Oh, woe is me!

I've been quite excited about once again having a telephone line.  A plain old local line.  A line so I don't need to arrange elaborate visits to someone else's house to conduct phone interviews with a reliable connection.  A line so I can stop going over my monthly allotment of cell minutes.  A line so I can also pay for internet.  A line so I can stop holding a we-don't-really-know-what-the-long-term-effects-of-these things-are cell phone so close to my brain all day long.

Today, my phone line was turned on.  It's a cool number that makes a very pleasing pattern on the keypad.  You can call it and you'll get a nice ring tone.  Only problem:  my jacks in the apartment are dead.  All five of them.  Clearly, this place has been wired, and it's been wired pretty well, as the aforementioned five jacks are in a pretty small space.  

Upon calling the phone company, I learned that they did indeed turn the line on at the box.  I also learned that one's California landlord is required to provide the first jack.  I furthermore learned that you can contract whoever you want to do the work on said jack, and that AT&T charges $425.

This is not a conversation I want to have with my new landlord, who gave me a rent reduction to move in.

Just as I have been learning more than I ever wanted to know about the inner workings of toilets, tomorrow I guess I'll be learning all about how multiple-line phone boxes work.