I went back to my roommate's place and we ran a few errands in the afternoon; trying to find the DHL office, trying to find an appliance store, etc. and got caught in the pouring rain. Its the kind of rain that comes sideways and we were soaked from the knees down. I guess its just that time of year.
I studied a bit in the late afternoon and then it was time for the meeting. There were a lot of people missing, which is definitely more noticeable in a congregation of only 66 members.
Thursday: One word: TVCable (pronounced tee-vee-cob-lay). I spent all morning waiting for them to arrive so they could install the Internet. When the two technicians did arrive, one of them asked where I wanted the cable brought into the apartment and where I wanted the modem and router set up. I showed him the guest bedroom and he pointed to the outside wall and asked if he could drill through it and then run the cable along the ceiling around one wall, over the doorway and down, setting the modem and router on a nightstand. Perfect I said. I went in the other room to work on an upcoming assignment in the TMS and was not paying attention to them. BIG mistake! All of a sudden, I look over and see a drill bit coming from the master bedroom through the wall into the living room. The second technician begins pushing a cable wire through. In my best spanglish I asked him what he was doing and why. He could see that I was upset. I looked in the master bedroom and the CAT5 cable is stretched across the ceiling, through one side of another wall and out the other and into a little room off the bedroom and out the ceiling. I asked what happened to running it into the guest bedroom like we had discussed. He pulls out the nightstand and says there is no electrical outlet there and so they ran it the other way. I moved the bed in that room about 3 inches and showed him the electrical outlet on the wall. I asked why he didn't ask me and why he was running it into the living room. He said something I didn't understand and so I called my friend and asked her to speak with him. There were holes everywhere - my landlord would no doubt be upset and make me pay to fix it!
He pulled the cable from the master bedroom and then re-ran it in through the second bedroom, but then refused to tack the cable along the ceiling since I didn't want holes in the walls. Meanwhile, the second technician digs into his toolbox and pulls out some sort of plastic plug and puts it in the living room wall.
I explained that was not acceptable and that he needed to patch the hole and repaint it, even though I knew it was a hopeless request. An hour and a half have passed by since their arrival and the Internet is still not working. I go to check on the technician and see what he is doing. He is supposed to be configuring the Internet and Wi-Fi network; instead I find him attempting to change the installation of Microsoft Office on my laptop. I quickly exit out of that window and show him where the network settings can be changed. Another 30 minutes go by; still no Internet. He tells me that his friend is going to come and configure the network and Internet and that he is on his way. 45 minutes later, his friend shows up. 10 minutes after that, I have Internet.
In the afternoon, I headed back to the San Roque market to retrieve my pillow and the little foot piece to my sofa. It wasn't until arriving home that I realized she gave me the wrong shaped foot piece. Afterwards, I went to another appliance store and spent nearly 2 hours trying to purchase appliances. Finally, the transaction was complete. The appliances were scheduled to be delivered the next morning.
It was raining pretty heavily at this point, and I had left the house without an umbrella :( I walked the couple blocks to the mall and got a cup of coffee and picked up the proper sized wrench from the hardware store so I could finish putting my bed together. Then I tried to take a taxi home, but most were already full. So I walked home in the drizzly rain. I decided that this would the perfect time to test out my shower. I turned the breaker on that controls the electric water heater. Then I did some RBC work as it was heating up. And now - the big moment... I turned on the water - cold... cool... warm... hot - I jumped in! You can't imagine how happy I was at this moment. The true test, though, was how long it would last. I decided to test the limits - it seems to be good and hot for at least 25 minutes.
I tightened all the bolts on my bed and went to put down the wooden supports for the mattress, only to discover that they were too long. Guess I won't be sleeping on my new bed tonight :(
There was a Pink Floyd tribute band playing at a local restaurant and a few friends and I had made plans to go. Ironically, the place is called Strawberry Fields Forever and is covered in Beatles memorabilia. The band was good, but they messed up the words on a few songs - or he didn't sing them in English - one or the other, it was hard to tell. It was nice to just sit and listen to music at the end of the day, but boy was I tired! The performance was supposed to begin at 10:30 (already my bedtime!) but didn't start until 11:30. Fortunately, they only played for an hour and by 1:00 I was home. It was my first night staying in my new apartment - probably the reason I couldn't sleep :(
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