Monthly Archives: December 2006

I’d Be the First Voted Off the Island

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Last week Celeste and I were in San Francisco.  I was there to run an event for my client (Competitive Financial Intelligence, if you’re curious) and Celeste flew out later in the week. We stayed through Saturday, flying home on the Saturday night redeye, and in general we had a great time.  Unfortunately one event has me seriously questioning my decision making skills and my ability to survive outside my safe bubble of suburban tranquility.

On Saturday afternoon we were at Ghirardelli Square trying to decide what we would do before heading back to the hotel to collect our bags and head to the airport.  Celeste wanted to see the Victorian homes and we decided it might be a nice walk there and then we could catch a bus, trolley or cab from there to our hotel.  We’d gone a few blocks when it started raining pretty hard with a nice strong wind (gale) thrown into the mix. So we turned around and headed towards the trolley stop which we figured we could ride back to Union Square and do some store browsing before we went to the airport.  When we got to the trolley stop we saw an amazingly long line so I figured we could walk a ways and try to catch a cab…in the rain.  Brilliant!

So we started walking and were continuously passed by overflowing trolley’s and unavailable cabs. I had the forethought to spend $5 on a cheap umbrella before we left the waterfront, but it promptly succumbed to the wind and rendered itself useless.  So we walked, and we walked.  Alot of it uphill. All of it in clothes that weren’t exactly weatherproof. Eventually we decided we were far enough into the walk that we might as well go all the way, which means we arrived at our hotel in the early evening looking like a couple of wet rats.

Obviously I made a strategic error in deciding to walk.  We would have been much better served by going back to Fisherman’s Wharf and standing in line for the trolley or walking down to the Embarcadero where there was a taxi line.  But no, I had us walk uphill for a couple of miles through a driving rain, knowing that we had nowhere to change clothes before heading to the airport.  Decision making at its finest, and one more reason I’ll never even consider trying out for Survivor.

Bankers are Giving Lawyers a Run for Their Money

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I’m beginning to believe that bankers have supplanted ambulance-chasing lawyers as the slimiest sharkskin-suit-wearing industry in the country.  Actually, they may be in a tie with health insurers (see my post about that), but right now I’m thinking the bankers are in the lead.

Here’s what has my dander up today: When we got back from San Francisco we had a message from Chase saying we’re late on our last car payment.  This confused Celeste because we’ve been paying with autodrafts from our bank account for four years, or the entire lifespan of the car loan.  When she called Chase back they said that if we’d read the fine print of our loan we would have known that they don’t accept autodrafts for the last payment.  Okay, fine.  So Celeste asks the very unfriendly bank rep why we’re hearing about this only now that the payment is 90 days late and we’ve been put in collections?  The rep’s reply is that she can only handle payment, not answer customer service questions.

It gets better.  Celeste asks how much we owe.  The rep says she needs our bank information before she can answer any questions.  Huh?  After Celeste asks again the woman gives her the amount and they take care of the payment information, which by the way requires a $15 processing fee.  Huh?  (Celeste truly has a knack for getting the asshole reps).

Before she gets off the phone with the bank’s collection-dolt Celeste gets a customer service number, calls it and enters into banker-logic zone. The customer service rep asks her for our address to verify that he’s talking to the right person.  When she gives him the address he says that it is the wrong address.  Bingo, they never got our change of address when we moved two years ago, which probably explains why we didn’t get a late notice on the final payment.  Yet they were able to track us down for collection purposes.  Nice.  Eventually he’s able to confirm Celeste’s identity using other information and Celeste, who is absolutely fanatical about protecting our credit score, asks how we can get this cleared off our records.  After all we’ve never been late on a payment for the entire lifetime of the loan, and obviously there was a mix up with our change of address.  His answer was to give her a fax number to send a letter to and then wait seven days for their verdict.  Huh?

Here’s my problem.  The bank is probably within their rights, technically, to treat us like this but in the real world they are behaving reprehensibly.  We’d obviously been good customers for four years, but they’re treating us like criminals because of an honest mix up?  And who’s to say it’s our fault?  If they could track us down for collection couldn’t they have done the same for a courtesy call reminding us that an autodraft wouldn’t be accepted for our final payment?  Assholes. 

We’re not the only ones feeling this way about the banks.  Greensboro blogger David Hoggard has some thoughts about banks (he compares them unfavorably with payday lenders) and there’s a very good Frontline piece on the credit card industry that is enlightening to say the least.   It’s not just the credit card side of the industry that’s sullying its reputation; let’s not forget the banks’ investment branches involvement in the dotcom debacle.  With the loosening regulation of financial institutions I think things might get worse before they get better and ironically I think our best hope is, gag, the lawyers.  Hopefully we’ll get some class-action cases going that will have the bankers begging for re-regulation from that den of thieves otherwise known as Congress.

Oh, good Lord.

Fantastic Machine

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My brother emailed me this video today and I figured it was so cool that it already had to be on YouTube (see below).  In addition to the video the email contained the following information:

This incredible machine was built as a collaborative effort between the Robert M. Trammell Music Conservatory and the Sharon Wick School of Engineering at the University of Iowa . Amazingly,* 97%* of the machines’ components came from John Deere Industries and Irrigation Equipment of Bancroft Iowa , yes farm equipment!

It took the team a combined 13,029 hours of set-up, alignment, calibration, and tuning before filming this video but as you can see it was WELL worth the effort.

It is now on display in the Matthew Gerhard Alumni Hall at the University and is already slated to be donated to the Smithsonian.

Here’s the video:

Scary Bush in San Francisco

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Despite the title this post has nothing to do with POTUS.  Below is some video I shot this weekend in San Francisco down on Fisherman’s Wharf.  This guy took a couple of branches, hid behind them and then scared passersby.  Never mind that there’s not a tree or bush anywhere near him, that he’s on a sidewalk and that he’s sitting next to a bannister with a drop-down to the bay, he still was able to scare more people than you’d believe.  Best of all is that no one got mad and he was making out like a champ in terms of $1 tips. Full disclosure: he got me good before I shot this.

Yeah I’m Weird. Here’s a List.

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I’ve been called on by Fec to list six weird things about myself. (He was called out by Billy).  Of course there are far more than six things that are weird about me, but here’s what come’s immediately to mind:

  1. I still like Journey. You’ll find this even weirder after you read item #6.
  2. I’m fascinated by hair removal products.
  3. I don’t like peanut butter and chocolate mixed together.  Watching the old Reese’s commercials used to make me gag.
  4. I do like banana sandwiches made with peanut butter and mayonnaise on white bread.
  5. I revel in schadenfreude, but despite this I can’t stand watching American Idol.
  6. I think the following artists suck: Dylan,  the Dead, the Band and almost every folk-rock singer ever recorded.

I’d Be Just Like John Madden

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Football commentator John Madden is afraid of flying and has a custom bus that he rides to all the games he covers, and I guess everywhere else he goes.  I’ve always thought that, while it might suck to have a phobia of anything, having a customized bus with a driver to get around in is about as close to traveling nirvanah I’d ever be able to find.

Well, after reading this Freakonomics post titled "Would You Fly on an Airplane with No Pilot" I can tell you that if we ever get to the point where planes are routinely flown by remote control with no pilot in the cockpit then I’m going to become a great customer for Amtrak, Trailways and all the cruise lines.  I know that auto pilot already does a lot of the flying, but at least there’s someone there keeping an eye on things.  On top of that the person keeping an eye on things has as much interest as I do in making sure the plane gets where it’s going without crashing.  Some guy working a joystick in Des Moines just doesn’t have the chips in the game, if you know what I mean.  What’s stopping him from having a couple of beers at lunch and then coming back to play "let’s land the 737 in half the distance it normally takes" just for giggles? And what about communications breakdowns? If you’ve ever watched satellite TV in the middle of a thunderstorm you know what I’m talking about.

Let’s put it this way: have you ever been to a hobby store to see who’s buying all those RC planes?  That’s probably the pool of applicants for this job and you’re going to tell me you’ll trust them with your life? 

Trailways it is. 

Esbee Hits the Bigs

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Fellow Winston-Salem blogger Esbee has hit the mainstream by being Piedmont Parent’s first blogger.  I haven’t talked to her so I don’t know if this is a paid gig, but either way she’s now part of the hated MSM (mainstream media). Lucky for us she’s going to keep up her personal blog.

Personally I’m holding out for the really big time, waiting on an offer from one of the big MSM players.  My first choice would be the membership newsletter for the undertakers’ association;  I think my sensibilities are perfect for their publication.

Congrats Esbee.