Please accept this as my formal apology. Over the weekend our DSL modem from Verizon died. I asked my wife to call Verizon and see about getting it replaced. Once again I apologize.

I think the ordeal took most of her afternoon today, and it's still not resolved. To set the stage, the DSL modem does not power up. I swapped out power supplies and switched outlets, no luck. It's dead. We were also one of the first in our area to get DSL, something like 6 years ago.

She calls and talks to one person, then another, then another. I'm overhearing bits and pieces of the conversation. Here are some highlights:

- At one point the tech says, here is the issue, you might not have DSL service since you're not paying for it. My wife responds, "Looking at my bill, we're being charged $35 for 'Advanced Data Services'...." Oh yeah, that's it, never-mind.

- The tech asks, "Have you tried the other phone lines in the house?"....Hello, the modem is dead, changing phone lines isn't going to make a difference.

- Verizon says they need to test the circuit, can we plug the modem in. If you remember the modem is dead, not sure how plugging it in will help you test it.

- It turns out our DSL circuit is so old they actually need to upgrade it to get us a new modem. That's 1-2 days.

More updates as this story develops.