AT&T? AllTel? Who's to blame?

Thursday, I'm gonna say around 10 a.m., cell service went out. And I don't mean just my phone, or a dead zone or something - everyone's cell service was out. No calls. No texting. Nothing over the airwaves. Silence.

Normally, this would just be an inconvenience, but of course on this day there's breaking news and we need to get ahold of Tribal officials. But the Tribal buildings are closed. My coworker has half of the Tribe in her cell phone address book, but again, no service.

So we waited.

THEN, I got fed up and went over to AllTel to see what the deal was. "No comment," I got told. I was told to call back to talk to a manager. I did not have time. So, we don't know for sure, but we're fairly certain that AT&T must have been attempting to overlay the cell towers with their new "upgrades." Like I said, we don't know, because no one said anything. At all. Great customer service.

So once cell service resumed, it was still sketchy. Whenever I tried calling people, we would get connected but be unable to hear each other. That happened with about 3 or 4 different people. Then, when my mom tried to call me that evening, when I answered all I heard was this woman describing (in great, boring detail) about a tour of some really neat building she went on.

Fascinating.

Mom said on her end all she heard was this guy saying, "uh huh...yeah...yeah...uh huh." So I don't know if we both got one half of the same call or what, but it was weird.

So then, about 10 minutes later, one of my best friends tries to call. I answer. It's some guy, talking in an uber-creeper voice, and all I catch is him saying something to the effect of "I know I'm a pain in the ass."

I hung up. And laughed. (And when I tried to call her back, she didn't answer.)

My coworker said the same thing happened to her...she tried to call her daughter and some dude answered.

So much for a 'smooth transition.'