CDs OF THE WEEK

In the car CD changer this week:
The Cynics - Great 60's style garage punk from Pittsburgh. (They're big in Germany!)
The Hives - I love these guys! I think the singer is channeling Mick Jagger.
Snake River Conspiracy - Somewhat goth and awesome! This chicks voice is captivating.
Peter Murphy - Former frontman for Bauhaus and very melodic.
Adam and the Ants - Gotta love anyone who wears face paint!
Firewater - Former frontman for Cop Shoot Cop's new band - very intense.

...and yes - the refrigerator came.

THE REFRIGERATOR COMETH...AGAIN?

We left our sad sad story off a few weeks ago. Needless to say, at this point, I have still NOT experienced the dull hum of the icemaker, nor the high gloss shine of the exterior of our new refrigerator. My new baby has been moved from warehouse to warehouse, has been taken to countless strangers homes and has ridden around in the back of a truck for weeks now.

But it his still not made it to it's new home - whose occupants are awaiting with open arms, empty glasses and melting ice cream.

Nope - not yet.

As of it's last arrival date (oh - and there have been many) I was called by our sweaty delivery guy and asked to meet him downstairs - our baby had arrived!!

I quickly created a path and dressed nice (so as to make a good first impression) and ran down the hall just in time to be told by our maintenance man that the elevator was...

Out. Of. Order.

So sadly I watched my refrigerator ride away on the truck in which it came, a small tear trickling down my cheek, as I waved bye bye with my sodden hanky.

Sigh.

BIRDS LIKE IT COLD
So now it seems that global warming is screwing up my bird pals. Now I'm pissed!
Animals Going Awry as Earth Warms, Scientists Say

MCDONALD’S ANYONE?

You’ve been to McDonald’s before – don’t deny it cause even after the gore of Super Size Me – you still go.

Well at any rate – I do. On my way to work a few times a week I pick up an egg & cheese biscuit (no meat), a yogurt parfait and a fruit & walnut salad (breakfast, lunch and snack). I do this a few times a week so I know the cost, etc…

Well today it seems I was met on the drive-thru speaker by a newbie. I ordered my usual and it took about a full minute for her to understand “egg & cheese biscuit”. Now, it’s on their menu – it even has it’s own button on their register and prints out on the receipt.

But I’m a nice person so I bear with it and go to the pick-up window where I am promptly overcharged. Lucky me I have an old receipt in the car trash and show her how much it is supposed to cost. The price is adjusted.

I wait.

I receive my bag of stuff and depart. When I get on the road I look in the bag and BEHOLD!

No egg & cheese biscuit.

Of course because of the wacky road I am on I have to drive 2 blocks make a right, then a left, drive 4 blocks, sit at a light and make a u-turn. SO after 5-6 minutes of returning, I park, march up to the drive-thru window and ask for my egg & cheese biscuit.

She looks befuddled, disappears to the back and returns with a bag and many apologies.

No problem – I’m really running late – gotta go.

I get to my office, unpack my stuff and what did I get?

A Sausage McMuffin.

Now, I know you’re thinking “why didn’t you check before you left?”

I’ll tell you why. It’s because we in the DC area (and I’m sure other places) have become complacent with bad customer service. And I for one am sick of feeling like it is my fault for not checking, double-checking and triple-checking other peoples work.

Where did this go wrong?

For starters:
She wasn’t properly trained – seems most places with any type of customer service required hire people with a pulse and few other minimal skills.

Might I suggest the ability to count to 10? How about being able to speak clear English? Hey! When I was in Mexico I ordered EVERYTHING in Spanish. (I’m the one carrying the Berlitz book and trying to find the restroom – but I always ask in the native tongue. And in case you were wondering it is “banos”.) How about the ability to LISTEN to the customer?

She didn’t open the damn bag before she handed it to me and count to three. I ordered three things – she should make sure three things are in the bag. Period. Not hard – not asking too much.

She couldn’t read (or chose not to). Now, I should add she seemed to speak very well so I don’t think that this was a language barrier. But she did clearly hand me a yellow-wrapped sandwich that said “Sausage McMuffin” instead of a white wrapper that says “Egg & Cheese Biscuit”. Seems to ME she couldn’t read.

Hmmmmm, I could go one but I think you get the picture.

Of course this doesn’t resolve the fact that I’m still hungry.

ME & MARILYN




Gentlemen might have prefered blonds back in the day but I know a few who prefer us redheads. ;-)

DID YOU SAY MEAT JELL-O?

Seriously - read it! You'll be in stitches. All I can say is Meat Jell-o. MMMMMMM Institute : Gallery of Regrettable Food : Specialities

THE LONE HOUSE FINCH


I'm sure you all waiting for the final bird report. This little guy finally left the nest (with some friendly urging) in the afternoon of August 6th. Which is a good thing since we were hosting our annual tiki party that evening and he was sure to be annoyed by all of the foot traffic (and obnoxious drink garnishes). Of couse, I should probably mention that a few moments later his parents came back and screamed at me until I went back in the house.

I wish I could speak bird.

THE COLD SIDE OF REFRIGERATOR OWNERSHIP

So, WAY back in June the SO and I thought that it would be nice to finally treat ourselves to a new refrigerator. Our current one is circa ’84 and is the color of an anemic banana – not quite yellow, not quite white. Since we’ve made so many spiffy upgrades to the kitchen we also thought it would be nice to finally complete one whole room of the house.

So off we marched to Sears to pick out a lovely black model with a bottom drawer freezer and a few more cubic feet of space to stash our Yeungling and freeze pops. I should mention before we did this, we armed ourselves with internet research on the best pricing, best features, best brands! So there we are – standing in front of the icebox of our (affordable) dreams. (No honey, we can’t have the one with the computer – how about an ice maker instead??)

“We would like this one” we say enthusiastically.

“We’re sorry, that one has been discontinued” they retort. (But I’m standing here looking at it??) “But we have another model number that is the same thing – would you like it?”

So after finagling a free icemaker (installed!) we agree.

The happy shiny salesgirl does our paperwork and after about an hour of creative financing (half cash – half no interest credit) we were told we would have our new behemoth delivered to our door in three weeks.

Three weeks? But you have our money now! Why three weeks?

FINE! Three weeks it is. We will expect our new baby on July 26. (I can feel that labor pains already!)

So, two weeks later (as goes the story of our lives) the phone rings and we are told that delivery will be delayed yet another week. We should expect our now aging baby on August 4. (It’s a good thing we didn’t jump the gun and get rid of our old one yet!)

After some screaming and yelling by SO they offer us a “loaner”. NO WE DON’T WANT A DIFFERENT ONE – WE WANT OURS!!!

Along about August 3rd we receive yet another call that it has been delayed once again and to expect it on the 9th. On the 5th we received a call that it wouldn’t arrive until the 16th. So at this point we ask ourselves:
Has this refrigerator been invented yet?
Did the patent fall through?
Did the young underpaid manufacturing children go on strike?
Did they forget to attach the ice maker?
Did it “fall off the truck”?
Is some woman in Albuquerque using my new refrigerator?
How can Sears sell you something and not be able to figure out when they can deliver it to you???

So, disgruntled, we call our original happy shiny salesgirl and chew her a new – er – exit. She offers that for our inconvenience we will be refunded 10 percent of the purchase price back to our card. Yippee! So now we continue to wait for our refrigerator – 10 percent richer.

If that phone rings again and it ain’t a sweaty delivery guy...

ONE DOWN...

August 3 - One has left the nest! I can only hope it was a successful flight! Three to go...

I SINK SHE IS BROKE

So, in the long list of home repairs that took place over the summer we chose to update our bathrooms. As a condo dweller one becomes very adept at scheduling any home repair job. Due to a shortage of extra space, if you don’t time things right you may end up sleeping with the old toilet. As a result, home repairs end up a sort of choreographed waltz with new parts arriving as old parts leave, etc…which is why it really screws things up when deliveries are delayed, lost or broken.

We had to special order a sink, because somehow, like the rest of our unit, nothing is a standard size. I have had to special order virtually everything from the furnace filters (by the dozen - only $15 a piece) to the window coverings because NOTHING is a standard size.

Nonetheless we trudged into our not-so-local home improvement giant to order our special sink. If we didn’t actually ever need to close the bathroom door this wouldn’t be an issue but Jon has this weird thing about privacy…

Anyhow, we order this faux granite pentagon shaped sink – because hey – if it’s got to be special ordered it may as well be “special”. Two weeks later, as scheduled, we receive a call to come and pick it up. So we drive all the way back out to the not-so-local home improvement giant once again to claim our overpriced prize.

“Wait here and we’ll have someone bring it up – it’ll be about ten minutes.”

Forty-five minutes later our sink arrives. When we open the box we are dismayed to see that the bottom of the sink – near the drain – has a chunk missing out of it. Now, I’m no plumber but I can see that this 2 inch missing chunk is going to cause a problem. So I tell the special orders person about this.

They say “don’t worry, the drain will cover it.”

Again, I’m no expert but – uh – how in the hell big do they think the drain is anyway?? So we grudgingly march back to the faucet department where we purchased our work of art a few weeks ago and grab a drain, bring it back up front and show the guy – it ain’t gonna cover squat.

He then proceeds to tell us we need to take it back to the bathroom department and have them reorder a new one.

We go back to find the gentleman who originally placed the order and told him the problem – he took care of the reorder lickity split and we returned home only to have to return in TWO MORE WEEKS to pick up the sink again.

Two weeks later – the call comes in – we once again drive to our not-so-local home improvement giant to claim the sink. As before we wait – oh – 45 minutes for them to bring it up. We open the box…

It’s two-toned. That means the sink bowl is a different color than the rest of the sink. Not how we ordered it, nor how the first one came. But as you can see we are now WAY OFF SCHEDULE so I say “what the hell” and we keep the sink. (Did I mention that the vanity cabinet has been adorning our living room for the past two weeks?)

Later that day we install the sink and discover that the drain is crooked. The hole was drilled at a slight angle causing the drain piece to form a not-so-perfect seal. I refuse to go back. I hate this sink.

Jon being the wonderful plumber he is (or used to be) rigs it so it works and you can BARELY tell it’s crooked. But I know…

About two-three weeks pass and this sink mocks me daily.

One day, we get a call from our not-so-local home improvement giant once again. “Your sink is in.”

WHAT THE @#%#@&% ????

Who is the imposter in our bathroom? Has it been watching us?? Has is been radioing notes to its mother ship??

So, Jon drives all the way back out to the not-so-local home improvement giant (because I REFUSE to go) and tells the special orders desk that he’s there for his sink.

Forty-five minutes later the man comes back and says “We can’t find it. We are really sorry. But we’ll call you when we find it.”

Jon (whose temper is much shorter than mine) is NOT happy. He demands to cancel the order and get his money back. In fear of their lives, they give it back.

We got a new entertainment center.

HOW PC ARE YOU?

I am part of a discussion group for association executives. A very interesting question came up regarding the title of a chapter of a book someone was writing about asphalt. It seems the author wanted to name the chapter "The First Black Superhighways" and the association exec wanted to run it by her peers to check the PC factor of the title.

Well people chimed in from all over citing why it would or could offend and how it should be changed. It was a very interesting discussion about being politically correct in everything we do. As I read the numerous postings it made me sad to see how we as a society have become so offended at everything.

Here was my posting:

I too have been following this discussion with some interest. I am the Treasurer of a very large condo board with a very multi-cultural community and I feel frustrated when I am writing (or speaking) and I have to sensor every word said - or at least view with such a critical eye that I am almost convinced that anything I say (or do for that matter) is going to offend someone.

I think as a society we've taken it too far frankly. And when I get frustrated by something that seems to continue to compound itself I step back and I think - we have to look at it from another point of view entirely.

In most cases it seems to me that the problem lies with the listener (or observer). So my question would be: How do we as a culture "listen" with the best intentions instead of the worst? Obviously if everyone walks through life assuming that someone is out to get them, they are going to read negativity into everything they see or hear. This goes for every race, culture, religion, socio-economic status, etc...

How do we as listeners begin to assume the best instead of the worst?
And since when did it become my job as a writer, speaker, etc to try to interpret how you are going to interpret what I am trying to say when I am saying it with the best of intentions?

Oh so far off topic...

So...I am not referring to obviously offensive things but really now - at face value how offensive is: "The First Black Superhighways"??

So, now I pose the question to you.