A comment that was left this morning really hit the nail on the head — how did Vince ever have time to work? He stays so busy now. Hopefully a lot of this is just routine “after you retire” stuff and life will slow down.
This morning Vince wanted to go to town so he bribed me with a trip to the Mexican restaurant for breakfast. It wasn’t very good so then he wanted to go by the grocery store and get corn tortillas so I can make Migas at home.
The main reason for going out was to get something at Home Depot that he needed for the table he’s building for the freeze dryer. I wasn’t saying no to that.
Another reason to go out is that we had to go to AT&T to get Vince’s cell phone changed from the work plan to our personal plan. That’s going to be interesting because I’ll go from having 1 GB of data to us sharing 1 GB of data. Vince said “She uses all the data” but I don’t think he realizes how often he uses data too. For not much more money per month, we can go up to a 5 GB plan if we need it. I don’t go into the AT&T store often but sometimes there’s a LONG wait. Today there was not and we got a very helpful and knowledgeable employee so that was quite pleasant. We were complaining about lack of cell service at home. The guy opened up his iPad and said “What’s your address?” He looked at his little map and said “Hmmm . . you’re really OUT there!” There is a tower about 5.5 miles from us but we’re in a “white” spot on the map which means very little signal. Add to that our metal roof and 8 – 10″ thick outside walls and the 12′ porch that is all the way across the front so the metal roof affects the signal even coming through the windows. He recommended a booster. Vince told him we have one. He wanted to know the brand. Vince told him. The guy was kinda shaking his head. The AT&T guy doesn’t want to say “You’re screwed!” so Vinces aid “We’re screwed?” and the guy laughed and said “You said it . . I didn’t!”
He was telling us that since we have DirecTV Now, we can watch it on our cell phones and it doesn’t affect our data. Vince said “We barely have enough internet to watch it on the TV. We can’t add another line trying to watch it.” The guy said “You have bad internet too?” He was a young guy and I could tell he was thinking “How do these people survive?” Between the garden, the knitting, the cooking, the fruit trees and the chickens, I don’t have a whole lot of time to even think about watching TV.
It struck me as funny that everyone wants the biggest TV they can get but yet people are happy to watch TV or movies on their phones. Then that got me to thinking . . I’m betting I could make Knit Companion work on the TV. Something else for Vince to work on! I should stop thinking right?
Erin says
Hmmm a booster something I should get … I am out here in an area too… is that something I get from AT&T?
Judy Laquidara says
We have a micro-cell which we did get from AT&T but they no longer sell or support these. We purchased a booster from WeBoost but haven’t had much luck with it.
Liz says
Since you have 40 acres, is there a spot on your land that you can try to lease to a cell tower company to improve the signal without being impacted in other ways? I know there is some concerns about health issues with the microwaves, but things might be improving.
I would expect that you may get some rental income off the tower.
Judy Laquidara says
We actually have 45 acres but (1) the guy at AT&T was telling us that even if AT&T rents space on someone else’s tower, it costs them over $1 million to get their equipment up and running (2) with the National Guard base right here, and so many helicopters flying in and out, there are probably restrictions as to high we could put anything.
Cell phones really aren’t that important to us. We can live with the limited service we have but if there was an inexpensive way to get better service, we’d be willing to do it but we’re not going to go to a lot of trouble or expense.
tiptopquilts says
My kids were happy when they figured out they could watch youtube on TV by running it thru a roku. We don’t have the latest and greatest by any means. I tell them as long as it works, it’s not being replaced…so each of my boys bought themselves flat screens for their game systems.
Judy Laquidara says
Sounds like a great solution.
Cathi in Texas says
When I first retired, I did all of the things I didn’t have time for when I worked. After awhile, I didn’t do much of anything because I could! It eventually evened out.
Judy Laquidara says
Yes, I figure Vince will eventually get everything done and be looking for things to do.
Nelle Coursey says
With Amazon Prime and a smart TV we watch a lot of things on our TV. There are all kinds of U-Tube videos out there on every thing imaginable! We like looking at them on the TV and we can both see them. I have watched knitting videos. You can really see it better on the TV than on the computer!
dezertsuz says
Your reply #8 is why you should NOT quit thinking! LOL So did you buy a better booster, or just leave it alone? You should be able to go online to ATT and change the data on your plan without having to go in the store.
Linda in NE says
The cell reception in our house is pretty much nil. We have steel siding and a steel roof. I call it my Faraday cage. LOL My cell phone is just a “almost smartphone” from Tracfone, but my kids have fairly new iPhones and don’t get reception either unless they go stand by a window or go outside. Needless to say, I don’t make many phone calls from my cell in the winter or 100 degree summer days!
Liz A. says
with an apple tv box, you can see anything on your iPad on your tv. so yes, you could use knit companion on your tv.