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February 4, 2009 12:00 AM Spotted Relaxing ... in the hot tub As you can see, I couldn't resist sharing that with you, and perhaps this is the beginning of the resurrection of this web site! I have found myself meandering through thought much more aimlessly since giving up this form of thought-release, and writing has always been a favorite tool of mine for solidifying otherwise very lucid and formless thoughts that roam the depths and widths of my minds' scape. I guess we'll see... Stay tuned! February 9, 2009 11:56 PM The Nighttime Sky in Calgary Too beautiful not to share  As I was leaving the court this evening, I couldn't help but notice one of the most amazing moonlit sky scenes, so I put my truck in park, threw on my hazzard lights and pulled out my camera - only to take some of the most wonderful pictures of the moon and the night time sky I've ever captured. As such, I felt compelled to share these images with you, and some others I had sitting on my camera from the other night.  Living in a construction zone has taken it's toll on my place, and I really haven't had a lot of nice space within which to live and relax. This weekend, however, Kristi came over and put a serious dent in my disorganized life with her amazing skills of order and cleanliness. The end result was some areas of my house where now, despite the ongoing renovations, I can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel getting brighter. And what better way to drive that point home than with some candles. Everything looks better by candlelight. It brings out texture, atmosphere, ambiance, adds character, brings warmth — so many wonderful things happen when you place candles in a room. I love it, and these pictures hopefully reflect that.      Back to the pictures I took tonight, here are a couple more that stood out.    February 20, 2009 6:32 PM Fed up with UPS A rant Preamble In order for these dampers to know when to open and when to close, temperature sensors placed throughout the house tell the system how warm it is in each part, and by using that information the system can then open and close vents as necessary to route the heated air where it is needed. These temperature sensors all connect to an interface board that takes their readings and converts them into digital signals that the system can use. I did a fair bit of research before choosing this interface, and settled on one made by a company in California who manufacturers them there. It is small, efficient, and does only what I need it to without any additional features or fluff that I don't need. The cost is modest, and even with our slumping Canadian dollar the total was tolerable. I was all set to buy one until... Now let me break out some numbers for you. To truly appreciate my angst in this situation, you have to see the numbers. I might even draft a pie chart to graphically detail why I am in no uncertain terms furious with UPS right now. First of all, my initial purchase.
Allright, not too bad. The board itself is about the size of a chalk-board eraser. If you're not sure how big a chalk-board eraser is, ask your parents. (And seriously, am I that old already??) For just shy of $200, I thought I was doing alright. That is, until the package arrived. COD. C-O-What? I paid my shipping fees when I bought the item! Brokerage fees? Duty? GST? Are you kidding me? Ok, well how much? (The blood begins to boil...) $49.95!?! And, on top of that, I had to go pick it up because UPS delivers only during the working hours of the business day, when of course NOBODY IS HOME! So then, not even factoring in my gas and time to go pick it up (twice, because my first trip learned me the lesson about UPS not being open on weekends. Heaven forbid someone might want to send or pick up a package on a Saturday... I seriously hope that company goes under. No bailout, no creditor protection, just belly-up, game over, Asta-La-Vista, Baby...) So now, after paying to have the item shipped, I get billed an aditional fifty bucks at the receiving end. Angry angry angry! Well what would you know it, but I can't get this interface to work. It just won't do it. And to make a long story short, after troubleshooting the problem on my end and conversing with the manufacturer on the other, we agree that the board appears to be faulty, and I am to ship it back to have them take a look at it. No problem, I pack it up, go to my local post office, drop it in the mail and pay now, $13.22 CDN to send it back by our trusty Canadian Postal Service. Interestingly enough, it arrives at the other end in the exact same number of days as it came up, for a third less of the cost (after you factor in the conversion.) So their engineers take a look at the board, go over it with a fine tooth comb and discover that not only is the board itself faulty, but there is a critical design flaw in the entire line of these products, one which will require an entire product revision and any existing stock to be modified to correct this problem before anyone else finds it. Alright, so appologies are granted by the manufacturer, who even agrees to send me another interface free of charge on my next order (a $134 US value, but of course I have to buy something else from them and ergo - risk repeating the cycle of insanity by having to have the products shipped by UPS...) So my repaired interface is back in the mail, on it's way back home, scheduled to be delivered today. I even made a sign for the UPS guy delivering it to have him leave it at the back door in case there is no answer. Waiting patiently, off to work I go. I get home, all excited, can't wait to try it out, plans for the weekend, testing, playing, programming, wonderful geeky fun, .. no package. Checked the Bar-B-Q. Nothing. There's a note on the door. COD owing - $49.38. I swore out loud. I'm ashamed to admit it but the anger of all things injust and unrighteous reared up inside me, combining with my sudden and unexpected disappointment and I was enraged! They're charging me AGAIN?!? I paid my duty. It said right on the way-bill, "Warranty Repair!" I had to call them and find out what was going on. This was ridiculous. I called the 1-800 number and got through almost immediately. I didn't even have time to sit on hold and calm down, I got right through. Cudo's to their customer support team for that one. I inquired. They quoted the amount I now owed them again. I asked for an explanation of the charges. They explained that it is their standard brokerage fee any time an item crosses the border. She did admit that they were also charging me duty and GST in error, and so reversed some $8.00 of the charges, but the brokerage fees still stand. "Can you see how frustrating this is? This was a warranty repair! For the amount of money you've cost me now, I could have bought a whole new item!" "Yes, I see how that could be frustrating." Acknowledgement. At least there was some acknowledgement. But let's go back to the charts now.
If none of what I've written sinks in, and I realize it's been a long rant, I've prepared a chart to illustrate in visual terms how much money throughout this whole fiasco has gone to UPS.  That big green slice of the pie represents the money UPS has charged me ON TOP of shipping fees for one, small interface board. I'll post a picture of it when I pick it up on Monday. That green slice represents $91.95. BACK to Journal Index | ||||||||||||||||||||||