raising the bar and withholding my messages.

i've had this annoying problem with receiving text messages on my cell phone for the past six months--someone sends me a text and sometimes i get it, sometimes i don't. the cell phone people have been decidedly unhelpful about fixing the problem whenever i've called to talk to them about it; most recently they told me that they could see all the texts i should have received but hadn't, and i was like, well, could you at least read them to me? not receiving texts wasn't a big deal until the past week or so when i started seeing this girl who wants to be able to text me. and since i like her i want to receive her texts. this should be simple, but no.

i talked to tech support for a couple of hours on wednesday, then i took my phone in to the store on thursday and they claimed it was fixed (not so much), so i went back into the store again today. it's been fun playing the "can cingular help me this time?" game, and yet i still can't receive hot new girl's texts. did i mention she's hot? she is. is it too much to ask that hot new girl be able to text me? i think not. cingular clearly is not as invested in my love life as it should be.

i would have to consider today's encounter with cingular to be the most fun so far. and by the word fun i mean that not only could cingular not fix the texting problem, but while the cingular employee was on hold with tech support he asked me out to thanksgiving dinner. at denny's. like this:

cingular dude: so, how's the husband? and kids? everything okay?

me: haha. yeah...

(i don't normally think such things because usually this doesn't happen, but i knew then that dude was going to ask me out and that it was going to be weird.)

cd: what are you doing for thanksgiving?

me: staying in town and hanging out with friends.

cd: me, too! i'm going to denny's.

me: sounds like a plan.

(and not one that i want to be part of...)

cd: do you want to come with me?

me: no.

cd: yeah, i guess it's kind of creepy being asked out by an old guy who works at cingular.

(word, but dude was maybe 30. not old.)

me: ummm...

cd: anyhow, i was just kidding about that. i have a wife. here's a picture of us.

(dude takes out his phone and shows me a picture that i'm pretty sure he uses for awkward times like this. dude isn't wearing a wedding ring, but if he's really married why is he asking me out?)

me: she's pretty.

cd: you can't even really see her in this picture.

me: it's still a good picture.

that was when--THANK GOD--the tech support people came back on the line. i'm afraid to think of where that conversation would have gone if he hadn't been interrupted.

i still can't receive texts. gah.