Over the past three days I have spent over two hours on the phone with DirecTV.  I now hate them.  

Some background:  At my previous residence basic DirecTV was provided as part of the buildng's monthly assessment.  I paid a separate DTV  bill for Tivo & HBO.  Recently I moved (No Shit - Ed.).  My master plan included canceling my service and having The Girl sign up under her name in order to gain all of the new subscriber spliffs.  However once I mentioned 'cancel' to the phone CSR I was immediately shunted off to the retentions department.  Knowing that the retentions department is basically all powerful, I decided to work the guy for all he was worth.  Managed to get some great deals over and above what the new subscribers get.  Great.  I'm happy about getting free gear and employee W567 is excited about scoring a retain.  He said he'd call me back later this week to confirm my Saturday appointment.  Couple of days go by with no call so I decided to take the initiative and see what's up.  Well it turns out that DirecTV employee W567 decided that, well, he couldn't really honor what he offered me so he just made note of a $120 credit on my account.  That's roughly 1/3rd of what was negotiated.  He also failed to make any note of a Saturday appointment.  What a fucking doucher.  So I was on the phone with one CSR this morning for about 40 minutes arguing my point before I had to leave for a meeting.  Thankfully they gave me a special PIN that would let me bypass most of the built in menu bullshit for my next call.  After much negotiation, the third CSR I spoke with was finally able to get me what was promised, but not before about 45 minutes of confused back and forth.  This installer guy better fucking show up on Saturday afternoon.

On the plus side of the column, the Halo 3 beta went live yesterday.  Joy. 

From the TV side of things, Lost has really been firing on all cylinders for the past three episodes.  Can't wait to see what they do with the finale next Wednesday.

Police State

• Frontline's Spying On the Home Front is a fairly chilling account on just how far the government has taken its domestic 'anti-terror' surveillance measures.  Even you red staters reading this would do yourself well to set up a season pass for FL.
• Speaking of evil douchers, some dude managed to google up neocon war monger Paul Wolfowitz's home address.  For those not following at home:  Head of the World Bank, Wolfie is under fire for promoting his mistress to a $165K/yr position.  Also?  He's evil.

Local Flavor

• Soup Nazi of Seinfeld fame set to open up a location in Chicago.

Reader Submissions

• Jeffrods thinks the idea of mixing taxidermy and computers is just wrong.  I will admit that when I first saw the article and saw "Beaver" and "computer" my mind went in a completely different direction.
• Drmorley wants to get all Spider-Man on SAMs

Other Stuff

• Plus 100 for creativity, minus infinity for exectution:  How to kill time at RFK stadium.
• Maxim's 'Hot 100' list is full of people I've never heard of.  Lohan made the #1 spot.  Apparently the Maxim editors get off of party girl coke sluts.  Wait a second.... they may have something here.
• Upront update:  Fox, The CW
• Anyone want to buy a Scientologist's NASCAR?
• Engadget cost Apple about $4bn with an erroneous post yesterday

Fortune is back from hiatus

Harry Hogge: Cole, you're wandering all over the track!
Cole Trickle: Yeah, well this son of a bitch just slammed into me.
Harry Hogge: No, no , he didn't slam you, he didn't bump you, he didn't nudge you... he *rubbed* you. And rubbin, son, is racin'.