Due to someone glitching the connections on my phone I was cut off from the outside world and SD.Net for nearly a day. 
I managed to squeeze a little time in at work but most of my free time there was spent trying to get QWest out to fix my phone without charging me a $100 service call fee. They like to charge that extra bit when it can't be proven that something on their end was jacked up. I had a problem with my phone earlier this year that miraculously healed itself after 1.5 days of keeping me from dialing out. I was told that it was probably a short and they often clear themselves. Really? If that's the case why doesn't QWest err on the side of the customer and give them the benefit of the doubt? It's because they're a monopoly is why. All the phone lines in the area are owned and maintained by them so the consumer is SOL if they don't like them.
Anyway, QWest did earn some brownnie points from me last night. I called in my problem from work at about 0300 (3am) and the lady was really helpful. The best part though was when she called to check and see if my line was really crossed with someone elses.
I'm sure whoever she got a hold of was very glad to be woken up to be asked about their phone number (expecially since I'd called them at a little after midnight too). The good thing was that I got QWest themselves to document that at least some of the problem had to be on their end before they even sent a repairman out. Anyway, I haven't been a big fan of QWest. I've only lived at my current address a little over 2 years and I've already had 3 phone outages that have lasted for significant amounts of time. Would you be interested in getting DSL from a company who keeps jacking up your basic phone service? Me neither.
