Interference
I've decided my house must be sited on some kind of electromagnetic anomaly, either that or an Indian burial ground.
I've always had odd problems. A few years back the phone used to chirp every time I went into the kitchen. My car radio cuts out when I drive through the archway under my house. My neighbour's wireless mouse makes my mouse cursor move, even when I press that little button on the underside to tell it not to. My kitchen chairs stack themselves in precarious towers when I'm not looking. And over the last year I've been getting intermittent crackling on my cordless phone.
One of those facts might be a lie.
More recently, I've also started to have problems with my broadband connection. It kept going dog-slow for no reason. After a lot of tortuous discussions with Demon and BT I managed to make it go away.
Then it came back again.
I barely use my home phone for dialing out, the line's only really needed for the broadband. I've got Skypeout which is great for calling free in the UK and cheap calls to my bro in Mexico. But the last time I used the landline I noticed the crackling getting worse. So today I decided to do the techy thing and eliminate all the possibilities. Which meant plugging in a old-fashioned corded mobile phone into the main phone socket in my house to avoid all possible other influences on the signal, before I called in BT.
Have you ever tried to buy a bog-standard corded phone these days? It's actually quite hard. Eventually I tracked one down in Argos for £3.50. Bargain.
Got it home, plugged it in. Nothing. Completely dead.
Played with the cables, looked for the on switch, even read the manual (oh the shame!) and it was still silent.
Then I plugged my DECT cordless phone back in, and that's not getting a signal either. So I surmise that my analogue phone line is effectively dead.
But my ADSL broadband still works.
SpooooOOOOooooky.
Gotta go, there's someone talking to me through the static on the telly...
...
...
Hey, hello! Hello, I can't hear you! ... Five... Yes... Yes... I don't know... I don't know.
I've always had odd problems. A few years back the phone used to chirp every time I went into the kitchen. My car radio cuts out when I drive through the archway under my house. My neighbour's wireless mouse makes my mouse cursor move, even when I press that little button on the underside to tell it not to. My kitchen chairs stack themselves in precarious towers when I'm not looking. And over the last year I've been getting intermittent crackling on my cordless phone.
One of those facts might be a lie.
More recently, I've also started to have problems with my broadband connection. It kept going dog-slow for no reason. After a lot of tortuous discussions with Demon and BT I managed to make it go away.
Then it came back again.
I barely use my home phone for dialing out, the line's only really needed for the broadband. I've got Skypeout which is great for calling free in the UK and cheap calls to my bro in Mexico. But the last time I used the landline I noticed the crackling getting worse. So today I decided to do the techy thing and eliminate all the possibilities. Which meant plugging in a old-fashioned corded mobile phone into the main phone socket in my house to avoid all possible other influences on the signal, before I called in BT.
Have you ever tried to buy a bog-standard corded phone these days? It's actually quite hard. Eventually I tracked one down in Argos for £3.50. Bargain.
Got it home, plugged it in. Nothing. Completely dead.
Played with the cables, looked for the on switch, even read the manual (oh the shame!) and it was still silent.
Then I plugged my DECT cordless phone back in, and that's not getting a signal either. So I surmise that my analogue phone line is effectively dead.
But my ADSL broadband still works.
SpooooOOOOooooky.
Gotta go, there's someone talking to me through the static on the telly...
...
...
Hey, hello! Hello, I can't hear you! ... Five... Yes... Yes... I don't know... I don't know.
The household appliances are rising up en masse in protest at being lampooned in hilarious 'web comic' style
;)
Eve the Badger and I will be tying the knot just as soon as she gets out of Holloway.
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