On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 16:53:21 -0500, Beowulf inscribed to the world:
....
I appreciate any help, I am having one hell of a time getting this sorted
out, in part because of the phone company-- they hooked my up to my house,
I had a dial tone, then 5 minutes later the line went dead; there was no
....

I have phone tone! Phones working now, hell of a mystery. Turns out the
phone line from the street to the NIC/Demarc box was bad, corroded, the
phone company had to string in a whole new phone line from the pole to the
outside NIC box! The temporary (30-60 second) usage I had, i.e. dial tone,
yesterday, was just from static electricity left in the line that allowed
a temporary dial tone. They put in a new line from the street and all is
working now. Thank you for your help everybody! I have learned a great
deal about phone wiring, etc.!