So I just got a call from the publisher of the Warbler newsletter who wanted to give me advice about software. So I kind of had to calm down and take that call. He's firmly in the Adobe camp, which is interesting to hear. I don't really have a clue what I'm doing in this field, so it's just fine to hear what people are using and why they like it. He likes it for the integration between Adobe products. So, it's something to consider.
Yep, I felt the need to make that last outburst public, loud, and clear. I just know though, when I call in the morning, that supervisor who told me they had everything is going to say she was mistaken and there's nothing she can do about it. And I'm going to have to contact the seller again, who doesn't want to be a part of this. And I will take his number this time and take her up on the offer of contacting him right there with all of us on the phone, so it doesn't just come from me. Just call me Cassandra... I TOLD this guy that FedEx would claim not to have what they needed from him, and that I would like him to send me a copy of the release letter so I could give it to them again when they said that. But I can't head off trouble when no one listens to me. I can tell you that what's going to happen now is that he won't want to go to the trouble of faxing, and even if he agrees to, I'll still have to re-fax the claim form, which I still have and I can fax again. Though I wouldn't be surprised if they tell me they have to start a whole new claim with a whole new form, instead of proceeding with this one. I've learned how these retarded companies work, but I haven't found a way to get through it, so that doesn't do me a lot of good. So then I'll have to go through the issue again of needing proof of value. Which I keep being told I have to send, and then asking and reconfirming that because it isn't over $50, I don't. But they keep trying to throw it at me anyway. So we'll have to go over THAT ground yet again. Is it worth it? Not really, but neither is just taking it and giving up. It is NOT OK that these companies tell you how "glad they are to serve you," and all their other bullshit customer service lines, and then they treat you this way and refuse to be responsible for anything at all.
They drew some fluid to test from the dog's leg/elbow where it's swollen. And they palpated her all over and said there's a hard mass in her belly that doesn't feel right, and they want to x-ray or ultrasound to see what's going on there. This is a reputable vet that we've been seeing for years, not some auto mechanic that tells you there's something wrong to inflate the bills. So now I have to tell Mom that when she calls tonight. That there may be something seriously wrong with Meg, not just a swelling to drain from her leg. She's really gotta stop sending me to the vet with the dogs... at least with the Irish Setters. I know it's not my fault if something's wrong, but I still feel like a jinx.
I'm so at a loss right now. I napped between 2-3 hours before going to the vet, and the alarm woke me from what was finally a deep sleep. I was having a bad dream that all my fetishes were broken, and kept breaking more when I tried to glue them together, so probably just as well I had to get up. I know I'm very tired, but I'm WAY too agitated to sleep. I'm way too agitated to do ANYTHING, really. Eat, sleep, whatever. There's nothing I really want to be doing. So I'm just sitting in the empty house in front of the computer, seething and wanting to cry, but not quite being able to do that either. It's not like anyone could make me feel better if anyone was here anyway. I just wish there was some better way to occupy my mind and pass the time when I'm feeling like this.
This must be my punishment (ooh,that word again), for the illicit ride in my parents' car with the stereo blasting this morning... in other words driving the car back from the airport with U2 playing moderately loudly. I dared feel good for that short few minutes.
FEDERAL EXPRESS IS THE MOST FUCKING OBSCENE COMPANY I HAVE EVER EVER DEALT WITH IN MY LIFE.
ON MARCH 22, SUPERVISOR CARMEN JOHNSON TOLD ME THEY HAD ON FILE THE RELEASE FROM THE SHIPPER OF MY PACKAGE AND THEY NEEDED NOTHING FURTHER FROM HIM TO SETTLE THE CLAIM WITH ME. SHE SAID I'D HAVE A CHECK IN 5-7 DAYS.
TODAY I RECEIVED A LETTER DENYING THE CLAIM, SAYING THEY DO NOT HAVE THE RELEASE FROM THE SHIPPER.
CARMEN JOHNSON HAS GONE HOME FOR THE DAY AND I CAN'T REACH HER UNTIL TOMORROW, BUT I LEFT HER A VERY POINTED MESSAGE AND I WILL BE CALLING HER FIRST THING TOMORROW.
I TALKED TO ANOTHER SUPERVISOR WHO FIRST SAID THE COMMENTS ON THE ACCOUNT SAY THAT THE RELEASE WAS FAXED IN, THEN CHANGED HER STORY TO SAY THAT THE RELEASE WAS CALLED IN AND THAT THEY'RE STILL WAITING FOR IT TO BE FAXED.
EVERY TIME I CALL THEM, IT'S LIES AND THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT I WAS TOLD BEFORE.
I HATE THIS COMPANY BEYOND WHAT WORDS CAN EXPRESS.
I was going to a new torrent site when I started getting a bunch of nasty pop-ups and redirects. Just as I was deciding... um... I don't WANT to be on this web site after all... and exiting out, the Norton window pops up announcing "virus found! download.trojan, clean: failed! quarantine: failed! access denied!" So I'm going, oh. Great. Juuuust what I need now. So I start searching for how to remove this virus, since Norton says it's updated, and it can't do it. And I find the site telling how, saying it's an "easy" removal, just have to delete two files and a reg entry. Only... those files and that reg entry don't seem to exist in my computer.
I virus scan, ad-aware scan, and spybot scan. They all come up with NOTHING. No problems, no viruses, no bad files, no nothing.
So. Either. Norton freaked and thought it found a virus I really don't have, explaining why it can't clean or quarantine it and why I can't find the files of this virus. Or. It's an even nastier virus that can make Norton think it's the less-dangerous trojan, while installing completely other virus files in the computer. Only... still doesn't explain why Norton, upon scan, doesn't find ANY kind of virus.
So far, the computer is still working ok. So I'm hoping it was some kind of weird false alarm and that I don't really have a virus. Because if I do, it's one that none of my programs can find or do anything about, so if anything bad starts happening, I could be in real trouble.
Meanwhile, I went over my article with Mom, and we no'd one of my ideas but came up with several more, so I have some new points to add in, and then go ahead and put that part online.
So I went downstairs to watch "CSI" down there while my parents were out for errands/dinner and my sister was in her room. Juuuust getting into the look-over of the first crime scene, when my sister bounds up from downstairs and starts talking at me. I missed a couple of points about what they were looking at, and then she says "oh, sorry," and stops talking. So I keep watching, at least having only missed one bit of it. Then about five minutes later, the phone rings, and it's my sister calling from downstairs to ask me how to ( Collapse ) It's a good thing to have submitted to, and nice that she found it and asked. But... it couldn't have waited one lousy hour until after the show she'd already interrupted once?
In other news, I had some soup for dinner, and even though I didn't feel like going out to meet my parents at Village Inn for more eggs and pancakes, I did take them up on the offer to bring me something back... carrot cake for dessert.
So where I'd still be watching television for another ten minutes, I'm going to go back to work on the site, editing the photos of our yard/feeders, laying out my long article into three sections for posting, and putting up the info from Audubon about their May bird counts.
Downloaded my pictures, unplugged the camera from the computer, scrolled through the pictures on the memory card, and my pics from the yard today ARE there. I have NO idea why the computer decided to read most, but not all, of the images on the card. Plugged camera back into the computer before, and it found them this time. Irritating, but better this way than somehow NOT having the pictures at all. I think there's one birdbath I didn't get in the shots of what all is mounted on our deck, so I still need another shot with that in it tomorrow, being as I like being thorough if I'm going to bother, but at least I can lay out the page with photos after all tonight, and just leave space for that one picture I'll still take.
( Collapse ) As far as those pictures I took today, I'm downloading from the camera, and ... somehow they don't seem to be there. I don't know why... I took about 10 pictures, and the memory card was NOT full... had room for 10 more. So I may have to take the pics again tomorrow, and do this tomorrow after all. How irritating.
Heard back from a couple of studios... both places so far say they rent the DA-88's, so I'd be paying the rental fee plus the studio fee of $25-$55/hr. I was really hoping to find a place that HAS the machines, ( Collapse ) At least it's progress. Maybe tomorrow afternoon I can call the rental place, since I'll have the weekend off again and I could find out about maybe renting it for one of my days off.
No practice today. My period started, so I feel icky even though I have the cramps controlled because I caught them starting last night. I started all this coding right around the time it would have been good to go out and practice, but I realized I wanted to take the pictures before I coded all the way until dark, so I went out for the pictures (for all the good that ended up doing). It was chilly out and wind blowing, and not nice at all, and between the monthly nastiness, the weather, and being in the middle of another project, I wasn't going out of my way to put all that aside and practice. Oh well. Maybe over the weekend again.
Turned off the lights and played guitar for a few minutes, just long enough for the computer screen to kick into standby and force me to shut my eyes and let go maybe half a notch. Nothing much was coming of it and the couple of times something started to, I'd hitch on some clumsiness of fingers, like always. Stopped before I really started reaching for something that isn't there. So, an indifferent-to-mildly-pleasant experience I guess, at least something I haven't done in a while.
Dark room with only amps and computer lights glowing brings back too many memories, in some ways.
The main character of "Texhnolyze" is SO familiar to me. His face, his hair, the hooded sweatshirt, even the style he's drawn in, and it's especially strong at certain angles and in certain shots. I am trying to figure out where I've seen either this character, or some other character extremely similar to this one, before. Not placing it yet. I mean, it's one weird feeling trying to place the face of a live human that reminds you of someone. For some reason it feels weirder to me having that feeling about, and trying to place the reminder of, ( Collapse ) The last few nights watching episodes of this series, the "reminds me of" feeling keeps happening over and over, and it's driving me nuts trying to figure out where I've seen the character before or what he's reminding me of that I've seen before. I wish I could place it.
Ok, I just searched a little bit online and found two studios relatively nearby that have some digital recording equipment. Emailed each of them asking if they have access to machines compatible with the ones my song was recorded on, that I get the transfer done of the tracks to my last song that I started in LA. I don't know that I'm ready to WORK on that song, but I'd like to have the tracks in a format I can access if/when I do want to. And maybe doing the transfer would get me up for working on the song again, I don't know. But, there. It's a small piece of action toward the first step of getting the tracks transferred to the computer. We'll see if the places email back. Of course I can search out more facilities if these places don't, but that means getting myself to take action again. Hard to say if/when I'd make the jump from thinking about it to actually doing even this small thing about it again, but I did tonight, so it'll go somewhere or it won't.
(edit, few minutes later) My other thought was just renting a machine and doing it here, but I'm not finding good info on any pro-audio rental place with that kind of equipment. Not in LA where I could just go down the street and rent it for $20/day anymore... then again if I were still there, I wouldn't have to be looking for a facility, I'd be doing it right at work. So, we'll see if the studios, which I found one more to email also, write back.
Another crash. Not the same kind of blue-screen crash as last time, but still. Closing some programs and there it went. Makes me very frustrated. Install another drive and system seems to be going to hell. Figures.
Did pretty much nothing today. No vacuuming. No photos of our feeders in the yard, no work on the last code mods for the guestbook, the two things I need to do before making the guestbook live on the site. Didn't install the DVD burner, even though that's probably good and I really want to wait and see what this system is going to do, get to know how it's acting with the new drive before I go adding something else. No practice. Not even good fics and good weather can pull me out of my self-imposed mental inaction enough to get out.
Took out anime cd's I burned quite a while ago and listened to some songs I hadn't listened to in a long time. Nice to know I can go through my cases of burned discs and find the discs with the music I'm looking for, based on my labeling system. It's not that every song is marked on every disc, but I pretty much know what's where without having to check through a pile of cd's.
Thought for the day... It seems like there's no time passing. So why does everything feel like it was a long time ago?
I find it pointedly interesting that Mel Gibson was above pushing "The Passion of the Christ" for Oscar nominations, but that he's not above pushing the new "uncut" version for the publicity and profit of new and repeat moviegoers. Just for the record, I'm not out against Mel Gibson or this movie. It's not subject matter that interests me, I didn't see it, but I have no reason to say he shouldn't have made the movie.
Also, another thing I thought was cool about Lemony Snicket's, was it has that whole eyeball thing going on. The eyeball motif is the design used on the soundtrack cd disc, too.
No go on the old hard drive. Install it, computer detects it, Windows announces "found new hardware: disk drive," but opening My Computer, there's no new drive there. Fdisk can't access it, and then restarting again, I get blue screen crashes. So there I go, I can give up for good on all the music stuff on that drive, or I can pay someone a fortune to try to save what'll probably turn out to be all corrupted anyway, and meanwhile I still need a second drive to do the things I want to do. I checked, and this drive isn't under warranty, of course.
So yeah, that means that when our old drive went bad, Western Digital sent us TWO DEFECTIVE DRIVES before getting to us the working one we're using now. I don't have faith in this company and I do not want to buy another drive from them.
I looked through the ads in the paper, and I think I'm going to go to Office Max and check out this DVD burner they have on closeout for $39 and see if there's a reason it's so cheap, like some feature I need that it doesn't have. Also I'm not fully clear if all DVD burners burn cd's also, like all DVD-ROM's seem to be cd-roms also. I need one that does though, since it'll be replacing my cd burner, much as my DVD-ROM replaced my old cd-rom. Then I'll check out hard drives. They're all over ebay, but I don't trust it and I don't want to deal with it. I'm going to go to a store, and find the best price I can, and get a drive that I can TAKE BACK if it doesn't work immediately.
Going to the bank first, to deposit paychecks and my state tax refund check that showed up. I don't want to spend all of that, and I won't be. Most hard drives seem to be good prices only through rebates though, so from what I've seen, I'll be spending $100 at purchase on a drive no matter what I'm going to get back some weeks later through rebates.
At least hooking up the bad drive doesn't seem to have hurt the operation of the computer. I'm back on just the good drive and working normally. Once again that neutral. No win, no loss, unless you count the effort expended for no gain.
...and I'm not sure... is it NTFS, or NFTS? I think it might be NFTS... New File Table System, or something? I think I put NTFS earlier. Getting confused with NTFC, isn't that a video format? Not sure. I'll look it up later just so I'm using the right term for the right thing. Right now I have to change clothes and get out shopping.
So that album cover I noticed last week from that "Frou-Frou" person.
On the way back from dinner last night, the radio had "select-a-sets" from listeners. One set caught my ear, very mellow songs, not songs I'd heard before. The first song was very reminiscent of Sting in the chord changes and the arrangement. Like... too much so. Stayed at a lower dynamic and never built quite to that next point of intensity like Sting does though. Any rate, when the announced the titles of the songs, it was music from the soundtrack to "Garden State," which isn't a movie I know, but that's what they said. And we were going over bumps and it got noisy and I didn't hear which of the songs they said it about (2nd song had been a male vocal, so it wasn't that one), but they announced one of the songs as by Frou-Frou.
I just went and checked out song samples of the soundtrack on Amazon.com, and the Sting-ripoff song is "In the Waiting Line" by Zero 7. Listening to the little sample clip, it still sounds like Sting, in fact, it's very like "The Hounds of Winter." The Frou-Frou song was the last of the set, "Let Go." I like the line from it "There's beauty in the breakdown," or at least if I'm hearing it right. Nothing special to me about the voice though.
Just one of those things where you notice something you'd never heard of before, and then suddenly there it is again. Maybe she's getting really huge and I'll start hearing about her all over the place now, but... it did start with the picture on the cd cover.
Reading, past the learning point, isn't about sounding out words and thinking about what each word means in relation to the other. It's straight from eye to brain, the symbol instantaneously conveying the meaning. In a foreign language, that may only happen with a few words at first. For me, these happen to be among those few.
The picture is still kind of a big file cause of all the bright pretty colors. It's a "Death Note" doujinshi, being called "shine," but... that is NOT what this says.
But, it certainly is SHINE-y.
I might have to buy this, just for the pretty cover and the title references.
Thankfully, no more email from the stupid guy when I got back. Still leaving the one from this morning for Mom to read. I'm feeling alright at the moment, and I'd like it to stay that way.
Mom was in a terrible mood for part of the day at the store. It seemed like everything we touched broke, and lots of stupid things were wrong with the orders that came in. That, and she kept finding things that ( Collapse )
A customer asked us today ( Collapse ) So, what a surprise, minutes later, I get my email to the Audubon Society of Greater Denver returned. Email box full. Isn't that nice. Major public organization, offering information and asking for money, and they can't even take enough care of their email inquiries to allow new ones to get through. So I went back to the site and emailed some other addresses. It won't do any good if they're all aliases of the same email address, but the webmaster's address was msn.com, not a box at the Audubon's domain. I told them I was disappointed to see that such a prestigious organization had such a backlog that I couldn't even get an inquiry through to them. We'll see if I hear anything back now, or if those messages will just get returned too.
I just feel SO strongly, that if you are not going to take care of your email, DON'T OFFER THAT CONTACT INFORMATION. JUST DON'T. If it's there, and you're saying "contact us for information by this method," and giving that email address, you are doing more HARM than good, by failing to keep that line of communication open and responsive. It's obnoxious and frustrating, and it's terrible that that should be happening at such a major organization, even at the regional-chapter level.
Store should have just closed, I'm hungry, and I'm hoping we'll as usual go get some food as soon as Mom and sister get back. If not, I'll find something in the kitchen. I'm usually hungry when I get done between 4 and 6 on Fridays, but I don't like to have more than a snack, because we usually end up going out for something.
Didn't really want to check my email this morning because I didn't want to read whatever the jerk ebay guy might have written now. Didn't want to leave it for discovering after work either, to whatever did last week, can't even remember if that was still this, or the last idiot. I run into so many of these nasty people it must seem like no one is ever decent. That's not the case; I've worked with some very nice sellers, and more than the idiots, truth be told. But I run into far higher a proportion of rude and unreasonable people than seems right. One could say then that it must be something in me and the way I act, but then how come all those nice sellers think and say I'm so nice too? So as much as I'm quick to be down on myself, I think it's fair to say I'm not bad at all to deal with for these kinds of things unless the seller starts being rude first. As much as I don't always assume the best of people, I really don't act on that until I'm shown that the person is deserving of the assumption. And too many are, hence my having learned that there's a good possibility assuming the worst is not pessimistic but only realistic.
Mom had said last night that if he wrote anything nasty again, SHE would have some choice words for him. So, I made my windows really small so I could only see the email header and not the message, and forwarded it to her. I'll consider reading it later, or I'll let her tell me what he said. I don't really want to read it/let it be directed at me.
I guess it sounds like I'm really just piling more onto her instead of taking things off of her. I don't really know. Writing an email isn't a time-consuming thing, it doesn't stress her quite the same way it does me after I hit my breaking point with it, and she expressed desire to say something back to this person. I'm still not really sure if I'm taking any work off of her or not. I feel like my working is enabling us to do things we wouldn't have gotten done at all without my time doing them. She's stated that herself, to someone else, with no prompting. But... the point was to free her up from at least some of the hours she has to spend working, and I'm not sure that's happening. Last Sunday, yes, she was able to do paperwork in the back of the store because Dad and I worked the front, and that is work she didn't have to do after hours. I hope things like that can happen more. And then I won't feel as bad if there's some trade-off, like saying, ok, I dealt with this jerk ebay guy up to this point, and now I need to hand it over to you to respond to his latest. I'm still the one that will be doing all the dispute forums if it has to go that direction, but at least... maybe she can handle this response.
I did request his contact info from ebay, also, just in case there's any reason to think a phone call would work this out. I don't really want to talk to him. He doesn't seem to want to treat me as a person experiencing real frustration with another party (FedEx, not him, up till this last letter), as opposed to some scam artist. Which makes me mad, because I could have treated him the same way, and I didn't, only to get it back at me. The request goes to both parties when requested by one, so he'll know that I requested, and who knows what he'll say to that... if he'll object to the idea that I might be preparting to contact him by phone for more "harassment" or something. I don't know. All I know is that at least I don't have to dread coming back from work this evening to nasty email, unless he decides to send something before getting a response. Hopefully not, but it would be just like my luck, to take a pre-emptive measure to avoid something happening, and still have the thing happen anyway. Happens all the time. Hopefully not this time. We still have an issue to deal with with this person, so blocking his email isn't really a good option at this time. When it's over though, I probably will, because I'll have no desire to hear from him or deal with him ever again.
My mom was in a horrid mood most of the day because she was trying to send an email from the store account for the March sale. ( Collapse ) Because of all this, she was on the computer all day today, which means I didn't check journal or email until late evening, which is weird and off for me. And even though it hardly ever happens, when she's so angry and frustrated, I get worried that she's going to start thinking of MY shortcomings, which are plenty, and turning on me for them. Her stress contributes to mine.
So, between waking up to the FedEx thing trying to fax to our home phone over and over and dealing with those idiots on the phone again, Mom's stress and not being able to submerge into my computer activities, and then this guy turning into a total jerk about the ebay thing, I'm very edgy, jumpy, unsettled, uncomfortable, and there's no real solution to "making me feel better," because I can't do anything about any of it. I don't feel like doing much of anything, but it's not like it's any better doing nothing. Work in the morning tomorrow, and some of it will recede with time, but then as soon as I have to deal with the next facet of the FedEx thing, it all comes back. So, since their process takes a while even if it gets done with no more hitches, I'll have this jabbing at me for a while. I just feel like I spend more time trying for time and distance from things, just to maintain neutrality, than anything else. I just have to do less and less, I guess, to avoid more and more things that don't work how they should and that make me this angry. Obviously it's "my" problem, so I should just avoid the things that make me mad. Like... oh, any kind of business or personal transaction with anyone at all. I don't know that I'd mind, but... I haven't found a way to accomplish it.
So FedEX tried to fax me the form today. Repeatedly.
TO MY HOME PHONE NUMBER, NOT MY FAX NUMBER. OVER AND OVER AGAIN, OUR MACHINE PICKING UP TO "BEEP, BEEP, BEEP."
I had to make TWO different phone calls, repeating my explanation to TWO different people, about what was happening, where I needed the form faxed, and where I needed the faxing to STOP.
Then the jerk seller, who had been reluctant, but civil, before this, in response to me asking him to copy me on the FedEx letter so I could send them another copy if/when they lose it, writes me THIS:
I am not sure if you are playing a game with me or not. First, YOU did not request insurance. I sent them FedEx so there would be insurance. My mistake! Second, the bottle has a total value of $2.99. That is what you paid and that is what FedEx will pay you. Third, the decanter is NOT ruined as it only needs a new cork and I told you where to buy them. I have sold hundreds of decanters and this is the first claim. Others, requested and paid for insurance if they wanted it, but most do not.
From my end I have already lost money by even selling the decanters. NOW I am supposed to send you a letter for your $2.99? I will go to FedEx this afternoon and authorize them to pay you for the decanter. That is all. I am getting frustrated with your demands. Next, I suggest in the future you do not send an email and accuse the seller of inaccurate description and then ASK for the seller's help. You have already admitted that you removed the head of the one decanter so it is logical to assume you tried to remove the head from both and the 25 year old cork broke. WHY would anyone want to remove the head anyway? People who collect decanters do not do that unless there is a reason. Twenty five year old corks break when you twist them. It is just a fact. Decanter collectors then simply replace the cork. You have chosen to turn in a claim on insurance you did not request or pay for and for a sum of $2.99, and then you want me to write you a letter? It has gone too far. I will request that FedEx honor your claim for the $2.99 and that is all I can do. If you want to return the decanters I will refund your payment. That is the other option.
WHAT A JERK!! He's going to GO to HIS distribution center, and tell them something about it, meaning that the authorization probably won't even get to the right place at FedEx, since they asked for a letter or a fax at given address and number. And this is AFTER I've A. Taken him at his word that he shipped the item intact B. Given him accurate information about what happened when we unpacked the box C. Done ALL the groundwork for the claim D. Asked him ONLY for the information that is required by FedEx E. Explained that I'm trying to ensure that HIS involvement is OVER, by having a record of the letter to re-send, if the incompetents there lose it, as seems awfully likely based on their handling of the matter up to this point.
And I get THIS CRAP back from him. And I wrote back, addressing each of his points, and telling him I expected to be taken at my word and dealt with politely just as I had him. Of course, that's too much to ask for, we all know I don't deserve any such thing, so I'm a hypocrite all over again. Yes, I forget myself and my place, it's good of people to remind me. I should thank him.
So, Mom says if he writes back nasty again, she's going to write him a nasty letter also. She probably won't though. A lot of things, she gets mad and then decides it isn't worth following through. I'm pretty much the one to say NO! THIS ISN'T RIGHT! And to tell the involved parties so, even if no one will do anything about it still.
See, this is what I get for being relieved last night that he said he'd send the letter. Which he did, last night, say "send the letter," not this crap about trying to do it in a totally different way from how FedEx said it needed to be done. And knowing how they work, they'll take his statement and say they'll get it to the right place, and no way they will. And then if I have to contact him again, he'll be more nasty. Point is, WHY, if he's SO concerned that he's being asked for too much for his cheap sale (which I did NOT point out to him that HE set the bid price, and it isn't MY fault no one else bid on it!), that he should just send ME the letter, let ME take care of it, END OF STORY. Because now he's got it right back opened up that I have a valid reason to be told that I need something more from him, and to have no recourse but to try to contact him again and get it. No logic, no common sense at all.
All this trouble for one of a pair of items that cost $5.99 plus $8.00 shipping? YES. Because ONE GOT HERE BROKEN, AND IT ISN'T RIGHT TO HAVE TO JUST ACCEPT THAT AND LOSE FOR IT. Regardless, in dealing with the matter, I've lost already, in time, stress, and anger. But it's better than just sitting there and saying, "Sure, it's ok that FedEx insures safe delivery, delivers broken, and then makes the process so difficult that I'll just forget it." I WON'T forget it, and I DON'T forget it, and I get angrier EVERY TIME, because this isn't isolated, it's how every person and every company everywhere seems to do their business now.
Meanwhile, we got a call today from a customer who called the other day, asking for a product. It was an item we had ordered at the Merchandise Mart the day before. I told him we'd be getting it in soon, took his name and number, told him I'd call him back after finding out our ship date on that order, called the distributor, found out that the order should be in the store in no more than two weeks, called him back with that information and the price of the item, and said he could call if he wanted us to hold it for him when it came in (he'd been looking for it in other stores and online). So he called back today, saying he wanted it, and we have the notecard saying to pull it from the order and call him when it gets in. Which there won't be any problem with doing.
Slight contrast in method of doing business? I think so, for whatever it's worth.
I napped this afternoon (didn't even go out this warm day, too angry about too many things), and had a dream that some inspector was coming in to our house and a woman was here the day before to tell us things to change before the inspector came. She told us that the computer in this room, where the monitor sticks up above the desk, in front of a window, "is starting to block the view of the city," and that wasn't ok. And in the dream, I went off on a TIRADE, cursing out this whole concept that these people had the right to come in and tell us we couldn't block our own view, that these homeowner's associations take more and more control about what people can have on their house, in their own yards, and so on, just cursing up a storm. Somehow I didn't really need a dream to tell me I'm angry about things of this nature. I guess my subconscious needed to process those feelings or whatever, but it isn't making my conscious any less angry about it. I'd rather dream interesting and vivid things like I did last night, that I remember only very small parts of, but woke up with a strong feeling from them.
Seller says he'll send their letter tomorrow. I don't know why it was such a big deal for him to make the phone call, before I was able to give them the information, but at least he says he'll do it. I asked if he wouldn't mind sending me a copy of the letter also. Because, as I explained to him, I don't trust FedEx one bit to keep the paperwork together and not lose something. And that way *I* would have a copy of everything they've asked for, and then no matter how much they might frustrate me and how long the whole thing might take, at least I would be spared the additional step of having to write him to get another letter, and he wouldn't have to be bothered by any of it again. I hope he won't mind that. Then he's DONE with it.
As long as FedEx doesn't give me any MORE crap and start wanting anything ELSE after I've confirmed and reconfirmed and re-reconfirmed, to finally get "matching" answers about what they need for this claim.
I was glad to hear an affirmative response from him though, took a little of the dread-anticipation away.
