One of my favorite google tips is when you want to find out bad things about a company, put the name of the company followed by sucks and put it all in double quotes.

Creating a Google Search
My blog title is just in case there weren’t enough hits on “sprint sucks”.

I have had cell phone service with Sprint for a long time now. Two years ago, I renewed a two year contract and added Thaddeus on so he could have a cell phone in case of an emergency. My bill went up about as much as I would have expected it to, but I didn’t really look at the detail. That was a mistake.

Fast-forward two years and it’s December 2009. I’m looking at my November bill (which is the last month of the 2-year contract) and I see a charge in the detail called “Vision Pack” for $15. I call Sprint to find out what this charge is. It allows me to send pictures taken on my cell phone to others via text messages or e-mail. I hadn’t requested this service, so I asked how long it had been on my bill.

Turns out I had been paying for this unused service for 2 years and I never saw it.

I requested a refund for the $360 plus all taxes and I was told that they could only go back 3 months. No matter who I spoke with, the most I could get was about $55 refunded. Even though I never requested the service, nor did I ever use it.

I know this is one of the caveat emptor things, and I should have reviewed my monthly bill more carefully, but I still felt cheated, and the customer service folks at Sprint are dreadfully bad…at least the ones I spoke with.

Suffice it to say, I’m now a customer of AT&T wireless and so far, I’m quite happy.

Current Knitting
Stranded knitting and secret knitting…knitting my chubby little fingers to the bone.

And here’s a picture of the back of the sweater so far, just so folks don’t think this is one of those casket sweaters that only look good from the front!

I only have about 3 more inches of the body to do before I start on the sleeves.

Flea Market Find
A vendor at the local flea market had a slew of needlepoint books, but since I don’t do needlepoint, I was only interested in this one.

This is Kaffe Fassett’s Glorious Needlepoint, which is just stunning to look at. I already knew what an incredible artist he is, but seeing it in another medium made it even more amazing to me.

I picked up my copy for US$3.00, which seems pretty good, even based on the used prices on Amazon.

Readers’ Comments/Questions
Kenny writes, “I have a lace Neibling question for you. I am now starting lyra and it’s going pretty well, except that I stumbled upon some discussion that on the “intermediate” rounds, you actually should twist the twisted stitches.

How do you do yours? What’s the best way?”

I have responded directly to Kenny on these questions. I just do plain knit on the “rest rows” except for knitting into double yarn-overs where I do a knit and then a purl. Some folks feel that if the pattern calls for a twisted stitch on the working row, you should untwist that stitch on the resting row…I don’t agree and like the texture/tightness of the twisted stitch.