I have to brag a little bit

Most of the time when I go to the mailbox I am greeted by the dreaded bills or junk mail.  It is not very often that I am the recipient of something positive or encouraging.  Today is the exception to the rule.  When we went to the mail box we did not find any bills but we did find some christmas cards and a letter to me from Trident Technical College.  I figured that the letter had something to do with financial aid or the spring semester in 2010 so I did not think much about it.  When I opened the envelope I was pleasantly surprised.  The letter states that I have been nominated to the Deans list for academic excellence for the Fall 2009 semester having had a 3.5 average and completing 12 credits. 

I remember how scared I was of going back to school and wondering how I was going to work a full time job and keep up with my school work.  The first three weeks was the hardest as I fumbled around trying to figure out how to get organized and worked out a game plan for how I was going to do this.  Once I got past the 4 week point the panic started to ease up and I knew what I was going to do and how I was going to do it.  The important part of the plan was that I had to be disciplined enough to get the work done.  Most of my assignments were due on Sunday which meant that for the most part I had 6 days to get the work done in all four classes.  Once I figured that out I was able to schedule the appropriate blocks of time in the evenings and weekend to get the work done.  My dear wife having been in graduate school is a pro at this sort of stuff so she helped me get a jump start on the organizational part of things and told me to go for it.  I am thankful to my wife for her encouragement and telling me that I can do it.  I also appreciate Steve Berry taking the time out to walk me around the campus that first day back in July and giving me the short cuts I needed to get registered for the Fall semester.  Steve was successful at motivating me to "just do it."  The time for talk was over and it was time to put my plan into action. 

I realize that I have only completed one semester out of many.  The academic journey will continue and I am determined to my very best because I know that my doing this not only will help me in the future but I also want to be an example for my two teenagers.  I am telling my teens that if they hope to have a chance at a bright and sucessful future that will include getting good grades now while they are in high school but they will need to use those good grades to spring board into college so they can get a solid education.  

 

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Christmas tree

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Molly and her baby in dresser drawer
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Jasper in a box
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Big companies losing sight of customer service

I was reminded yesterday of how large monopolies have lost sight of customer service.  I make a living at supporting technology and I was appalled at the lack of timeliness with regards to giving me support. AT&T is our vendor of choice who provides us with the communications links that connect us to the outside world.  I received a call from AT&T MIS notifying me that one of the links was experiencing problems.  They advised me they were going to do some tests on the link and wanted to know when a repair person could access the site in case it was determined a repair person needed to be dispatched.  This call happened around 9 am Sunday morning as I was driving to church with my family.  I advised the person on the phone I would be available for on site from 2 pm until 10 pm on Sunday if they deemed it necessary to fix the problem. At that point I forgot about it because there did not appear to be any problems that were affecting the network.  At approximately 7:30 pm AT&T calls me back telling me the same thing.  Your data link is bouncing around and we need to do some testing.  I was sitting there wondering what AT&T did for the last ten hours?  I was told that they were going to do intrusive testing from 9 pm until 1 am and then let me know if there was really a problem.  I advised them that we pay good money to AT&T for telcom services and this level of support was not acceptable. We use these data links to provide us with connectivity to the outside world and manage our business websites and other services this way.  We can not afford to be down especially when we have known that the data link has been bouncing around for 8 hours before my intial notice.  I notified AT&T operations contact and asked them to escalate the ticket and get something done in a more timely manner.  This contact did everything they could to escalate the ticket and a repair truck was on site at 8 am Monday morning. We were without Internet access and e-mail for 2.5 hours this morning because AT&T decided to take HOURS and HOURS to decide there was a real problem.  I am sorry AT&T that is not acceptable customer service.  That is absolutely pathetic customer service and I am not happy about it.  I will be sending a letter to our customer support team notifying them of our experience and I hope that they will be able to make some adjustments accordingly. 

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Using technology responsibly

I just read a disturbing article about how people are using Twitter to "tweckle"  (heckle) key note speakers during a conference.  It reminds me of the articles I have recently where couples are at the altar about to make a life time committment to love one another and the ceremony is interrupted by one or both of them whipping out their smart phones to tweet about the event.  I find myself sitting here thinking "are people really doing this?"  Apparently people are doing this and I find myself wondering if we might be taking this to an absurd level.  When I spoke to my wife about this she told me "I could see you doing this".  I told my wife absolutely not.  I believe that there is a time and place for technology and at the altar is not it.  I understand that we want to share those special moments in life with our loved ones.  That is why invitations are sent out well in advance so that those folks that can make it to the event to share it with us first hand can do so.  The other folks who did not come or could not come will have to watch the video afterwards or look at the picture album. 

I think that it is sad that people would use Twitter to take pot shots at folks who are holding a speaking engagement.  I understand that people have expectations of what they will experience at a public event.  I also believe that we should hold ourselves to a higher standard and perhaps extend a certain amount of flexibility and civility towards those who are trying to provide the message.  I am thinking that if we are at a public event and we are there to listen to what someone is saying then using a cell phone to have a verbal conversation or to type out messages to our friends can be viewed as distracting and somewhat rude.  If the shoe were on the other foot and we were trying to engage the audience in the content of our message and all we see is people who are not paying attention because they are too busy tweeting (tweckling) how would we feel?  I am thinking that we would hope that people would put away the electronic gizmos and pay better attention to what is being presented. 

I believe that with the advancement of technology and the ability to publish what we want when we want comes a new level of responsibility.  The spoken word no matter how it is published is very powerful.  I believe that we are should be responsible and accountable for what we say.  What we say can encourage or discourage others.  Our words can either build up people or tear them down.  What we say can leave a lasting impression on others.  Once the words are spoken or written down they are there and you can never take them back.  We need to train ourselves to try and find the good in people and situations instead of always finding the areas where people are lacking.  I am hoping that we can find a healthier balance the next time we feel like using our blogs or twitter to take a shot at someone.   

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Out for walk near angel oak tree
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Waves

On beach
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Kristina

Beach picture
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Justin

On beach
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Beach

Myrtle beach
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Travelbugs

Found 2 travelbugs in myrtle beach cache
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Fall colors

Tree
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Repeating the December tradition

The Dallas Cowboys went to play the New York Giants this last Sunday and lost.  Despite the fact that I am a die hard Dallas fan I was afraid that the turn out would be Dallas losing the game and I was correct.  For whatever reasons Dallas has gotten an ugly reputation as being a team with a lot of talent and potential that falls apart right around play off time.  During the first half Dallas went up 10 to 0 over the Giants and they looked pretty decent up until the fumble by Marion Barber which equated to a touchdown from NYG.  It seems to me that Dallas lost their wind and their running game pretty much ended at that point.  Marion Barber loses the football and we quit?  It seemed that we were running the ball pretty well up until that point.  Why did Dallas turn into a one dimensional football team going to only the pass?  As for the passing game Tony Romo did an awesome job of connecting with Jason Whitten and Roy Williams.  There were two things that nailed the lid on the Dallas coffin in the second half.  The first one was the pass to the NYG running back who outran all the Dallas defenders for 74 yards and a touch down.  There is no way that our coverage should have been so out of synch that we could not have tackled this guy.  The other thing that killed Dallas's hopes of coming from behind was the punt return for a touch down.  That was the 14 points that put the game out of reach in the fourth quarter.  There was another thing that killed Dallas and that was the fact that the NY Giants were emotionally charged up and ready to play the game.  They did whatever it took to win.  I rarely ever see that level of enthusiasm out of the Dallas Cowboys.  I almost forgot about the stupid move Flozzel Adams made at the half when he locked horns with one of the NYG team mates.  I am sure that will cost him a pretty penny for that move.  Lets see some of that emotion during the game play and not on the side line with the opposing team Flozzell. 

Dallas is still in the lead in the NFC East but they have a very tough schedule for the rest of the season.  I am hopeful that they will keep their poise and stop quiting when they run into a turn over.  Mistakes are made and all you can do is learn from them and go on.  You have to hold on to the ball and realize the defense is going to come after it.  We must get the running game going and we also need to air the ball out down the field and loosen up the opponents defense some.  If all you do is throw short passes to Whitten and you never air one out that is going to give the defenses secondary the confidence to play man to man coverage and play up close which makes it almost impossible to run.  

 

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Donating Blood on Kiawah yesterday

I really do not want this to come off the wrong way so before I begin I want to say that the American Red Cross does an awesome job at disaster relief all around the world.  I personally appreciate the help and assistance that this organization provides both here and abroad.  One of the services that they provide is to have blood drives and collect life saving blood for accident victims and sick folks that need it desperately.  I was told that giving blood could save three lives.  I was recruited by a co worker to do this several weeks ago and I must admit that the 10 gift certificate was very tempting especially since funds are so low.  I made the committment and even though I hate giving blood I went through with it.  I was one of the first 35 people to sign up and I figured that since they were taking appointments that the procedure would be fairly quick and hopefully painless.  I was suprised to find out that while the procedure was mostly painless that it was nothing close to quick. 

My appointment was at 1 pm yesterday so I arrived at 12:50 pm and I finally got out of the donation bus around 2:20 pm.  I am glad that they screen people as closely as they do to make sure that they are getting a good supply of donated blood that stands a good chance as being usable.  The first thing I had to do was get in line with three or four other people who were waiting and read a 14 page book that did its best to talk you out of giving blood especially if you are sexually permiscious or have traveled outside the country to different regions for any length of time. Luckily for them and fortunately for me I was not in any of the risk categories that would disqualify me for giving blood.  The next step was to go into this tiny cubicle and have the volunteer ask you all sorts of questions, take your personal information and then ask you 49 questions that you have to answer either yes or no.  The whole process with interruptions takes about 60 minutes. 

I had several moments where I had to fight the urge to run out of the bus and get out of there.  I was a big boy and stuck to my committment.  Once I got on the donation couch and lay down I was out of there in about 15 minutes.  The gentleman that did the procedure was very professional and answered all my questions and did his best to make me comfortable.  The person taking the blood and those assisting seemed to have better people skills than those folks that were taking care ofthe pre donation phase of things.  There were a couple of moments that I wanted to just go MOOOOO because I felt like I was in some sort of meat packing plant standing in line waiting on someone to whack me between the eyes with a ball pean hammer. 

I woke up this morning and my arm looks like I have needle tracks.  As a matter of fact when we had our luncheon at work today all of the co workers with me that donated looked the same way.  The book I mentioned earlier warned us that this might occur.  It has been a long time since I gave blood so I do not remember if this happened before or not.  All in all I am glad that I overcame my fear of needles and endured the long process but I am hoping that the American Red Cross will find a better way to do this.  Certainly the process can be shortened or optimized in some way so that we do not have to wait for 90 minutes.  One of the things that was mentioned is that we believe the team that was there from the Red Cross was not expecting the turn out they got.  Perhaps if they would have had a couple of more volunteers and an extra donation bus they could have processed more people quicker. 

The important thing is that we donate if we can.  This is the season for giving and there is nothing more precious than life giving  blood that could save a life.  

 

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Lincoln

Towncar
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Desert

Yummy
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Auto Dialer Hell (rant)

I am taking a break in the Happy Birthday mood that I was in to share my experience with what I will call "Auto Dialer Hell". 

As we all know the economy sucks and I am like most folks in that I find myself over extended with more bills than money.  This has irritated my credit union to the point that they have entered our account information into their nifty little auto dialer which dutifully calls us every single day. 

I do not have a problem with the credit union calling me to make payment arrangements with me on the auto loan and the personal loan I have with them.  If I am late and I have not communicated with them then I certainly expect letters in the mail and phone calls.  The only problem I have with them is the mindless auto dialer which totally ignores any and all arrangements that I have made with the credit union personell.  I thought that payment arrangements were made in order to keep the relationship between the creditor and myself in good standing and to satisfy the terms of the loan.  I guess the auto dialer hell that has been imposed upon me and my family is designed to punish us for being slackers and not paying our bills on time.  Obviously we are doing this on purpose because we are dead beat consumers who really dont care about our bills and would go out of our way to hoard our money and not pay the bills. 

This morning auto dialer hell connected with us once again and I spoke to this poor lady who is only doing her job.  The conversation started out like this.  "Hello I am calling you about your past due loan sir."  The conversation went pretty well up until the lady told me that we had not kept our payment arrangement with the credit union.  I asked her to please read the notes on the account and tell me if I had not made arrangements to pay on the 30th of November.  "Oh yes, I see that now but you have not made a payment yet."  I told the lady that I had two problems with that.  It is not the 30th of November yet and I did make the payment on the 24th in person at one of the branches.  The lady told me , "no sir you did not make a payment yet."  At this point I am over my Happy Birthday mood and I got grouchy with her.  I asked her, "are you calling me a liar?"  "Oh no sir, absolutely not" she replied.   Again, I tell the lady I DID make the payment on the 24th AND it is 6 days BEFORE the 30th.  Does that not fulfill the arrangements I made with the bank? All of a sudden this lady finds the information on her computer screen and acknowledges I made the truck payment per our arrangements with the bank.  Now the lady wants to know why I have not made the payment on the personal loan yet.  I asked her again, is it the 30th of November yet?  At this point she totally dismisses the fact that I did keep the arrangment and continues to tell me that despite my conversation with the bank EVERY DAY and the copious amount of notes on the computer that they will continue to use "auto dialer hell" to irritate me to the point that I want to throw the phone over the fence in the back yard. 

I understand the need for the credit union to make every effort to communicate with their customers and work out arrangements to get the payments due on accounts. At some point once the credit union has made arrangements with the consumer and the consumer is fulfilling the said arrangements I believe that this should earn a measure of trust and the bank should remove people from auto dialer hell up to the point that the consumer breaks the arrangement and it is necessary to pester the living crap out of them to bring them back into compliance.  I do not think that is an unreasonable thought.  Ok, thanks for listening to this rant.  I had to get it off my chest.  I am now going back to my Happy Birthday mood and I am going to unplug the stupid telephone and let the dog bury it in the back yard. 

Fetch Willie ---------wheeeeeee  Pictures to follow....

 

 

 

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Birthday

Cowboys blanket and carry bag. I am so happy
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Happy birthday present from starbucks
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