There wasn't any more to that story. I pretty much stopped caring about the Padres.
The End.
Friday, October 5, 2012
Saturday, April 18, 2009
In the Beginning...
I just need a place to vent. That's all this blog is. When you are powerless, sad, suffering, whatever... sometimes you just need to vent. There are, certainly, more productive ways to solve my problems. But I'd rather vent and suffer, I guess.
So this is a story. It has just begun, and it is quite possible that it could end up being needlessly boring before it's all said and done, because I have no idea nor plan as to where it will end. The end, in fact, is not up to me. The end is up to AT&T, or maybe ESPN, or Major League Baseball, or Cox Communications, or even, most boringly, the slow passage of time. Who knows?
Here is the story as it starts:
I like baseball. I like to watch baseball in person. I like to watch baseball on the television. I'm not obsessed with the game; I don't follow teams that I don't give a shit about. I don't play fantasy baseball. Really, I mostly just follow the home team, the team I grew up watching and rooting for, the team that was never very good, but always supplied enough magic in small doses to make it worth while. I follow the San Diego Padres.
I don't make a ton of money, and a few years ago the Padres moved into a more fancy ballpark, and started pricing me out of attending. They were very clever about it, in fact there are still fairly cheap seats, but not like it used to be. You could get a seat that didn't completely suck for under fifteen dollars at Qualcomm Stadium, but everything under fifteen dollars at Petco Park is really scraping the bottom of the barrel. I digress, however. The primary focus of this story is not how the Padres are screwing me, but more about how AT&T is screwing me with their bullshit Uverse sports coverage, and how no one seems to care. That's the worst part. No one cares, so I must vent.
I switched from Cox Cable to AT&T Uverse this past winter. Now, if anyone out there is familiar with the San Diego market, you know that the Padres have a contract with Cox Communications to air their games. So, why would I ever switch to AT&T if I'm a Padres fan? The answer, like most things, is not black and white. Baseball is not the beginning and ending of my day, it's just something I enjoy very much. I also enjoy many shows on television. My fiancée watches shows on HBO and Showtime, and really likes movies. I also like movies, and that offbeat shit you find on channels like BBC America or The All-Fucking Science All-the-Fucking-Time Channel. I like a wide variety of programming. This is why Uverse caught my eye. I ended up switching to the U400 package, which has a ton a movie channels (not merely HBO and Showtime), a ton of random shit like BBC America or The All-Fucking Science All-the-Fucking-Time Channel, plus, what I thought, where a buttload of channels that would play sports. Fox Sports Florida, Fox Sports Arizona, Fox Sports every goddamned place, ESPN, ESPNU, ESPN2... you get my drift. All this, plus internet and phone, for less than I was paying at Cox for just cable, internet, HBO and Showtime. So I'm not in a hurry to switch back. But I'm still pissed. Thus, I'm in the venting zone.
I knew I was not going to see the Padres regularly anymore. This was okay, because during the summer I work at night, so I rarely see them anyway. So don't get me wrong, I am not pissed that I cannot see Cox programming on my Uverse. I'm not quite that retarded. This is what I'm pissed about:
This past Wednesday I had the day of work, and the Padres were on the road in New York. The game was listed to be broadcast nationally on ESPN2, start time 4:10 in the afternoon. I did some chores, got some beer and snacks, and settled in to watch one of the few telecasts I was bound to see this year. Then it happened.
"The game you are trying to watch is blacked out in your area."
What? Clearly this must be some kind of mistake. I mean, I'm trying to watch ESPN. ESP-fucking-N!! I've never in my life seen a nationally televised game blacked out on ESP-fucking-N. They are on the fucking road! This is bad enough, but not nearly as bad as the inept, incompetent, uncaring, flat-out retarded customer support I received from AT&T when I call looking for the reason. That will will be chapter two of this story...
So this is a story. It has just begun, and it is quite possible that it could end up being needlessly boring before it's all said and done, because I have no idea nor plan as to where it will end. The end, in fact, is not up to me. The end is up to AT&T, or maybe ESPN, or Major League Baseball, or Cox Communications, or even, most boringly, the slow passage of time. Who knows?
Here is the story as it starts:
I like baseball. I like to watch baseball in person. I like to watch baseball on the television. I'm not obsessed with the game; I don't follow teams that I don't give a shit about. I don't play fantasy baseball. Really, I mostly just follow the home team, the team I grew up watching and rooting for, the team that was never very good, but always supplied enough magic in small doses to make it worth while. I follow the San Diego Padres.
I don't make a ton of money, and a few years ago the Padres moved into a more fancy ballpark, and started pricing me out of attending. They were very clever about it, in fact there are still fairly cheap seats, but not like it used to be. You could get a seat that didn't completely suck for under fifteen dollars at Qualcomm Stadium, but everything under fifteen dollars at Petco Park is really scraping the bottom of the barrel. I digress, however. The primary focus of this story is not how the Padres are screwing me, but more about how AT&T is screwing me with their bullshit Uverse sports coverage, and how no one seems to care. That's the worst part. No one cares, so I must vent.
I switched from Cox Cable to AT&T Uverse this past winter. Now, if anyone out there is familiar with the San Diego market, you know that the Padres have a contract with Cox Communications to air their games. So, why would I ever switch to AT&T if I'm a Padres fan? The answer, like most things, is not black and white. Baseball is not the beginning and ending of my day, it's just something I enjoy very much. I also enjoy many shows on television. My fiancée watches shows on HBO and Showtime, and really likes movies. I also like movies, and that offbeat shit you find on channels like BBC America or The All-Fucking Science All-the-Fucking-Time Channel. I like a wide variety of programming. This is why Uverse caught my eye. I ended up switching to the U400 package, which has a ton a movie channels (not merely HBO and Showtime), a ton of random shit like BBC America or The All-Fucking Science All-the-Fucking-Time Channel, plus, what I thought, where a buttload of channels that would play sports. Fox Sports Florida, Fox Sports Arizona, Fox Sports every goddamned place, ESPN, ESPNU, ESPN2... you get my drift. All this, plus internet and phone, for less than I was paying at Cox for just cable, internet, HBO and Showtime. So I'm not in a hurry to switch back. But I'm still pissed. Thus, I'm in the venting zone.
I knew I was not going to see the Padres regularly anymore. This was okay, because during the summer I work at night, so I rarely see them anyway. So don't get me wrong, I am not pissed that I cannot see Cox programming on my Uverse. I'm not quite that retarded. This is what I'm pissed about:
This past Wednesday I had the day of work, and the Padres were on the road in New York. The game was listed to be broadcast nationally on ESPN2, start time 4:10 in the afternoon. I did some chores, got some beer and snacks, and settled in to watch one of the few telecasts I was bound to see this year. Then it happened.
"The game you are trying to watch is blacked out in your area."
What? Clearly this must be some kind of mistake. I mean, I'm trying to watch ESPN. ESP-fucking-N!! I've never in my life seen a nationally televised game blacked out on ESP-fucking-N. They are on the fucking road! This is bad enough, but not nearly as bad as the inept, incompetent, uncaring, flat-out retarded customer support I received from AT&T when I call looking for the reason. That will will be chapter two of this story...
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