TuttleTree.com

Strike two and a half.

You may have heard about the storms going through eastern Pennsylvania over the last few days. Some of the most intense thunder I've ever heard… pretty powerful stuff. And on Saturday night, it made our power go out, perhaps just briefly — we're not sure. One thing is sure, though. Our satellite receiver? Dead. Again. Third death in two months time.

The original was a hard drive problem, and the second was … I don't even remember. I seem to have been so angry that I've blacked it out from my memory. You can imagine how I feel right now. Frowny face.

We have Dish Network because they are inexpensive. And when you're selecting a provider, aside from customer service reputation (looking at you, Comcast) you base your decision mostly on price and hardware. (Unless you're really into food or sports, then you might care a bit more than the average person about channel selection.) Dish Network has the lowest price for someone who wants HD and DVR in our area, their hardware isn't bad, and they have all of the channels we require. So we picked dish.

Then, there was this news about the extra $5/month charge for not having a phone line to connect it to, so that it could download messages (geez, I wonder what on (or off) earth they could possibly use to do that, other than a phone line) and let us know about pay-per-view events that we would never even consider purchasing; not even in a googol years. The last receiver they sent us — the one that's dead this time — had an ethernet jack on it next to the phone jack, which was new. I did a little digging, and it turns out that we can connect it to the internet to get that charge waived, so we did. I'm still bitter that it's required, and that they weren't up-front about the charge, even when I asked the installation technician if it was a problem not to have a phone line connected ("Nope.").

Satellite also has its own inherent problems that I'm not too fond of living with. We regularly lose sections of recorded or live shows in semi-crappy weather. It makes sense, you're beaming the signal through the sky after all, but obviously this is a flawed system. It's just not something you have to deal with when your TV comes across a buried cable.

I was ready to cut all ties with them on Sunday morning when we woke up to find the receiver dead. It's plugged into the same surge protector as everything else down there, and everything else is fine! Obviously, this isn't exactly premium hardware we're dealing with, here.

So I called to complain and give them one chance at redemption. After cursing at the computer that thought it heard me speak one of the menu options when I was in fact dead silent — When will they learn that these voice-operated systems are tragically awful? Just let me punch the numbers! — I finally convinced it to transfer me to a human, who was courteous and responsive and within a couple of minutes had me slated for an overnight shipment of a replacement receiver (ahem, 3rd in 2 months! all the same model!) and at no charge. Good enough for now, I suppose.

But, finally, Megan is on my side. This good deal — the lowest cost provider — is no longer a good deal. It can't be. Because at this rate, we're paying $60 a month for the privelege of going days without our service, the fun experience of re-programming our DVR schedule, and the delight of losing whatever might have been recorded when it died (not an insignificant quantity or quality of shows, I assure you). She's actually mad! And you practically have to try to make Megan mad.

So Dish? Get your act together. There are no more warnings. And there's always Hulu.