I’ve noticed that a lot of publishers like to put photos in the middle of some non-fiction books.  I’m guessing it has to do with the type of paper used, since it’s usually glossy as opposed to the normal paper of the rest of the book, and putting it in the center makes sense.

The problem I’ve found with this, though, is that you have to be very careful not to look at all of the pictures when you get to them, since you’re only halfway through the book.  The captions on the pictures can spoil things for you by giving away events you haven’t gotten to yet. 

However, you’d think that when the book is released as an eBook they could move the photos around so you don’t run into them before you’ve read the relevant part of the book.  I’ve been reading The Shadow Divers, which is about a group of divers who found a German U-Boat in 1991 off the coast of New Jersey that “wasn’t supposed to be there.”  Given the way the pictures are arranged, it’s actually harder to skip the pictures in the eBook format than it is with a physical book.  With a book, you can simply feel your way to the end of the photo section and keep reading.  The eBook requires you to scroll through the photo section.  Given that I’m capable of getting the meat of an entire paragraph at a glance, it was very difficult to get past that section without learning more than I wanted to at the time.

The quickest way to lose me as a customer is to respond to my customer service request with canned information that doesn’t actually address my problem.

I’d been avoiding Amazon.com for the last six months because I just couldn’t get any satisfaction from their “customer service” reps over an issue I was having with their order notification emails.  I’m pretty prickly about how people contact me.  If you aren’t agressive about making sure that companies adhere to your wishes (and their own rules), they’ll quickly fill up your inbox with stuff they think you might be interested in.  Anyhow, this case wasn’t about that but rather about my dislike for HTML emails.  They slow down my email program while waiting for images to load and they often contain lots of flashy crap that I have to work around to get to the real information.  I’ve always had my email preferences on Amazon.com set to “text only” for email.  On several occasions I received HTML-based order confirmations, despite the settings.  Each time I’d contact them to tell them there was something wrong with the system.  The first several times I just got back a canned response that I could go into my preferences and change the setting.  A couple of times they told me they’d gone in and changed it to “text only” for me or that they’d confirmed the setting, despite the fact that I’d told them explictly each time that I’d already confirmed this setting and that this was an intermittent problem.  Eventually I just gave up on them and quit using Amazon.com altogether when I couldn’t get a satisfactory answer that at least implied they took the problem seriously.  In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t a big issue.  Although part of me was wondering if they can’t be trusted to handle something as simple as an HTML-email flag in their database, why should I let them store my credit card info?

I only went back to Amazon.com on Monday because I was given a gift certificate from them for my birthday.  At checkout time I encountered a problem with the size of the entry fields in Firefox.  For some reason they were so short that I couldn’t see the text that I was entering.  I checked with Internet Explorer and didn’t see the problem.  Despite the problems I was able to complete the order in Firefox.  I sent them a feedback letting them know about the problem.  Unfortunately, their customer disservice department hasn’t improved much in the last six months.  Instead of really acknowledging the problem all I got back was an obviously canned response about how I should clear my browser cache and reload the page.  I responded back that the answer was not helpful and all I really expected was an acknowledgment that the issue had been forwarded to development/support.  Their response to this was an apology and a note that they were sending it for further investigation.  While I give them credit for at least acknowledging the problem, I’m not sanguine that they actually sent it for investigation.  I suspect the responder just said this to make me go away.

But it isn’t just Amazon.com that has sucky support.  Atkins.com is in danger of losing my business because they gave my email address to a third-party for some kind of survey.  I contacted them about the problem, but all I got was what appeared to be a canned response that didn’t even get my name right (“Dear Aubrey Aubrey”).

Thank you for your inquiry.

We use your personal information to fulfill any orders made on the Web site.  We occasionally make our customer list available to a few reputable, carefully screened companies whose products you may find of interest.  However, if you do not want your personal information shared with companies other than Atkins, please check the box that says,” If you do not want your name and contact information shared with Atkins Nutritionals business partners, please check here” when you register and when you purchase products on the Web site.  For more information about this topic, please see our privacy policy.

People who know me (or have been reading this site for a while) will understand why this answer is unsatisfactory.  I explictly stated that I didn’t give permission to be contacted in this manner.  Further, I make it a habit to carefully scan all registration and order forms to make sure I’ve correctly “opted-out” of whatever SPAM they’re trying to get you to take by default.  I know for a fact that I selected the “don’t bug” me checkbox when registering.  I’ve sent back a response telling them this, so we’ll see if it gets anywhere.  But I’m not hopeful that they’ll actually forward the request to anyone who can actually investigate the problem or fix it. 

Given the usual pressure on support staff to answer as many calls/problems as quickly as possible, I can see how they don’t really take time to understand (or even read past the first sentence).  This just highlights how most companies don’t understand the actual costs of their support centers.  They all see the bottom line cost of the expense of hiring support staff, but they don’t understand the cost in terms of lost revenue from pissed off customers.  It doesn’t even require that they completely fix every problem.  Sometimes just acknowledging that a problem exists or simply showing that the rep understands the problem may be sufficient.

Failure to understand this is costing them business.  In the case of Amazon.com I used to use them as my go-to site for any kind of product I was searching for.  Now I tend to try to find it in a local store or search on Google for a different source.  I can’t say for sure how much I’ve spent in other places that would have gone to Amazon.com, since I’ve bought some of the items locally.  However, I was able to determine that they’ve lost $228 to Barnes & Noble for books and CDs and another $109 to DVD Empire for DVDs and CDs.  Another way to look at it is that I spent a little over $3700 with them in 2003.  Although 2003 was a bit of an anomaly since I bought extra items for the house.  Regardless, they’ve lost their opportunity to get a share of those purchases this year.

Atkins stands to lose $240 every six months in supplement sales if they can’t give me a satisfactory answer concerning their failure to adhere to my expressed preferences.  There are a few places around the area that sell the Atkins supplements.  It was more convenient to order them on the website in six-month quantities, but I can get them locally with only a bit more effort.

My hatred for insects, that is.  The other day I went out to grab the paper and heard an ominous buzzing above my head as I came in.  There was a nest of red wasps on the eave of the house right above the entry area.  At times like this I don’t want any of those namby-pamby new bug sprays that promise to smell nice or be more environmentally friendly.  I want some nasty stuff that knocks those stinging bastards right out of the air.  I hit that nest with a dose of ‘Real Kill’ and most of them dropped down to the ground and rolled around.  A couple of them tried to take off again and I hit them with a personal dose of it and put an end to that.  Real Kill doesn’t smell nice and you don’t want to get it on you, but it does the job of knocking ‘em dead from 20-ft. away.  With that other crap I bought at Home Depot last time you would end up drowning them with the spray rather than having the chemicals do the work.

Which brings me to the general ineffectiveness I’ve noticed in so-called environmentally friendly solutions.  I remember once making the mistake of buying some eco-friendly windshield fluid.  Not only did it smell bad, it didn’t work.  Now I look for the stuff with the skull-and-crossbones on the label so that I know it will work.  When you have to scrub off a bunch of nasty Texas bugs you need toxic chemicals, not green vinegar.

It seems that a couple of my neighborhood residents arrange a neighborhood garage sale twice a year.  It’s going on today and tomorrow from 8:00am to 4:00pm.  I decided that I’d take the dog for a walk during lunch today to avoid the worst of the heat (i.e. it was only 90°F instead of 95 when we left).  On the way back I made the observation that people at garage sales don’t know how to drive or park.  I was almost run down by one driver who was so distracted by the stuff on display that she couldn’t be arsed to stay on her side of the street.  At another house I had to avoid a car parked in the middle (!) of the road by someone who just couldn’t be bothered to park normally, such was the allure of whatever item caught his/her fancy.

I can only imagine what it’s going to be like tomorrow, since I’m sure most of the people will be here then.

I have an American Express card that was issued by my company for business expenses.  Normally, business expenses are submitted through an online system we have that then sends payment directly to AmEx.  Somehow I guess I messed up the last submission, because I got a bill from them for $0.35.  It seems like it would almost cost them more than that to process the bill, but a debt is a debt.  Anyhow, it isn’t worth the hassle to me to try to mess with the online system at work, so I decided to just pay it from my BankOne online payment system.  They’ve recently upgraded their software, and along with that upgrade they’ve added a new criteria to their validity checks.  All payments must be at least $1.00.  I know in the past I’ve paid a bill of less than $1.00, so this is definitely new.  Anyhow, this means that I had to send AmEx $1.00, which means I’ll be carrying a tiny credit on the account now.

This isn’t really significant in any way, but it’s the kind of nagging little detail that annoys me.  I want the balance to be $0.00 and have done with it.

Just a friendly warning to any U.N. “observers” who might come to the U.S.:  Remember those “small arms” that you hate so much?  We’ve got ‘em by the millions over here and we don’t acknowledge your authority in our internal matters.  Nothing will be allowed to take precedence over our constitution. 

I would think that powder blue would make target acquisition easy…  (not that I’m advocating violence or anything )

Via little green footballs.

Since the Fourth of July is coming up, all of the local news stations feel the obligation to inform all of us idiots that we shouldn’t handle fireworks.  “Leave it to the experts,” they say as they’re showing footage of test dummies having their hands blown off by “fireworks” (it makes me think these tests are rigged for effect, given the pansy-ass little firecrackers they sell these days).  Our local ABC affiliate devoted nearly 5 minutes to this topic this morning, including an interview with a local ER doctor who told everyone what to do when injured by fireworks.

Of course this is typical of the addlepated “advice” that these on-airheads spew at us for “our own good.”  Quite frankly, I’m sick and tired of the sanctimonious condescending attitude of these bastards.  If we had listened to these safety ninnies in the past, this country would have never gotten off the ground.

Anyhow, I’ve been handling fireworks since I was a little kid and I’m not about to stop now.  I’m going to my mother’s place this weekend, where there’s room to shoot off fireworks.  I’m going to go buy one of those big artillery pieces and use it just to piss off the safety nazis.  Screm ‘em and the airbag-equipped horse they rode in on.

Since I work at home these days I have to spend a lot of time on conference calls.  That’s usually not a problem, but it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence when you’re wearing a headset which is connected to a landline and a big thunderstorm rolls in.  And since my dog is hiding under my desk, cowering on my feet, I suppose if I get hit we’ll both get it…

One of my pet peeves concerns the incorrect use of “it’s”.  I don’t know whether it’s getting worse, or I’ve just become more sensitive to it, but I’ve been noticing it more of late.

Just for the record, its is an adjective referring to posession of something by itself (“The spider spins its web.”), while it’s is a contraction of “it is” (”It’s snowing outside.”).  Because English usually uses an apostrophe and an ‘s’ to indicate the posessive form of something, confusion between the two is understandable.  However, that doesn’t excuse it. 

The worst example I saw was a restaurant that had the phrase “Dining at it’s best” commited to two large signs, especially when you consider that two or more people had to have seen the phrase and none of them noticed.  It really stands out to me, though, because my brain translates “it’s” to “it is”, which makes no sense when you read the sign that way (“Dining at it is best”).

I tend to buy new vehicles.  Earlier this year I traded in my old Avalanche on a new one.  Mostly the reason was to get some upgrades that I wanted when I bought the first one, but that I thought I could get by without (and which I’d been regretting ever since).  However, every now and then I run into someone, who I’m sure has the best of intentions, that tells me that I’m stupid for buying a new vehicle and then launches into a discussion of how they were so smart to pick up such-and-such used vehicle, etc.  I’ve always wondered if these people have really thought through the implications of their advice.  Specifically, if it weren’t for the “stupid” people like me, where would all the good used vehicles come from?  Someone has to buy new vehicles or they wouldn’t have any used ones to buy.  Also, I tend to do all the scheduled maintenance and keep my vehicles clean.  Without me, they wouldn’t be able to get those great used cars/trucks.

Anyhow, I’m not unalterably opposed to buying a used car or truck.  I just tend to look at the deal a bit differently than someone who’s out for the lowest-cost alternative.  I place a high value on a factory warranty and not having to deal with unknown maintenance issues that the previous owner may have neglected.

The next time these people are tempted to call me stupid, perhaps they should reconsider.  They’d be wiser to keep it to themselves and realize that without me there’d be no used cars for them to crow about…