Always ask for a supervisor

I recently switched one of my land lines from Vonage to Cablevision's Optimum Online. It's not that I have anything against Vonage, or particularly like Cablevision, but the pricing is slightly less and the one year discount on my cable TV service was several hundred dollars. It was leaving money on the table not to take them up on their offer.

I called up their sales desk, who cheerfully took my order. When I explained I wanted to port my Vonage number, they said they could not do it today, but would have to schedule with Vonage. That wasn't a problem, but then they told me that a technician would have to come to my house the day of the transfer. Cablevision *loves* to roll a truck for unnecessary reasons (like slipping a cable card into a TiVo), so I figured this was just their own craziness. But then the rep said that if I was not porting a number they could just turn it on there. This, of course, is just plain stupid - all this takes is for them to do the switch and me to plug my household system into the cable modem rather than the Vonage VoIP adapter. But it was nearly midnight and I didn't want to fight them at that time.

The day before the install, I got a friendly reminder call. I really did not want to take the morning off to wait for a guy to come in, pick up my telephone and say "Yup, it works". I called customer service and got a similar tale as before - that they had to send a tech. When I asked why, the rep said "The technician comes out with a cable modem programmed for the telephone number." That piece of bullshit was the final straw. I told him that didn't make any sense, and would like to talk to a supervisor.

We played a little scene where I had to wait on hold for 20 minutes, and then got told a supervisor would call me back. No problem, I wear a headset, so I can sit on hold and still work for hours at a time. Eventually, I did receive a call back. I explained my situation to the supervisor, and he told me I still needed a tech visit. When I asked why this time, I got an answer I could work with - he said that the technician would have to rewire my phone system. I explained that there was no need for that. I already had VoIP service, so all that was needed was to unplug the phone system from the Vonage adapter and plug it into the back of the cable modem. He paused, and pondered for a few moments, as he had an epiphany. He asked me to hold for a few minutes while he checked something.

Sure enough, a few minutes later he came on the line and said - "No problem. I'll put in the service change for midnight tonight and it should happen soon after. Just switch the plug and check it in the morning. It's a good thing you figured this out, because with the snow tomorrow, you were almost sure to get cancelled in the morning." I thanked him, did a little victory dance and went back to work.

That night, I swapped my phone system input to the cable modem. In the morning, I had dialtone. All is right with the world.

Netflix fail of the day

Blade Runner: Theatrical & Director's Cut
Because you enjoyed:
The Shining
A Clockwork Orange
A Fish Called Wanda

Don't get me wrong. I loved them all. But I'm never going to be terrified of Michael Palin.

What we need is statesmen, not politicians.

The Giffords shooting makes me ashamed for my country.

Stateswomen don't mark their opponents with cross-hairs, as if they should be shot. Sarah Palin does.
Statesmen don't advocate shooting their opponents. Jessy Kelly does. http://azstarnet.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/elections/article_349e18b8-ec64-5fd7-b347-afe7f1778a47.html

If we believe patriotism is going around shooting everyone who holds a different opinion, then we are no better than the terrorists we are fighting around the world. If this is the Tea Party way, then the terrorists have won, and already taken down what makes America great.

More Quicken Essentials uselessness

Today I found encountered another factor that helps makes Quicken Essentials useless. You cannot have an investment account without tying it to a brokerage for automatic download. In fact, you cannot enter transactions yourself, like the older Quicken versions. So, there is no way to track investments without storing the account number and password on my computer. I don't understand why they have changed Quicken into a tool which is strictly "tell me what my banks says", rather than a tool which lets you track your version of reality.

Funny Mis-Addressed Mail of the day

I own many domains. Sometimes I get mail for people at other domains. Occasionally, the make me smile, like today''s:


Mark Amaru Pinkham KGCTpl
North American Grand Prior
International Order of Gnostic Templars
P.O. Box 20548
Sedona AZ 86341
928-284-1429
www.GnosticTemplars.org


Mission Statement of the IOGT
The International Order of Gnostic Templars is committed to assisting in the revival of both the Goddess Tradition and the Gnostic path of knowing one's self fully. IOGT members seek to complete the work of the original Knights Templar by working to synthesize the spiritual traditions of the East and West. IOGT members dedicate themselves to living in accordance with the ideal of the spiritual warrior - one who is able to effectively, and without fear, meet any and all challenges that life places before him or her.



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: GnosticTemplars@aol.com
To: ...@...
Date: Tue, 29 Jun 2010 18:54:03 EDT
Subject: KNight Templar Questions
Hello Squire redacted
Below are the questions we provide for all Knight Templar candidates. Please answer and return asap. Thank you.

In Service to the Order,
Sir Mark Amaru


Knight Templar Questions

1. Explain how the IOGT is different from other Templar organizations in existence today.

2. Summarize the history of the Johannite lineage that the Templars inherited in the Holy Land.

3. Explain some of the heretical acts - and what their gnostic purpose was - that the Knights were involved in when they were arrested in 1307.

4. Explain the path of Gnosticism and what it means to be a Gnostic Templar.

5. Explain how the IOGT is linked to the Goddess Tradition. Explain some fundamental differences between orthodox patriarchal religion (Judaism, Catholicism) and the Goddess spiritual path.

6. Explain some of the goals of the IOGT.

7. Explain what a person can gain by becoming a member of the IOGT.

8. Outline the IOGT approach for uniting the world's religions.

9. Please state why you would like to become a Knight Templar at this time.

Mark Amaru Pinkham KGCTpl
North American Grand Prior
International Order of Gnostic Templars
P.O. Box 20548
Sedona AZ 86341
928-284-1429
www.GnosticTemplars.org


Mission Statement of the IOGT
The International Order of Gnostic Templars is committed to assisting in the revival of both the Goddess Tradition and the Gnostic path of knowing one's self fully. IOGT members seek to complete the work of the original Knights Templar
by working to synthesize the spiritual traditions of the East and West. IOGT members dedicate themselves to living in accordance with the ideal of the spiritual warrior - one who is able to effectively, and without fear, meet any and all challenges that life places before him or her.

LIPA doesn't understand paperless billing.

To be fair, it's not only LIPA (Long Island Power Authority) who doesn't have a clue when it comes to online billing. Almost everyone who tries it gets it wrong. But, they are the ones who most recently and succinctly demonstrated their shortcomings

1. The email telling me I have a new bill should tell me how much I owe them.
It does not have to include my name, address or any other personal identification, but it should at least say what I owe this month. That's because it's almost always within a few dollars of last months, and I can just pay online like I did the month before. Instead, what they do (and this is less then useless) is mail me a link to their web site, so I can sign in and read my bill.

2. Either my email address OR my account number is my user id.
I speak for every customer in the world when I say that your business is not important enough to me for me to make up a new "user id" just for you. This is not Swiss banking. You are a service and I am a customer, you can call me Mr. Aiuto. And they way you can do that is to call me by the email address I gave you.

3. I don't care about your web site. It will never be a destination for me. I will make a new password for you site once, then promptly forget it and wait for your bill to arrive each month.

Now, let's add this up. Anything less than what I suggest is a lose-lose proposition. It is more difficult for me than getting a paper bill and it is more costly for the service provider. They will have to provision for more traffic and handle increased customer support for those people who can't sign in any more.

How is that, you ask? Well, let me give you an example from real life. I forgot my LIPA user id and password. The web site will not send me my password unless I know the user id, and there is no provision for recovering my user id based on my email address. So, I'm locked out of viewing my account until I call them and talk to a human. Huh? Don't they even try to think things through?

Could the phishers at least try a little?

I got this in the mail today. It's so obscure and confusing I don't think I would answer it even if I was a noob. I think my favorite part is "Please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to". Yeah. My bank always says something like that in their correspondence.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Paul N. Baroudi"
To: {me at one of my addresses}


Dear Tony,

Regarding below email, do you have any updates. I need the statements to
show the Kafalat audit team.

Best Regards,
Paul N. Baroudi

Junior Credit Officer| Zouk Commercial Branch
Bank Audi sal - Audi Saradar Group
Tel +961 9 226500/1 Ext. 253
Fax +961 9 226502

Val De Zouk Center
P.O.Box: 11-2560 Riad El-Solh, Beirut 1107 2808 LEBANON

P Please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to
________________________________

From: Paul N. Baroudi
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 2:01 PM
To: 'tony@ics.com'
Subject:


Dear Tony,

Following our conversation, here are the 2 check numbers: 562140 ,
562139. Could you send me a copy of bank statement showing these checks.


Best Regards,
... more of the same ...

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belonging to Bank Audi sal - Audi Saradar Group and is intended
solely for the addressees. The unauthorized disclosure, use,
dissemination or copying (either whole or partial) of this
e-mail, or any information it contains, is prohibited. E-mails
are susceptible to alteration and their integrity cannot be
guaranteed. Bank Audi sal - Audi Saradar Group shall not be
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the intended recipient of this e-mail, please delete it
immediately from your system and notify the sender of the wrong
delivery and the mail deletion. Consider the environment before
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