Not Happy

August 18, 2008

11:52 PM

It's been a goal of mine to one day start my own company that rivals the search giants. I plan to go at it from the side - use my research to provide a different capability, rather than beat them at their own game. (Realistically, I can't out machine 'em, so I gotta out think 'em!) If my dream ever becomes a reality, at least I'll know how to fail at customer service. Here's a handy guide in case anyone else is ever interested.

Step 1: Offer a special promo deal to a customer.

Step 2: Charge customer regular (non promo) rate instead. Don't warn customer about not following through with the deal. Instead, let them see a bill for three times more than they were expecting

Step 3: When customer calls irate about the bill, tell customer to call back during normal business hours (relative to a different time zone!)

Step 4: When customer calls back, explain deal was expired and so shouldn't have been offered in the first place, so they're just going to have to suck it up and pay the extra amount.

Step 5: When customer cancels account several months later, call them early Saturday morning to ask why

Step 6: Fail to remove charge for month that hasn't happened yet from bill.

I should have expected that I'd have to call again and ask them to remove the charge for August since I canceled on August 3rd and they billed me for all of August on August 4th. In theory, they're supposed to prorate the "unused" days from the bill once they record in their system they've received their equipment. Of course, I returned it first thing Tuesday (the 4th) morning. I should have realized something was up when the sales associate was very insistent I not lose the receipt. Good thing I haven't! Alas, it'll have to wait until Monday for me to take care of it. Even though it's a nominal amount, I'm too aggravated to let it slide.

And while we're on the subject of poor customer service, it's also not cool to mark a voice message as "urgent" when you're just calling to return an estimate. It's especially not cool to mark it urgent when it's the first message you're leaving, or when I have a week to decide my interest level. "Urgent" makes my phone chirp constantly until I return from my meeting, annoying everyone within ear shot. If you don't need to know a blood type, you can wait for me to return a call.

Behind

August 13, 2008

7:22 PM

I know. I fell behind. Majorly behind. At the end of July I went to SIGIR – the top conference in my field. It was great to meet from and learn from the other researchers, and see how my work measured up. The experience was invaluable on a number of fronts, not the least was some good ideas that were directly applicable to my research. I also got to enjoy sun in Singapore, even if it was only in the evenings. But the trouble with conferences in tropical locations – it's hard not to crave a vacation.

I went on my own dime, which put me a week behind in my summer internship. These past few weeks I've been trying to catch up. I've had an explosion of progress, but also some really frustrating bugs that sent me back. For the past two weeks I've been staying at work until 8 or 9. Last night I left close to 10. Given the hour drive home, it doesn't leave much time for anything else, and updating Dust of Dreams was bumped to the wayside.

So what's new with me other than the raccoon eyes? My apartment lease is up next month, so I've been simultaneously looking for a new place to live and attempting to negotiate the rent. I do not want the hassle or expensive of moving, but I may have no choice. Tomorrow I go to a good friend's wedding, which reminds me, I still have pictures from another friend's wedding on my digital camera. I should probably get those to her. Speaking of which, I bought a new camera. I was tired of crappy blurred shots. I was especially annoyed after Singapore. Here I am in a beautiful exotic location that I will probably not visit again anytime soon, and a forth of my shots are blurry!

Classes are just over a month away. I've already registered. Scary thought. One thing I've decided I really don't like about grad school / internships is the lack of vacation & sick time. I always thought I would miss the paycheck the most, but no, it's the ability to take a week straight off and do nothing but hang out in my pjs. Yes, I know some of you other grad students do that anyway, but I mean without falling behind in work. Speaking of which, a run just finished and now I need to generate a graph from the results.

Hot Tamale

July 9, 2008

8:29 AM

The weather outside is brutal. Yesterday was 107, Monday was 103. According to weather.com, the high is going to be 99 today, however weather.com also predicted the highs for Monday and Tuesday at 91 and 97 respectively. My biggest concern at the moment, though, is not the heat but the power. Yesterday was the hottest day of the year, and many news outlets are predicting today to be worse. Even Weather.com's estimate for today is 2 degrees higher than their estimate from yesterday.

Yesterday we hit a stage 2 power alert. That means our power reserves are already significantly taxed. We've been in a stage 1 power alert all week. In the stage 1, everyone is asked to conserve power as much as possible (turn the AC down, and). Stage 2 is voluntary black outs. (Corporations volunteer in advance to reduce power in an emergency, they get a discount for the cooperation.) Stage 3, of course, is the final stage and involves involuntary black outs. I'm not sure what I'll do if we hit Stage 3. I can always stay longer at work, or find an air conditioned mall to hang out in. Lily, an indoor cat, cannot.

So I've been doing the best that I can to concern power, but it doesn't help that my top floor apartment seems to be a giant heat trap. I turn the A.C. off at night since it's a wall unit that never reaches the bedroom. Monday night I accidentally turned off the overhead fan. I ended up sweltering for a few hours, unable to sleep until I realized the problem. Last night it was so hot I left the window open until 4 am for a cool (80 degree) evening breeze. The heat is making it hard to sleep, and I'm feeling exhausted this week. As bad as I'm feeling, I know lily is feeling worse with her fur coat and inability to leave, so I've been researching ways to help her beat the heat.

Here's what I've come up with:
* Fill a 2 liter bottle 3/4s full of water and freeze it, wrap it in a towel and lie it down for kitty to play near.
* Place ice cubes in the water or on a linoleum floor for play
* Run a cold damp towel over kitty. A good place to get wet & cold is under the chin as a major vein will carry the cooler blood to the rest of kitty's body. Kitty may not like this trick as much.
* Another good trick that won't be on kitty's favorite list is getting the paws wet.
* Set up two fans in different corners to get a good flow of air.
* If heat continues to rise, we're going to try a cold bath

Two more days to go! Hears hoping the heat breaks on Friday like predicted.