second wondering if this was some sick Time Warner joke or hidden camera show, and then, remembered that the remote was in my bag... So I dug it out and proceeded to give her the remote, and she in turn gave me a new one. And that was that. She did not ask me about the account number, whose name it was under, or anything other than that I give her the old remote. I thanked her, and quickly left the store, before Ashton Kutcher came out from the dark corners to tell me that I was punked. (Note: I am not famous so this is impossible, but if he ever did, I would punch him in the fucken face.)

I returned home, and the remote worked.

And so for almost two years, I have not had a remote control for my television because I was worried that Time Warner would some how steal my soul or some how render me impotent if I undertook the process to get it fixed. Instead, in less than three minutes on a Saturday morning in August, I replaced that remote control and simultaneously, proved that I am a giant JACK ASS!!!