Inaudible Nonsense

So the relay and chat software combination is idea that seems made in heaven. It can be scary as f-c-u-k, though. Just FYI. Especially if you have no TTY experience.

Unable to find one service that meets all my needs (more on this later), I’ve signed up with a handful of relay services: i711, Hamilton, IP-Relay.com. IP-relay is the only one that has the one that has a personal phone number that is at least in my area code (personal 800 numbers seem like a good idea, but I think its sort of sketchy).

I bought a computer last night and left the IP-Relay telephone number as my contact number. They tried to call when I was out. I got the message in AIM when I got back that someone in the 301 (SoCal) area code was trying to call. So dammit I missed it.

A little more frustrating was trying to call them back. No fault of the CA at IP-Relay, but I basically don’t know what I’m doing. So I forgot the GAs, can’t remember if I’m supposed to include messages to the CA in parenthesis or upper case. And I’m on the clock, because like most corporate places, when I call this woman back I have to go through her voicemail system. I’ve got to find her extension, figure out how to tell that to the CA and then what message to leave and again how to get that to the CA to give to her voicemail. And if I don’t do it in time, the poor CA has to start all over because the voicemail system is timed.

I’ve never Googled so fast in my life. Not really to much avail. In the end, I left her the weakest-ass message — I forgot my callback number for one thing — that I could have possible given her. I sent her an apologetic email with like four different telephone numbers. Only one of which I can answer. The relay number, so I’m not sure why I gave her the other ones.

Gah! That was frustrating. And now I still don’t know what’s up with my computer.