Verizon should pay for my ulcer treatment

I am so angry with Verizon Wireless right now I want to kill somebody. I don't dare CALL them or I'll burst into tears, like I usually do when I am halfway to a meltdown... like today...

Let me start at the beginning. I have been with Verizon since about this time in the year 2000. EIGHT years. At an average of $150/month (sometimes more, sometimes less... but that's the average sum) I have paid them somewhere in the neighborhood of... $15,000!

They're stingy and scrimp on me with the "new every two" and want to give me just $100 off on the purchase of higher-end phones... I'm sorry, but I think after being a steady customer for this long they should give me THE BEST PHONE THEY OFFER at no charge. If they were smart they'd do this anyway, realizing that the nicer the phone is the more likely I'll order additional services to go with it. (Navigator, Internet, etc.)

This year I won a fairly decent phone. An LG enV. And I have been very happy with it... until August 1. But let me backtrack a bit.

I purchased numerous ringtones for this phone, but not all of the songs I wanted were available as ringtones, or they were not cut to the section of the song I wanted for a ringtone. No problem... I could go to myxer.com and make a ringtone from any song. I even made ringtones from four of my own original songs, which CERTAINLY aren't available through Verizon's system.

I was loving my custom ringtones and my great phone until August 1. Why? Because my phone shut down as of August 1, forcing me to exchange it for a new, BLANK handset. I am convinced that Verizon somehow MADE my phone shut down in order to FORCE me to buy ringtones from them despite the fact that they don't offer all of what I want. Me... their 8-year customer. Treated like trash. Yeah.

I didn't figure out that they probably did this until I went to myxer.com and tried to do the same thing again... but now Verizon blocks them... and every attempt I made to circumvent this did not work. If you know of a way, please let me know. I have put it on a memory card, emailed it... but they strip it from the email now. You can't email mp3's to a phone nor midi... nada.

Verizon is really making me hate them, and it's tempting to stiff them and start an account with a new carrier... but I don't think I can wrench my phone # away unless I finish out the contract.

I think it's time I wrote a new song. Weird Al, feel like teaming up with me on "Can You Hear Me Now?"