I live to say “I’ve had my “wildest” Walmart experience.” You may ask what’s with the quotes around the word wildest in the past sentence. It’s simple, you have no idea what may face you should you choose to return to Walmart.
It occurred last Friday during my lunch break. I was going to Walmart to pick up some new head lights, since one had burned out. I entered the Walmart parking lot as most people do in a car. I was driving in the lane directly next to the entrance. The car in front of me began to slow down when approaching the entrance door. He then came to a complete stop and was looking in the door. I came to a complete stop behind him, thinking he just may be overly cautious or waiting for someone. I waited for 3 seconds and he still hadn’t proceed to move so I pulled around him into a lane and parked.
When I got out of my car the owner of the car I went around, pulled up and rolled down his window. It was a middle aged man bluetooth in ear with a large gold chain. He yelled, “that’s not nice, you took my spot.” I stood there with a questionable look upon my face trying to comprehend what he was saying. I responded, “you stopped at the entrance.” He claimed he hadn’t stopped. I pointed and said again, “you stopped right there.” He then said “I stopped there because there is a stop sign.” I looked again and there was no stop sign. I let him know there was no stop sign and that he could have the spot if he wanted it, thinking dying over a parking space at Walmart isn’t a way I want to go out. He gave me the stink eye while grumbling and drove off.
Let me know your walmart stories. Hopefully none end as tragically as Jdimytai Damour’s did.
For the year of 2009 I’m officially giving my worst customer service award to the creators of the popular mac virtualization software, Parallels. They somehow managed to surpassed the worst of the worst for customer support this year in my opinion. Although Central Parking Systems came in a close second charging me $13 for one hour while grabbing dinner(FYI their policy is no monetary refunds). Back to the creator of Parallels though, because they easily took the cake.
I didn’t have all that difficult of a question. It was simply, “What is the upgrade policy for users who purchased Parallels 4.0 in September.” Nothing that crazy since Parallels 5.0 came out this November. HA, little did I know what faced me. The total time span of trying to get this question answered took between 60 – 90 minutes.
Step one I thought I would go to their website and look for their customer support number. Simple enough they have a fairly easy to navigate website. So after easily finding the 24×7 customer support number I tried the toll free number. There was a menu prompt do you use Parallels desktop press 1. Then I had to press 1 again as a Mac, or Linux Parallels user. After that I kept keeping disconnected. So I ended up trying the other number for the 24×7 support. After about 25 minutes of fumbling through the automated menu I was finally able to speak to a live person. The person I spoke to was having a hard time speaking or understanding English. I spent the next 10 minutes explaining how to say my name(Michael) and spell it repeatedly. While giving the woman my call back number she hung up on me. WHAT THE HELL!!!
I tried calling back and after about another 20 minutes I was finally back to speaking to a real live person. Go figure, I got the exact same support representative who proceeded to tell me sorry her phone line dropped. Fair enough sometime technical glitches happen. After repeatedly speaking very slowly asking my question about an upgrade deal for recent purchasers of Parallels 4 she finally grasped what I was asking and said there wasn’t anything she could do. I thought OK that’s fine. I asked to speak to her supervisor so he could verify. She said sure no problem and then hung up again.
With the US unemployment hitting 10.2% in November I started thinking how could I earn an income if I became part of that statistic. The news had been showing the lives of many who lost their jobs and their worlds turned upside down. All facing the question, “what do I do to pay the bills now?”
I had been thinking about becoming a youth hockey referee for a couple years now. So about two months ago I decided to go for it. I signed up for the required seminar and attended. It was seven hours in the classroom and one hour of on ice training. After the seminar new referees are required to take the level one certification test, which is open book and 45 questions long. The total cost to become a ref for a season is $45 which covers the seminar and pays your yearly dues. After that your ready to ref your first game. The games in my area start at $14 for a Mite house league up to $60 for Midget AAA travel.
I’ve spoken with a few people at my primary job and there were a couple who have refed soccer or baseball in the past. They agreed its an easy second or alternative income. Refing youth sports is also a good for your resume, it shows your involved with your community.
Man I’ve been lazy. I think it’s been about 2 years since my last post and really the time has come for me to get back at it. All I needed was a little inspiration delivered by no other than Mr. T.
Well the other day I finally got offered to join Google Voice’s beta program. I thought since my mobile number is basically my primary number that having an extra number to hand out instead of my direct cell phone number. As of right now Google only gives out dialer applications for Blackberry and Android and someone has released a good application for the iPhone. I have only seen one other dialer application for windows mobile but the individual is charging money for it. So I decided that i would write my own application. Instead of charging money for the application, I’m going to hand it out for free. The way this application works is that on first use it will ask for your google voice number. Then it will display a list of contacts, or you can enter a number to dial. If you select a contact it will display their information and it will display all the numbers associated with that contact. The program dials your google voice number then pauses then dials the number selected. This way will not use any data minutes.
One main caveat, you must disable pin number when dialing your google voice number.
Email all questions and comments to brandon@uncubeme.com, this is a beta version. I know there is a lot of work still to be done with it
Web development services in India have changed the face of the internet in a remarkable way. With more and more companies marketing their products online and customers relying heavily on the internet, web development has picked up radically. Most of us now enjoy the facility of buying commodities or goods online from the very comforts of our own homes instead of visiting stores, malls and shops and searching in person for what we need. This not only helps saves time but also saves the hassles and the efforts that one has to put up with in order to reach nearby stores or malls.
Web development initially was thought to be limited to the designing aspect of creating an appealing website. However, nowadays web development is much more than that. It would include many others modules like e-commerce, online videos, advertisement campaigns, creating online inventories, online stores, tutorials and much more. The scope of web development can range from developing simple static web pages of plain text to the most complex web-based internet applications, electronic businesses, or social network services.
Large setups and organizations would usually have a huge portal running on the internet marketing their products and services hence they would hire a web development team comprising of many web developers to maintain their website for them. On the contrary, smaller setups would usually hire a webmaster or a small team of graphic designers to help maintain their site for them. Web development may only be a successful proposition if all departments in one organization present a collaborative effort towards it.
Web development has become a very easy job as compared to the past. There are many software tools available like for example Adobe Dreamweaver, Photoshop or Microsoft Expression Studio which can help you in developing a classy website in no time at all. These tools are so user friendly that extensive knowledge of HTML or any other programming is not all required. You can effortlessly place pictures, graphics and create web pages beyond your wildest dreams.
Many small to large companies have engaged web development companies to create for them backend tools like Content Management Systems through which their webmaster can update their website for them. Again, no expert knowledge is required in running these CMS packages and they can update your website in no time at all. Open source CMS codes like Drupal, Joomla and Xoops are freely available. They just need to custom programmed to meet the individual requirements of a company.
Costs involved in web development are not as what it used to be a couple of years back. In fact there are many sites available on the internet which can help you build a site based on your basic requirement at very low rates. However, if you own a company and are looking for slightly complex web applications to be created for your site then it is always best to hire a web development company. Web Development in India is on the rise and there are many experienced and professional companies providing efficient services. One needs to be cautious while choosing the right Web Development partner and should look into various aspects such as the solution offered, the costs, the communication level of the company and ufcourse the standard of quality that the company offers. IT Chimes is one of the leading Web Development companies in India and with a portfolio of more than 100 clients worldwide and 300 successful projects already delivered they have the confidence to take on complex project and offer efficient and result oriented solutions.
With the US unemployment hitting 10.2% in November I started thinking how could I earn an income if I became part of that statistic. The news had been showing the lives of many who lost their jobs and their worlds turned upside down. All facing the question, “what do I do to pay the bills now?” 