It sounds like the beginning of a bad comedy--in fact, really, it seems like only a matter of time before someone options the rights to the story. And if any Hollywood producers are looking for someone to write the screenplay, I'm sure that Carol Sinclair could recommend a few names.

The 53-year-old actress/playwright was arraigned in a Halifax Provincial Court, following charges that she held a technician for her Web provider, Aliant, hostage, after he failed to fix her connection.

Sinclair, under the wire with deadlines, got frustrated when the 21-year-old repairman, David Scott, said that the problem lay in her computer, rather than the connection. Sinclair recalls saying, "I don't want to hold you hostage, but would you mind hanging around until the other technician arrives so that the two of you can sort it out."

Taking the comment as less than idle threat, Scott fled the scene. "She told the technician, in a tirade, that he was not leaving until her Internet was working and she told him she was keeping him hostage," Halifax constable Jeff Carr told The Globe and Mail. "She implied that she had a gun, although he didn't see one."

Police later search her premises and didn't find a weapon.

"I'm a Buddhist," said Sinclair, chalking the whole thing up to a wacky misunderstanding. "I'm a wimp. I'm a pacifist."