| Saturday,
August 7, 1999 My birthday. "Now it's clear to see my
friend, you're one year closer to your end, but Happy Birthday, Happy
Birthday..."
Someone broke into my car and stole the cell
phone last night, and I have been an hour trying to report it. The police
won't take a report until I deal with the phone company, and the phone
company has put me on hold... so I hear advertisements about how
convenient their new automated service is, but of course it has no
automation for a stolen phone.
The police won't take a crime report because it was a phone. If someone
had stolen a hat or something like that, they'd send out an officer, but
for a phone I have to go there, with a copy of the contract with the phone
company. Now none of this will cost me much, due
to insurances, and I now have the phone company report, of calls to a
couple of local numbers but nothing else. I even have the numbers. And
they can't make any more calls on that phone. It's a block of wood. But I
don't have a copy of a phone bill or a service contract, so I don't have
any way to get a police report, and until I have a police report I can't
get the insurance company involved. So I get to spend my birthday chasing
paperwork. For my convenience I can go to the local Pacific Bell phone
store, get a copy of paperwork, take that to the police station, go back
to the phone store to file an insurance claim. I now know why the crime statistics
are down. No one can report a crime, or will bother to do it. There's
plenty of crime. Just no reports.
I also have to deal with the Ford agency to get the window fixed. Oh
well, it was time for servicing anyway. And the chap was nice enough
not to damage the car other than to break out a window. Well, serves me
right for leaving that phone in the car, but it's going to cost me time.
But that's how I will spend my day. Hope you have a nice day...
It got even more interesting. The Pacific Bell Company had no copy of
my service contract. That would have to be obtained from the local Pacific
Bell store. The dog was due for a walk anyway, so we went down to Studio
City. There I was informed that they file the contracts by date. What date
did I sign it? All I remembered was that it was after COMDEX last year,
sometime in December. Not good enough. They couldn't look through all
those...
So back home, I called Pacific Bell Wireless, who told me what date my
service began. Now I could go back to the Pacific Bell Wireless
storefront, where the nice young man looked up the contract by date -- he
still had to go through a bunch of them -- until he found mine. I got a
copy. It was about 1345 by then. Now out to the North Hollywood Police
Station. "I want to report a stolen cell phone."
Right. I get to wait in line. There are three other people reporting
stolen phones. All of them had been required to get paper work showing
their contract with the Phone Company before the police would accept a
report. So I sat reading Keegan's World War One until it was my turn. Now
I have a police report, but it won't have a case number for several hours.
When I get that number I can report this to the insurance company, which
will instruct Pacific Bell to give me a new phone, which I can go get in
Burbank or Woodland Hills, my local outfit not being one that processes
insurance.
All this for 5 phone calls, and I have the numbers called. One answers
"Hello", a normal male human voice with a slight Latin accent.
Our miscreant called that number twice last night. I gave the number to
the police, but since it's in Santa Monica I doubt anyone will do anything
about it. Why should they?
I, meanwhile, have to get the glass replaced in my car, and this being
a Saturday afternoon I won't get to that before Monday. But of course
SIGGRAPH starts tomorrow. One of the few times I can use a cell phone is
during computer shows. Only I won't have one.
It has been a day of inconvenience, and it's not over yet, and the
criminal got 5 one-minute calls for his effort. Why did he bother? The
chances of getting caught were not zero, and making calls to people who
could be, were the police to insist on it, persuaded to tell who called at
3 AM last night, made being caught even more likely.
Perhaps I'll find out who those telephone numbers belong
to and enter them in various magazine sweepstakes. Perhaps send in a
dollar or two to order cheap junk by mail to be delivered to their
address. Put their phone number up on men's room walls with a solidification.
("Lonely? For a really good time call 555-555-5555 between 4 AM and
dawn! Best rates in town.") In fact I suppose I won't do anything,
but I can dream.
So having spent today on this I have another day to go,
getting the phone replaced and taking the car out to have the glass
replaced. And paper work with my insurance company to deal with. So that
someone can make 5 one-minute local calls.
==
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