It has been a while since I wrote. I fell into a sympathy-funk while Shae dealt with her work woes. Lost interest in writing; I also had little to report.
Back now. Ready to report for duty.
I just finished my first week of work after a 4 week holiday. That was nice. I have not taken more than 1 week off consecutively for the past 7 years. It was very liberating, and pretty refreshing. We saw family and friends which was really fun.
Before I write about the “Good” of the trip, let me start with the “Bad”:
We got home today from our trip to Mexico. And what a trip it was. It all started on Thursday March 1st, at 4am Cancun local time…
We rose early to get the shuttle to the airport. It was picking up a few other passengers, and that would add to the hour-long trip to the airport from our hotel. This leg of the trip was uneventful. We had some inkling of what was to come as we started seeing “Delayed” next to several flights bound for the various cities in the US.
We flew from Cancun to Canada to encounter the “Storm of 2007″. This was causing havoc to the travel industry throughout North America (at least Canada and the US). All of the passengers were looking forward to getting into the Kitchener airport, but we did not make it. Our flight was diverted to Toronto as KW was in the midst of a real pounding from the storm.
After we safely landed in Toronto, we were told that we would probably be bussed back to KW. This was met with some groans, but at least we were on the ground, in our own country. The groans turned to real grumbling when we were told a short time later that no buses would run as the 401 was in bad shape. We got to stay the night in Toronto (on the airline’s tab), with the plan to fly us back to KW the following day (today).
A minor bit of chaos erupted as we all tried then to dash through Customs, get our luggage, then run upstairs to the Sunquest departures desk to get our hotel voucher, topped off with a “rush” to the hotel-airport bus stop. I have heard enough horror stories about hotel vouchers being given out, but there being no more room at the hotel. I did not want to be one of the unlucky ones.
We did manage to get a room. After a nice meal, we went to bed. The next day would also begin early for us as the flight was scheduled for 6:30am, and the Sunquest reps told us to be there early as they expected a big crowd of regularly scheduled and delayed passengers. They were right. I have only seen a crowd this large when flying to NYC on Thanksgiving. Crazy.
Fortunately Sunquest set up a couple of ticket agents to handle the Kitchener-bound passengers. This got us out of the big line into something more manageable. However, all this did was speed our trip into another wait. Our flight was scheduled for a 6:30am departure, but eventually took off at 9am. Delays on the tarmac, with the flight crew, flight plan, and passengers all took their toll.
Taking off at 9am felt unreal. We all joked that we were going to be diverted either to Hamilton or right back to Toronto. The joking was unnecessary as we landed safely in Kitchener 15 minutes after leaving Toronto. I could get used to that travel time, leaving out the hours of prep.
The car was where we left it, but covered in ice. It was fun to take the ice off, until I discovered that rust had started to develop on the body panels. That really made me grumpy. Putting that aside for the moment, we wound our way back home, first stopping to get some groceries. The drive-way was a real mess due to the storm and the snow plows. Good thing I had plenty of gas in the snow blower!
The final straw today was the discovery that the house was sitting at 9 Celcius. The furnace was not working as the blower motor died. No idea when it did. And now $700 later, we have a working furnace. That motor was expensive, and the labour was not cheap either.
What else will happen? Stay tuned.
Burning Crusade came out today. Bought it, then I had to go to work. I may now have the luxury to finish some PVP-tagged quests. It seems that everyone else is heading through the Dark Portal. Fun, fun.
I was finally able to order a Wii online today through FutureShop. After a couple of weeks of trying, the constant monitoring of online stores paid off. As it turns out, Shae was able to order one as well. The second one will go to Simon, who wants a Wii more than I do.
I look forward to many hours of silly gaming with the Wii. Plus it will get me moving while gaming. That is a plus.
2007 brings the promise of new horizons and experience. When I look forward, I frequently look back: I started working full-time 10 years ago this month. I bought my first car 8 years ago, and our first (and current) house 4 years ago. We were married a little over 2 years ago. This past year I bought a snowblower (you can thank me later for paying the “mild weather tax”… sorry about the snow on the west coast and in Colorado; that was not me).
During the same 10 year span, I saw old family and friends go, and I also saw the smiles of new family and friends. I hope that this and every year is good to all of us.
Happy New Year
Just finished spending a wonderful day with my family, who is currently visiting us. My mother, father and sister were gracious enough to share the holiday with us. Nick came over for dinner tonight, which was late due to my starting the turkey hours later than I should have.
Hopefully today was full of peace and prosperity for all.
Happy holidays!
Okay. It has now been 4 weeks since our Rogers customer service nightmare started. It has ended today. We have the PVR. Although we had to go to a Rogers Video to get it. Wow. Their system and training sucks. If you have to call, get the Kitchener call-center. They are higher-functioning people. The other call-centers, not nearly as high.
Sigh.
The whole deal sucks. At least this new PVR has an external SATA port to allow you to use an external hard drive to augment the pitiful 160 GB in the box. 20 hours of HD content? That is silly.
The PVR is here and HD content is being viewed. Ranting has simmered to an occasional grumble now.
Got my snow blower today. It is heavy. I have the bruises and scrapes to prove it. I had to help the delivery guy get it from his pickup. Well, I was unprepared for the weight. The auger hit me in the leg, and the whole unit took a hard fall to the ground.
The sweat pants I was wearing now have a big gash in the leg. Fortunately I managed to escape real injury, although the bruise I now have is a biggie.
I consider buying the snow blower as insurance against a heavy snowfall this year. Next year, someone else can take the hit (physically and to the wallet).
When customer service is done correctly, I really appreciate it. The staff seems happy that I am happy. I guess that their managers are happy that we are all happy.
Why is it then that customer service is so frequently done incorrectly, to the point of making the customer really angry? Is it a problem with the service staff, the customer, the training, the product, or the infrastructure? I think that it is a problem with the whole thing, with significant weight applied to the staff and the infrastructure. Case in point:
When we bought our new TV, we got a deal with Rogers to get an HD PVR rent-free for 10 months. We ordered it (after some mixup) THREE times now since mid-November. As it turns out, Rogers own infrastructure and staff were at fault. Their order system cancelled our re-order of the PVR because the order timed-out. Some manual intervention was required for our order because of the initial mix-up. Since this step was not taken, the order was cancelled.
Shae managed to speak to a staff supervisor about the problem with the order last night. Hopefully it is all fixed now. We managed to get another 2 months free rental for the box. Fingers crossed, knock on wood, the box should arrive in 5 business days.
Shae’s harrowing account of the story:
It blows heated air outside, but only a little. We just had a REEP evaluation done on the house, and it scored a decent EnerGuide rating: 77 out of a possible 100 (a higher score indicating a more energy efficient house). The evaluator told me that 80 is really hard to come by.
The sum of the holes/leaks in the house amounted to about a “55 square inch hole”, if I recall the evaluator’s words correctly. They were predominantly around outlets and light switches, which can be sealed up with gaskets. The big culprit are the new holes in the house for the HRV exhaust and intake. I can seal those up with some spray foam. Finally, our basement walls are insulated half-way down from the ceiling. This is another location for heat loss. If we insulate right to the floor and seal up the known air leaks, we could see a 10% improvement in the energy efficiency of the house.
The official report should arrive via snail-mail next week. Looking forward to implementing the necessary fixes.
Call REEP. Get your house evaluated. It is always nice to consume less energy: Your wallet and the planet will thank you.