We've never had many problems with DirecTV, and those we have had were always fixed quickly and professionally, with a minimum of fuss and bother on our end. Apparently, that era has ended.

Our housing association decided over the course of the summer that all their houses needed new roofs -- {sarcasm} because gods know there's nothing that needs more attention than the roofs, except the things that actually need attention {/sarcasm} -- and after bureaucratic nonsense held up the project all summer and autumn, the construction company that won the bid started on the roofs this week.

Now, the satellite dish is bolted to the roof, meaning the roofers had to pull the dish off in order to complete the roofing job. They put it back and re-secured it when they were done, but because of this, it unfortunately isn't aligned correctly any longer and we can't pick up a signal.

So I called DirecTV and explained what had happened. They said they could send someone to realign the dish...for seventy dollars. Yeah. Seventy dollars to climb on my roof for around a minute to turn some screws so I can continue to receive the programming I'm paying them for. No thanks.

The next morning, I explained to the roofers what had happened, and they were very understanding of the situation. They even offered to try and realign the dish, but we met with no luck; we couldn't peg a signal with it. So I called DirecTV back and asked if there was any way they could credit the charge for the service call, especially since we've been good customers for over five years.

"No" was the response. Pay up or I'm out of luck. They also reminded me that if I canceled my service there would be a much higher disconnection charge, as I am currently on a two-year commitment contract for some reason.

So, I can't receive the services I am paying for because of a problem with their equipment, and the only way I can receive those services is to give them more money so I can actually receive the services I've already paid to receive. And if I cancel our service contract, they will charge me more money for not continuing to pay them for services I am not receiving.

Hinky.

That's like walking into a store, handing a cashier $15 for a hammer, having the cashier take your money and put the hammer behind the counter before telling you it will be another $30 for them to give the hammer to you, and when you say the hammer isn't worth it and demand your money back, being charged $100 for canceling your purchase!

How is that fair? I'm paying to receive goods/services. How can I fairly be charged for goods/services I never actually receive?

Imagine if this were a shipment of vegetables. The truck breaks down and the vegetables don't arrive. The shipping company then attempts to double the price of those vegetables to cover repair of their truck before they will deliver them to me. And if refuse to pay for the truck repairs, I will never receive the vegetables but still be liable for their cost and the truck!

It's goddamn nonsense.

So, today, I borrowed a ladder from the neighbors, had my friend Jim bring over his tools and a compass, and we climbed up on the roof to realign the damn thing ourselves. It took an hour and finally just ignoring the positioning directions from the satellite receiver's internal Setup Guide and going by random adjustment-by-hand, but we managed to peg around a 90% signal. Saved myself $70 I shouldn't have had to spend anyways.

I should invoice DirecTV for my time.

My wife paid $420 for the 360 back in July; she gave it to me for my birthday at the tail end of August. This was our big purchase for the year, because that's alot of money in this household. All told, the 360 has been actually owned and operated for less than three months. That bit is important to what follows...

So, what happens today? The 360 makes nasty squealing noises and the screen freezes up. We turn it off, try with another disc. Same thing. Turn it off, check the cables, etc. Turn it on, and we get the three flashing red lights of doom. I hunt up troubleshooting tips online. Troubleshoot. It works -- that is, the lights go away -- but then it makes noise and freezes. Restart. Back to the red lights.

I called customer service immediately, ran through the troubleshooting steps a third time, and find out the console needs to be repaired. The representative stated it would cost $139 for the repair, but since it was purchased in July, there was nothing he could do for me -- it doesn't matter that I've only actually had or used the console since the start of September. Only the purchase date matters for the warranty.

Including the cost of repair, I could have bought a PS3 for the same amount of money! Hell, I wish I HAD at this point, because I am now the owner of a lovely and expensive paperweight. I can't afford $140 out of my ass, especially not during the holidays. In fact, I've never had problems with any of my Sony products, I've never had to shell out a third a cost of a Sony console just to have it repaired (Sony charged me $20 to repair a PS2 I'd had for over three years that didn't just blinker out for no reason like this, but was dropped on the floor by a kid! $20!!).

But wait, there's more: I find out that Microsoft has supposedly stated all consoles manufactured before January 1st, 2006 are flawed, and is offering to repair them for free. I call customer service back and it's true. They are sending me a shipping box overnight to send the console to them for a free repair/replacement/whatever.

Huzzah? Sort of. Basically, this never should have happened in the first place; three months from new to complete failure is a damn crime, and a charge of a third of the price for repair is robbery, especially for those of us who don't have green bills shooting out our posteriors like a magical leaf-blower in reverse.

And here's a question: why didn't the original representative give me this information about the free repair? Would I have been charged and screwed out of the money unless I discovered the statement by Microsoft later and called them on it after-the-fact? Would I even have known my original console was a pre-06 model and subject to a refund of repair money if they had just replaced it?

So, while my 360 is being repaired, and that is a good thing, I'm still none to happy about this situation. And the words my wife used to describe Microsoft after all this would have made babies cry. I don't blame her. Don't get me wrong, we are both happy we can get it repaired, but I really hope there are no more service or product glitches like this in the future.