Big sky, little town

Today is a gloomy, gray day, with rain threatening, and completely unsuitable for working outdoors. Of course, since we are getting into the rainy season, each afternoon has been turning dark and stormy, with rain coming down in amounts anywhere from sprinkles to downpours that result in visibility reduced to halfway up the front of the property.

When the rains came after a couple of months of no rain at all, we were happy. It saves the trouble of watering, and the ground definitely needs it. But there are Issues, as we say. And we’ll get to those. First, we’re going to back up a bit, and wander back into May.

It’s a (very) small town here. Small enough that the actual town in which we live doesn’t have its own post office. The nearest PO is in another pretty small town.

Continue reading Big sky, little town

Poor service abounds

I despise crappy service. I really do. In fact, it was one of the reasons my then business partner and I started our own company.

It isn’t every day, though, that you find a rather stunning example of bad service – so amazing that at first it’s annoying, but then becomes rather puzzling, as there is no need for it and no possible explanation to give for it.

Case in point: we register domains for people. Lots and lots of domains. Today, we received an email from a tech at the registrar, telling us that one of our customers had been trying (unsuccessfully) to get in touch with us – yeah, I know, we of the round the clock coverage are just impossible to get in touch with about anything. The email we received also told us to see their “correspondence below”. It also included a notation to the person contacting them that the registrar had forwarded their email to us.

Problem: we received no forwarded email. There was no “correspondence below”. In fact, there was nothing at all to indicate who had contacted them, what they wanted, or what the message contained. So, off goes a response, telling them that it would be rather helpful if they’d include the correspondence they said they did, and that is copied to the email address of the person who contacted them (and this latter fact is noted for the registrar).

To which we receive a response from that same tech, asking us to contact the person who contacted them. Now, this just begins a downward spiral, because of course we did copy that other party and we did note this in our response – obviously, reading comprehension is not this guy’s strong point.

So, again, we ask for whatever correspondence there should have been, and tell him again that we did copy that other party, and perhaps someone could do something productive. Like let us know what the hell the issue was so we could address it.

Which led to the third party – who, as it happens, wound up being not only NOT the customer, but unconnected to the account in any way, shape, or form – telling us that our demeanor sucked, based on our pleas to the registrar to give us any shred of information that would be helpful. Which led to his mail being blocked to the entire network, because one thing we don’t need is random asshats who jump to faulty conclusions based on no information whatsoever.

In the end, we told everyone to have the client contact us themselves. Just as they have done in the past, via the very same methods they had used in the past, where they found their rare tickets answered politely, efficiently, and promptly, just like everyone else. Because we’re certainly not in the habit of releasing information about accounts or making modifications to account based on contacts from third parties.

*** Followup: as it turns out, despite the fact that it is mentioned nowhere in the email to us from the registrar, and despite the fact that it specifically states that they are forwarding the (presumed) client’s email to us….the presumed client didn’t contact them via email. They called. A fact mentioned exactly nowhere in the conversation back and forth today until I pointed out for the tech that we didn’t need lessons on service from him and that more crap from him about how we should be conducting ourselves would result in us pulling about 4K domains from that registrar and moving them elsewhere.

Remarkable, really. Such a simple issue – or it would be, with a little bit of common sense.

Cultivating dirt

Thus far, in our adventure on the farm, what have we done?

Other than trying to coax grass to grow to keep our own personal Dust Bowl to a minimum, not much. There is still plenty of garbage strewn about that has to be collected, and quite a lot of the property to be graded to a level that it can actually be used. Since I have no grader attachment, that means leveling with a rake and shovel in smaller patches as I put down grass seed. In the side and rear, where I want to put the garden items, that’s a bit more difficult: it surely is a large piece of ground to be leveling by hand, and there’s only one of me. So, I plan to do a smaller patch by hand, just to get my seedlings transplanted out of the flats before they croak, and then we’ll ask the builder if he has a guy/girl to do the rest so we can put seed directly down. Once that grading is done, the fun will begin in earnest.

The current plan is to have three 40′ rows of silver queen corn, three 20′ rows of the same, and three 20′ rows of another sweet variety called maple sugar. I might do another row or two of a Japanese hulless corn for popping. Once thing I miss more than I thought I would since treatment is popcorn: I can’t eat traditional variety, because the hulls get stuck everywhere in my mouth after just a few kernels, and dental stuff takes forever as it is. I figure a hulless corn for popping may be just the thing.

At one end of the long rows, we’ll have zucchini, and at the other, squash – no crosspollination for us, thanks. At the ends of the smaller blocks that will hold tomatoes, we’ll have a couple different varieties of cukes. We’ll also have a couple blocks of different types of peppers. Along the fenceline around the pool on the east side, which will get AM sun and PM shade, we’ll have onions, garlic, shallots, broccoli, and cauliflower, so as not to have them burn up in the heat of the afternoons around here.

We also have the following to plant: lettuce, arugula, spinach, carrots, celery, snap peas, green beans, English peas, black beans, watermelon, and canteloupe. I also have potatoes and strawberries coming in – the latter a hybrid designed to withstand the kind of heat we have around here in the summer. I also need to get the winter squashes in the ground soon (butternut squash and pumpkin).

Around the blocks, we’ll have marigolds and nasturtiums planted, to keep the nasty bugs away. Plus, there are all the herbs that have been started: cilantro, different types of basil, catnip, spearmint, oregano, parsley, rosemary, and so on.

The biggest stumbling block right this moment is the grading. I also need to get my compost pile started again. Fortunately, for that, there is plenty of brown matter around here to chip/grind and throw in with the green matter.

I know everything will come together. Just a little more patience, I suspect, the same as it is with awaiting those first sprigs of green in the areas where I have already put down grass seed.

Oh, and at some point, I need to plan the menu for the Memorial Day party, and we need to get the invites out so we know how many people are coming. It seems every day one of us says we’ve invited yet another person/group of people, so this year may be our largest yet.

Winners, all

Poking along on dialup does a couple of things, really. It offers a lesson in patience, for one, but it also affords one the opportunity to reflect on the miracle that allows some people to get through their day to day lives without accidentally killing themselves or someone else through sheer stupidity.

Like the guy who told us he couldn’t access his account and complaining that he was “losing listeners”, but provided no details as to what his issue was. He then wrote back to us to cancel after being provided with his access details again, telling us he was “dissatisfied” that we were not going to set up his site for him because he was paying a per month fee for hosting and a per month fee for domain registration.

There are two things wrong with this picture. Well, more than that, but there are two that jump right out at us. First, it’s a brand new domain. Just how many visitors are you losing, exactly, to a domain that did not even exist before you ordered it? And secondly, just what part of the FAQ or the terms or the invoice did you fail to grasp that indicated domain fees are done on an annual basis? All of them, apparently. I won’t even get into the fact that we don’t do design or setups and don’t say anywhere that we do, or tell you that your local fifth grader could design your site for you for the fee you’re paying each month, because it won’t be done by a pro at that rate – or that you could just install a ready-made app right from the control panel of the account, so all you have to do is click the mouse a couple of times and then start typing up whatever inane crap you’re going to put out there for the world to see.

My favorite type of person, though, are those with signatures in their emails indicating their association with the IT world. Like the latest one I just closed out, who wrote in to cancel because they were having issues retrieving their email (although the logs showed that email was delivering quite nicely, thank you). He complained that they had written in a few days prior “with no resolution”. A check of the previous ticket shows that yep, it was responded, and we asked some followup questions. All of this from someone whose signature read “IT – Systems Administration”. Now, if it were me – and I’m just tossing this out there for consideration, mind you – if I achieved some lofty position in IT based on years of toil, and I contacted a vendor about an issue related to email, I’d probably use an email address I knew I could check. Say, one not at the domain I’m writing in about. Because then I wouldn’t need to bitch at the vendor about not receiving a response just because I was a complete dumbass for using an address at that domain. But hey, that’s just me. What the hell do I know.

In other news, today will be the first real yard work day around here, now that the old place is finished completely. That’s after I sign off on some paperwork at the accountant’s office, ship a motherboard back to the vendor as a DOA, and other assorted business things. At least the moving is finished, thankfully. I hate the process. But I love this particular result.

Home, sweet home

Welcome home.

We discovered that our suspicions were true: the neighbor behind us had dumped most of the crap onto this property, including a bunch of giant creosote poles. The builders finally got them removed – by the neighbor who dumped them in the first place. Now that side of the property looks even larger than it did, although there is still more junk to be removed, courtesy of the neighbor.

The yard tractor also arrived yesterday. It’s lovely.

And moving can be very painful to those with sensitive skin due to medical routines.

I have a matching set on the other arm, plus bruises up and down my legs and on my hips. If I only had a jacuzzi now…

The weather is here, wish you were fine

Wait, that’s the other way around, isn’t it?

This weekend has been spent hauling things out to the estate – we’re calling it the estate to differentiate it from the current house, since otherwise when we’re not together and someone says they are “at the house” it saves the time we would ordinarily be asking “which house”. So, the estate it is. I have bruises up and down the inside of each arm from toting things, because for whatever reason since treatment, it seems that I can bruise even with the gentlest of touches. And hauling boxes is not a gentle process when half your upper body is quite a bit weaker than the other half and you can’t really lift one arm the way you can the other. It makes for a little offbalance moving, but since we’re all a little offbalance, I suppose that’s fitting.

In any case, after a full day of back and forth on Saturday between the estate, the house, Home Depot, and the NOC a couple of times, with work in between each, I settled in and tried to sleep. Sleep, for me, has never been consistent and I can’t remember the last time it was ever really a good sleep (not including the times I was drugged up, of course, but a drugged sleep isn’t all that natural). Another fitful few hours later, and it was Sunday, so I got up to do it all over again. One trip to the NOC to crawl around and trace a power line that was mislabeled (by moi), and it was off to the races. Our dear friend Brutus showed up to help sling some boxes and see the house, but then things slowed down and we sat outside by the pool, enjoying the quiet, the breeze, and the beauty of the new place.

They completed the sod around the pool area and a line around the house, so I’ve been working to keep that watered since Mother Nature isn’t cooperating by giving us any rain.

While I was taking the second shot, a crazy person – aka, my mother – decided that she wasn’t going to let a little thing like 72 degree water stop her.

My sister also took a quick dip a little later in the day. Me? I’m cold enough as it is. I’d turn into a human popsicle if I climbed into that water.

In the meantime, the movers will be here on Tuesday now instead of today, but that’s fine. We’ll have satellite and the remaining two phone lines installed today, so those guys will be out of the way when the moving are bringing things in. That works out well. That also gives us another day to tote more of the little stuff over and gives me the chance to test the dialup out there and to start working on some of the outside landscaping/gardening things.

Ciao for now!

How was your day, dear?

Well, I gotta tell ya…

Good. And bad. And good. And seemingly neverending.

The pool is lovely, bright, and deep.

After a very restless night and very little sleep, I bagged it, got up, and did some work to clear a few things off my list. All the while, I seriously contemplated the distinct possibility that I might wind up puking before going off to get a cashier’s check for closing.

But I didn’t puke, I did get the check, and did head off to sign my life away.

Naturally, in the midst of signing all the papers, one of the servers went down and would not come back. A bit of misinterpretation by one of the guys equaled an issue that lasted quite a bit longer than it should have. I wound up blasting out to the NOC, at the beginning of rush hour, to run some commands on the server. While working on that one, another page from the monitor: another server has bitten the dust. Fortunately, I was already there, as that server, after a reboot, needed a disk check as well. With that running, but before the final reboot to bring that one back online, yet another page: another person has crashed their server (but this one does this on a fairly regular basis). That one, of course, came right back after a power cycle, as it was the one I was least concerned about. With all the disk checks done, everything back online, and the monitor all clear with all services green, I could finally enjoy the moment.

Just the tiniest taste for me, since alcohol and my tongue are still not yet approaching being even the most distant of friends.

Back on the road for more work, then back on the road to return to the HQ. Ding! Yet another server issue, and it’s the same one that went off earlier today as I was working on server number one. Criminy. Manage to get to a safe spot, get logged on to the reboot port via my phone. Ding! Recovery notices. In the five minutes or so it took me to do that, the user has rebooted the server (although, I believe that if you can get into the server, 99% of the time it isn’t necessary). Back on the road, finally to the HQ, settle back in to work.

Only to consider that perhaps our habit of answering tickets almost instantly is something we should rethink, as a user is demanding to know why someone hasn’t answered a ticket in 30 minutes – a ticket related to that very server, in fact. That could be because my vehicle, sad to say, does not travel at the speed of light, it’s impossible for me to answer tickets on my phone, and I’m the one covering tonight. Ergo, no response to that ticket or any other in the preceding 30 minutes.

Take care of that, whip through the other few tickets that have arrived, and then receive a real winner: someone complaining about a charge for domain registration, telling us they have no account with us and to remove it. Well, genius, it would help if you could give us some kind of hint as to who you are, when the charge was processed, what the domain name was on the invoice, what the invoice number was, or perhaps what the last four of the credit card were. You know – any sort of information whatsoever that would let us know which of the numerous charges we process on any given day would be The One.

Oh, and this is what greeted me when I got back to the old house.

What used to be a pillow was now a collection of small fluffy islands in the foyer, living room, and office. And no, Newton was not the culprit. But he did pose nicely.

Mickey had wisely decided to take his ass outside after laying down on the floor at my feet, knowing that he’d been bad. Damn dogs. Good thing they’re so cute.

The first couple of loads of stuff is at the new place. Tomorrow will bring more work and more back and forth between the old and new houses. It will be a rather exhausting weekend, I can see this already.

Reflections on gardening, cooking, and life