Electrictiy and Internet (A tiny home/land development report)

On Tuesday, I was working in my office in Bridgewater when I was tagged on facebook in a post made by my Most Awesome Neighbour saying that there was a lot going on at my land.

What! Gasp! The power company!!! Hooking me up!!!

Amazing.

I had not been given a heads-up call the day before so I had no idea. I wrapped up my work as quickly as I could and headed home, where I chatted with the extremely cordial crew leader. They already had the poles in and all that remained was to string the line, make the connection to my shed and then turn the power on up at the road.

Flabbergasting.

The power company did have to cut down one of my crooked trees, sadly. It hadn't been marked for removal by the power company's site inspector, but the crew felt strongly that the tree jeopardized the power line – and I could see their point since it was tall, dead and leaning in direction of the line.

See that leaning dead maple tree behind the truck?

I had wanted to leave it standing because it was so beautiful, but it's beautiful on the ground, too, and will make a wonderful bench for reading and picnicking. 

I have power right now. No more watching my laptop battery count down into oblivion. No more careful husbanding of my cellphone battery. This feels extremely – well, powerful.

The first thing I did, once the power was hooked up, was to call Eastlink to invite them to come hook me up with a high-speed Internet connection. The woman I spoke with on the phone was not the most helpful (she sounded like she had a terrible head cold and didn't seem like she'd be very with it at the best of times), but she took my info and set  up an appointment with a technician for Thursday morning, which is pretty quick. I wasn't complaining.

(The second thing I did was break my $0 booze budget and went and bought myself a bottle of bubbly.) 

And I was very glad to have a glass of bubbly inside me when I received a "confirmation" email from Eastlink that had me at a completely different address, even though I had confirmed the address several times with my call centre compatriot.

Another call to Eastlink ensued. I got the address issue sorted out with someone else and I got to keep my Thursday morning appointment.

I was all stoked to post today that on June 30, 2016, about 5 weeks since there was only a space cleared for my driveway and dwelling here, I have a home, a shed, a garden, electricity and Internet access.

But not so fast there with the bubbly optimism, Mac. Here, finally, is an example of things not happening as quickly as I'd hoped. My Eastlink visit this morning was anticlimactic. The technician needs a different crew to install a tap (tack? taco?) up at the pole on the road so that he can do the rest of the installation.

They should be able to do that sometime next week. In the meantime, I am close, but no cigar.

Oh well. A few more visits to my office in town may be in order, but that is no hardship.

And on the plus side, today I received my deposit back from the province for the work on my driveway. I was told that could take up to 6 months, so 4 weeks is cause for celebration.