Santa Was A Telekom Engineer

I woke up late on a Tuesday, and as my mom was sending me to the LRT station, she asked what present I wanted for my birthday.

“A haircut?”

She was heading to Midvalley anyway, and I got my haircut. It wasn’t worth it – for every Ringgit spent all he did was rewind it a day. The colleagues couldn’t tell the difference! (It was, of course, much lighter… so maybe he did some hairstyling magic to cut off loads but keep the volume?)

The Streamyx (ADSL broadband) installer called me when I was in Tower Records listening to CDs. I told him we’d be home at 8pm. Of course, I later realized that my lovably-bullyable colleague Kay-Li was in a play (Me, Myself and Pulau Belakang Buaya) that night, and it was the only screening, at 8:30pm!

My parents could handle the installer, I thought. Or not. My mom assumed that the Alcatel Speed Touch 510 ADSL broadband modem/router box in the plastic bag near the computer was for my friend. The phone line was dead anyway, so the installer couldn’t do anything.

My delightful enjoyment of the play poking fun of Malaysia was marred by a stern mother saying the installer needed to speak on the phone. I reached home for some parental frying pan.

On Wednesday, an appointment was set at 3pm, but he came at 2pm. Santa he was indeed.

As he checked the cables, Santa asked for the filter thingy, and I took it out of the box, revealing the old Lantech 5-port 10/100 Fast Ethernet switch. He asked how much it was, and I said it was RM105 when I bought it, but PC Fair was selling such at RM75, so I’d sell it at RM50. He bought it.

The night before, I set the ADSL modem’s mode to PPPoA (which could give me 2Mbps if they forget to uncap my bandwidth) instead of PPPoE. However, it refused to connect until I switched it back to PPPoE, at a stable 384kbps.

The best part was, the router passed every test in Gibson Research Corporation‘s ShieldsUP! tool.

I just hope I can maintain such enthusiasm (jakun!) It’s not like I haven’t tasted broadband at the office before…

Regretfully, DJ Phuturecybersonique told me of a Linksys wireless router/modem going for RM220… with wireless networks, the chances of the modem getting struck by lightning and passing the current to the computers are virtually nil.

Flush The Evils

Me and my family were in the family van, coming home from my grandma’s. I wound the window down to reach out to the toll system’s Touch N Go.

We were just looking out for signs to home. Soon, the two lanes converged into a highway, and at that point, there was a huge puddle. My dad slowed down, on the deeper end, the left side.

An idiot zoomed past on the right.

I wanted to wind the windows up, but I just closed my eyes and winced.

The huge wave splashed on my sister, mother and I.

I felt like horning at that fella, but all we could do was laugh loudly. What more from a van window that was higher than usual!

Seasons Greetings

Oh yes, Merry Christmas. I hate typing it because my fingers go all over the keyboard. So don’t be offended if I type “Same to you” instead. 😛

0 thoughts on “Santa Was A Telekom Engineer

  1. Ant Post author

    I think Santa decided that his former job was too risky. With the high pressure that can leave him as a blob of goo and all. So yea, glad to know Santa can make decisions for himself. He’s not selfish for that, mind you. Nyahaha. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you? ;D

    Reply
  2. Albert Ng Post author

    I don’t know how you’ll read this unless you bookmark it.

    The PPPoA option is available in the setup program on the CD. I’m not sure if the option is available when you Telnet your router.

    Reply

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