the perpetual busy signal

As you may recall, when I moved to this apartment back in May, I discovered that it had only one phone line installed. I called the phone company to install another line, and in a feat of skilled scheduling, arranged to have the repairman arrive while the movers were still bringing my furniture up in the freight elevator. After working in politics, I could schedule you for an audience with the Pope and still get you to the hair stylist by two.

The repairman, who turned out to be about twenty-five and heartbreakingly beautiful, told me regretfully (in a delicious Southie accent) that the wiring in the basement was so old that installing a second line was virtually out of the question barring extensive and expensive electrical work.

"Shit," said I, thoughtfully. "This means my habit of leaving the computer online all the time might not be such a good idea anymore." And I dutifully logged on, checked my mail, made my round of journals, and logged off. This period of responsible action lasted nearly two weeks.

Since then, my home phone line has been an impenetrable wall of Busy Signal for anyone trying to reach me. This can be good or bad. In the case of the Saks Fifth Avenue billing department, it's good. But my friends and parents are understandably peeved.

I've made sure that everyone has the number to my cell phone, and sometimes people call. But the walls here are hundred-year-old two-foot concrete with metal lathe, which naturally inhibits the cell phone signals. So what am I to do?

Go cable. I've called RCN and AT&T and each has disavowed responsibility for this building. Here's my solution, going up today in the mailroom, the laundry room and the main elevator:

When the nurse in the emergency ward last Friday tried to set an IV in my right arm, she blew the vein. It wasn't her fault, really; I was dehydrated. Almost immediately, my forearm puffed up like a little pillow. "I'm sorry," the nurse said, looking closely at my arm. "You'll probably have a little bruising there."

Four days later, my right arm looks like it was run over by a truck, or possibly like the results of some rather violent kinky sex. Thankfully, it has become too cold to wear short sleeves in public, so the only strange looks I have to deflect are from people at the gym. Here, check it out:

Taking a photograph of the outside of my own arm turned out to be an anatomically interesting trick. The inside of the arm is somewhere between blue and brown and not nearly so interesting, so I played at it for a while and figured out how to get the picture. Oh, the things I do for you.

I have way too many things to accomplish. I need to make a plane reservation to go to DC for Thanksgiving (yes, Mom, I'll call today). I need to buy something pretty to wear to Thanksgiving dinner (an excuse to shop). I need to get refills for my Aveda aromatherapy candles, an appointment to get my hair trimmed, a reservation for Cricket with the cat hotel.

I could accomplish these things so much more easily if I had a free phone line. Time for me to go hang my little signs. And time for you to go read Princess Julie's journal, which is hysterical. (Julie rocks like Bob, yo. She is an essential part of a healthy breakfast and bursting with fruit flavor.)