July 29, 2008
Not that I’m tempted …
but why are there 4 H&M stores, aka the only stores with button down shirts that fit me perfectly sans alterations, within walking distance of my hotel? WHY??
family
Farewell to the best boy in the world
About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag
Read MoreJuly 28, 2008
An Addendum
What I AM doing, however, is avoiding my coworkers. My evil coworkers who have pointed out three H&M stores between this hotel and our meeting building and dinner locale since yesterday and insisted that we were going shopping this afternoon.
I can make much better use of my time and whatever money I saved from the SD trip by holing up in my room and using the free internet. Hah! And it’s a pretty nice room, too.
So much to do!
Back in my room after 9 hours of meeting, through a working breakfast and lunch. I had about half a day’s notice that this meeting was going to be centered around my area of expertise, at least for the first day, and given the amount of miscommunication and animosity surrounding the area, I was very concerned about how this would go. It went ok, though, considering.
Felt compelled to clean up work emails for the next hour and half since I’ve got some time before dinner, but it occurs to me that I’ve also got a week’s worth of personal finance and blogging, reading and commenting, and news to catch up on. I’ve not touched financial stuff for days and that makes me antsy. Also, my work email account is acting crazy and rejecting my password; I think it’s a sign to just do my own thing.
I almost don’t know where to start, so I’ve got about 7 windows open and the WSJ spread out on the desk in front of me.
Ah yes, and the retirement account balances have declined yet again. Not much change, then.
Am raring to complete an expense report for the San Diego trip, but not enough time. Have the feeling that this will be the state of affairs for at least a few more days.
July 27, 2008
Back from Con, and moving on!
Whew, from one spectrum to another. I drove home from San Diego just around midnight, and left again before 6 am to catch a flight, and now I’m on the East Coast for two days of meetings and turning right back around and leaving again.
It’s humid.
I’ll have a Con update when I get back, I have to upload some of my photos. I’m going to have a LOT of catching up to do.
July 25, 2008
*sigh* I miss T-mobile
Aside from not ever having a possessed phone when I was their customer, their service just seems to get more and more excellent. My parents have a T-Mobile family plan and I just called to change the family plan to a cheaper package with 700 minutes instead of 1000.
One, they offer a callback service. Instead of making you wait on hold, they ask for your name and number, and they call you right back, if you prefer.
Two, the CSR didn’t go through any rigamarole when I inquired about the minute usage and told her about my intention to change plans: she immediately offered the plan I knew would fit best, noting that there was one other option but that it wouldn’t save as much money.
Three, she quickly backdated the change of plans so that it would take effect for the current billing cycle rather than having to wait until the next one, saving me $10 for this bill effective immediately.
Four, she also corrected the contract dates from the botched up replacement phone fiasco where my mom had insisted to ordering phones that I couldn’t afford, without waiting for me to help select phones they could use. Those phones were sent back a few months ago, but I’d never called to make sure they’d made any necessary corrections to the contract dates. All fixed!
Five, she gave me all the information she had on the T-Mobile Home Service (I asked), and offered to get me to the folks who had more information if I wanted it.
And all of the above was completed in five minutes. I LOVE T-mobile’s customer service.
July 24, 2008
Simple car repair?
The lock on my driver’s side has been malfunctioning on and off, more on lately than off, over the past month. It doesn’t respond to the remote when I arm the alarm, so I hear a quiet little *thunk* …. *thunk*….. *thunk* as the door tries to lock in order before arming the alarm. Since it can’t quite make it, the alarm is never properly armed, so I have to manually lock and unlock that door in order to use the remote alarm.
It’s mostly inconvenient, but when I’m busy and in a hurry, I don’t want to forget and rush off leaving my baby unprotected! A family friend promised to come over and teach me how to diagnose and fix the problem, but it’s been two weeks and the man still hasn’t called or shown up, so I’ve asked a good friend to help me out.
He thinks he knows what’s wrong with it, but I’m going to put it through a field test to be sure of exactly what does and doesn’t work before I go spending money on it. With any luck, it’s just the one lock unit that will have to be replaced, and he can help me install it. In the meantime, I’ve found a couple car enthusiast forums with huge lists of installation guides, and am hoping to learn some car savviness, wish me luck!
July 23, 2008
Off to see the Wizard ….
Well, not really. But I’m going to give my bags a last looky-loo, and then toss them in the car, fill up and get going!!
Whoo!
We have free wi-fi throughout the convention center this year, but unless I email my posts, I probably won’t be doing much blogging between now and next week because the laptop is just too heavy to carry. Oh, and I’m on va-ca-tion!! I’ve got a few posts scheduled, though.
I’ve got my $150 in Shell gas cards in my wallet, my $200 in cash (my entire budget for the trip), and a short list of people I’m going to spend that cash on. After that? It’s all food, parking and me!!
So very excited. This is going to be awesome. Have a great week everyone!