Our phone isn’t working, or I should say, it’s working as long as you construe the word “working” to mean “crackling and buzzing like a badly tuned radio.” I do not construe “working” to mean this. Not by a long shot. I am surprised how angry I am with the phone company. (Yes, you, AT&T. I’m a blogger now. Feel my wrath!) I was promised the problem would be fixed last week, and that I would NOT have to be at home. Later, a machine called to contradict this, telling me that I must be at home between — get this — 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. On a Saturday. I had a long-standing appointment that took me out of the house for three hours...and yes, you guessed, that’s when AT&T showed up. A machine let me know that they considered my problem “fixed” even though they’d not done one blasted thing about it. Read next feature >