There are a handful of times when I’ve been stupid as an adult – most of them involve women – the latest is not following my better judgement and going for the dreaded telecommunications and entertainment “bundle” or “triple-play” as this company now tried to disguise it.  Bundle packages from these companies and monopolies are never a good idea. You get a ridiculous monthly rate, fall behind, and then are at the mercy of the cold-hearted corporation.  I knew this and tried the ComCOST one anyway.  Ten months later, I am all about de-bundling and never again letting one hideous corporation hold all of my modern services hostage. For the second time in in nine weeks, CUMcast  “disconnected” my land line – even though I diligently pay them  weekly  as a show of good faith.  Their “bundle” began me with a $250.00 deficit, and each month’s bill out paced anything I can earn consistently.  Apparently I am not the only one who has had bad experiences with CumCost as any internet search on Ask.com will reveal; or better still, when I speak to my friends near and far, I get the “Oh I know what you MEAN about Comcast…” reply.  So if this monopoly is so bad for so many, WHY are they in business?  Whatever happened to the good old-fashioned BOYCOTT?  I mean, they are all about the money right?  So we consumers with our hard-earned $$ should stop giving it to corporations like this.  Where is a Ralph Nader consumer advocate when we need him? Off plotting his next failed run for President?? 

Go to a ComCOST payment location in this city and witness the backs who least can afford it upon the rich get richer with a cue of paying customers that rivals any bank.  As I stand there inching forward amongst the pleas for more time or payment “arrangements”, promotional announcements, Big Brother-style TV cameras in the ceiling and annoyingly loud conversations by pseudo Hip Hop outfitted homies on they “celly”, knowing there at least twenty people ahead of me, I feel the victim of a huge scam.  Comcast and entities like them are today’s banks; if I were Bonnie and Clyde, I’d go there for some action.  Maybe  they  need some of President Obama’s “tough love talk” to reign them in so that the people can get a bailout!  They are raking it in!  I feel bad for all the poor people on those lines who should – like me – be  watching less television and living more productively, and I reaffirm that vow to myself.

This is why I am actually glad that they suddenly cut off  all of my telecommunications with one outside of the company “contractor” climbing a telephone pole. Then he had the nerve to trespass upon my inner property and beat on my side door to demand some mysterious “box” that I supposedly had, but had “returned” the last time they disconnected me from life as I knew it. I had an excuse to vent upon somebody for a change, poor dude, it isn’t  his fault, but NOBODY should ever take jobs like that – to repossess upon the little people out here who are struggling to make ends meet.  I’m sorry, they are betrayers of the faith.  So, I had no internet, no TV, and no land line telephone with one snip (bastards), but what I got in return was a return back to basics.

Luckily no corporation can cut-off my music system and radio.   They didn’t count on the fact that they were dealing with a veteran of the real fun terrestrial radio days and an actual DJ/Personality with a music library and the acumen to fall back upon National Public Radio waay down at the “educational” part of the FM dial for my information fix; the BBC on the classical music NPR station, my old VHS tapes – stuff I forgot I’d even taped (and some of which I wonder why I did).  I worked more OFF-line, editing the manuscript of my hopefully forthcoming memoirs about my radio days book ; proofreading, researching and editing my music reviews as well.  Yeah, ComCOST did me a favor, and I am sharing that lesson with you, my favorite reader because we have become too reliant upon cable TV, gadgets and “new” technology toys and watching others who have their “millions” while we struggle, still watching them, while WE should be making our own “hay” as my Dad used to say.

I spent about sixty dollars on my Virgin Mobile top-up card celly just to be able to say in-touch with the outside world at twenty cents per minute; money that Cumcast could have had, La la la la Laaaa…’got back into using my huge Funk & Wagnall’s dictionary instead of dictionary.com; the actual Yellow Pages instead of “google” or “ask.com”.  This has been a refreshing wake-up call, and I wanted to share it as a lesson to us all – don’t be seduced by the bundle – EVER.  Separate your services – always.  Never let one company “handle” you like I did.  On the serious side, since I work from home on the telephone, I have lost three weeks of potential income – something I tried to explain to the “collections manager” so he would ‘put a hold” on my account, to no avail.  He even told me “too bad, I cannot downsize your bundle until you pay three hundred dollars”  I  said “If I can’t work the phones, I can’t possibly earn that much, so you are chasing your own tail inside a Catch-22.”  I guess that went over his feeble billing head as I ended-up having to hang-up upon his inflexible ear vowing that “I wished I’d never signed on with CumCast!”  And Yes, a former g/f  didn’t watch any TV,  and chastised me for doing so – kudos to her (and you know who “you” are) for one of your little wisdoms coming to pass with me – but not for you to enjoy or see. 

Daily, I hear the horror stories now, but most people just turn the other cheek and continue to PAY. Not me – no way.  So many of us are experiencing so much trial and tribulation that it takes those in control to help us get by.  I don’t feel that spirit from entities like ComCost or AT&T, even though their commericls (which I always mute by the way) try to pay lip-service to having our best interests at heart.  Bull! The only thing they are concerned about is the dolla sign and the bottom line.
[Editor’s note: two years later, I do not have ANY type of television in my home – and don’t miss it. Filed a claim against Comcast with the Division of Consumer Affairs in the state I live in for price-gouging and defamation of my credit history because they refused to do-bundle me despite my repeated requests for them to do so (which I saved in my email folders and printed). To be continued…] Thanks for reading; please comment.

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