Lauri’s Neighborhood

Not feeling altogether healthy today, so have been lying a little upon my bed. I have the blinds open and a crow is spending large amounts of time sitting on the lamp post outside my bedroom window and looking in at me. It flies away and then returns to take up its post again. I am not overly superstitious, but I am starting to get a little spooked out by the damn crow. I would indeed like to stone the damn thing.

FD and the crow : not friends at all

Look you saggy bag of black feathers take your business somewhere else! SHOO!

Blew the audition....

Tricky

Shouldn't have told 'em I was a one trick pony....

Been busy with other stuff tonight and I just realized the time. I'll have to use my car post as my Nablo of the day. Back to quasi-theme posts tomorrow. By the way, there are still a few post suggestions given in a previous post that I can use, but feel free to throw more at me if you wish.

Given that this is Remembrance Day, let me leave you with this video from Veterans' Affairs Canada.

Hmmm, sorry, vox's video thingy isn't working. Please go here.

Nablo1109

Yep,  my prescription.  800mg each.

Pills

Here is an Ohio Scientific Challenger 4P (C4P).  It used the faster version of the 6502 processor (Apple and Commodore used the standard version) had lots of RAM (for the time) and all sorts of ports built in.  Nevertheless,  it had no expansion slots.  Hence no 3rd party add in cards.  It was released in the Fall of 1979 and the Apple II+ was released a few months earlier in the Spring.  It never could catch up.

This one was a friends first computer (he also had the Black Apple).  He had used it for years before upgrading to the Apple.  I would imagine the upgrade was actually the diskette system of the Apple and RAM as the specs on the C4P were better otherwise.  But the C4P did have the nifty wood sides.

Unfortunately while in good cosmetic condition,  BASIC will not come up.  It did last time I had it powered up.  I guess time for troubleshooting.

C4p front

C4p rear

Nablo color

Yesterday Mr FD and I experienced two ends of customer service - the good, the bad and the bad was ugly.

As mentioned in a previous post, Mr FD and I have been in the process of buying a car for the company that Mr FD is currently setting up. He started some two week ago on this process and he told everyone involved that he needed the car to leave on an extended trip last Monday. He just wanted the basic car, happy to choose from the colours on the show floor. Wanted no extras - oh except floor mats which now cost $180AUS for 4 rubber floor mats! Mr FD made call after call, repeating his need and his deadline. No one listened. They all heard what they wanted to hear, and then covered up with excuses of "fax didn't arrive" ,  "missed the deadline and head office won't process until tomorrow" and "they are out of the office and I'll leave theme a message" . Where do you leave the message? On the toilet wall of the business next door?

Anyway, we finally got the call to collect the car. We made an appointment for 2.30pm. When we arrived our saleswoman was nowhere to be seen. She was out on a test drive with another customer, even though we had an appointment and knew Mr FD had to leave that afternoon on an extended trip. A number of salesmen walked by us without even acknowledging that we were human and breathed. Eventually we made enough noise to be noticed and demanded to be served. A very junior member of the team took us through signing the papers and then she found a poor salesman who had a leg in a cast and couldn't make an exit to go through the car with Mr. FD. I made little effort to make small talk with Junior Girl as she kept up this charade of our Saleswoman returning at any moment, weeping over her unintended absence. Oh yeah.

An hour later we are driving out of the show room and Saleswoman appears. She throws herself in fron of our car and reefs open Mr. FD's door and screams "Congratulations " as though we had just given birth and not gone into spasms more of heart breaking debt. Then she plants a big lipsticky kiss on his cheek, something that normally would have his heart go into overdrive. THEN she runs to the otherside of the car and reefs open MY door, and rubs her cheek against mine. I take particular note of her name badge and facial features to add her to my stick list. I had never met this woman before, Mr FD had only ever spoken to her over the phone. Not a word of "sorry" even though "I knew that you were driving an hour to get here, and had an appointment with me, and were short of time". Nope, She had our money and she was onto the next sale. Customer service? I think not. Next company car, and there will be one or two or three, won't be bought from her.

On the other side, earlier that morning, a real estate salesman left his comatose mother to drive over an hour to bring some papers to us for signing as he knew Mr. FD needed to sign them before he left yesterday. [We are renting warehouse space]. While we were signing, the LOVELY [HANDSOME] Salesman received a phone call to inform him that his mother had just woken from the coma. She had been involved in a car accident a day or so previously. So this man spends 3 hours away from his possibly dying mother as he knew how important his role was in the next step of Mr FD's business. [If we had known before the meeting we would have gone to his office]

Wait there is a 3rd tale of service. Mr FD is in the seed business, pasture seed mainly. He had bought some seed and organized for it to be sent to a depot for delivery. Yesterday morning there is a knock at our front door, Mr FD goes outside and there is a delivery truck driver outside. The delivery man says "Got a pallet of seed, here for you, mate." They sent the damn seed to our residential address despite Mr FD making it obvious the residential address was for billing purposes only! The poor delivery driver had in fact alerted his office that they were sending him to a residential address with a pallet of seed, but they wouldn't listen or double check the details, so the poor delivery driver drove across town only to be told that "yes, that is right, this is the wrong address", and to have to drive back across town to the depot.

So not only are they giving bad customer service to their customers but they are giving bad customer service to each other. Your co-workers deserve as much as your customers, if not more.

To me, it is easier to do the right thing, and to do the right thing first time around than to do to the pretence dance. And if MR FD asks you to help him make a deadline - just remember there is a Flamingo Dancer with a stick list standing behind him.

[Stick list : list of names of all the people I am going to hit with a stick one day soon]

it is possible I'd seen stand-up before watching Richard Pryor Live on the Sunset Strip, but if so, Richard made me forget about it.  RPLotSS was one of the first shows that incorporated performance into stand-up

Richard covered a lot of ground in 80 minutes. a meditation on love, loss and the difference between men and women:

NOTE:  I feel silly even mentioning this, but just in case.  This is RICHARD FUCKING PRYOR peoples.  offensive language is a given.  do not listen at work or at grandma's house.

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Him in recovery, crystals have been removed from his bladder, he'll probably get to come home tomorrow afternoon with drugs and the cone of shame.

Thanks for the thoughts.

HRTortie had a great night yesterday, being on FDaddy's lap all evening, sleeping on Mommy's electric blanket, and cuddling with me early this morning. I was under the covers with her, thinking about all the stuff I needed to do and worrying about TK, till I realized that I couldn't do anything about any of those things at that time, so the best cause of action was to go back to sleep petting the warm floofy purring tortie. The Zen of Floof got me another 4 hours' sleep.

Nablo9

Daughter1 just sent me the following quote of the day. Needless to say I agree with it!

'Whatever you give a woman, she will make greater. If you give her sperm, she'll give you a baby. If you give her a house, she'll give you a home. If you give her groceries, she'll give you a meal. If you give her a smile, she'll give you her heart. She multiplies and enlarges what is given to her. So, if you give her any crap, be ready to receive a ton of sh-t.'  

Dad was at church this morning after seniors choir practice, and another man fell and knocked him over. He fell on his hip that was replaced eight years ago. They're at the hospital, and it appears the bone may be cracked, so he may have to have surgery again tomorrow.

Dad's a lot frailer than he was back in 2001 after his first hip surgery.

Please say a prayer for him and think good thoughts.

Thanks.

Update: Just talked to my sister, and they're waiting for the surgeon (busy day, I guess) to determine if surgery will be necessary. But he's not in too much pain, and he actually got into the hospital bed under his own steam, which is a good sign.

He actually answered the phone when I called the room, and he sounded pretty good. So here's hoping...