A Picture is Worth

Y's daughter is graduating from high school and sits for graduation pictures.

Order form comes.

Smallest package available is $270. Includes four wallet size and an 8x10.

Y figures that after all the time and effort (and cash) they have put into getting daughter this far, what's another 270 bucks. Plus there are grandparents each with a gaping hole in their wallets just waiting for this photo.

Package arrives.

Pics are blurry.

You're kidding.

(This is probably how phones with cameras got invented. A mom was so frustrated shelling out hundreds for school photos she probably figured it would be cheaper to create a smartphone and take the pics herself.)

Y does not want to accept mediocre photographs especially at highway robbery those prices.

Calls place.

Customer Service says: What Can I Do For You.

Y says: Blah blah daughter, blah blah pictures, Can you see the pictures from there?

Customer Service says: Wait a minute, I just have to load em up, my computer is so slow today - hold on - yes - 

Y says:  Well can you please look at the photographs and tell me - do they look blurry to you? I mean, you do this all day and you're the expert, I just wanted to get your opinion?

Customer Service says: Yeah, actually. They do look kind of blurry. We can absolutely sharpen the image from here and send them out.

Y: Oh, thank you so much, that's terrific.

Customer: Also, I noticed a little pimple on your daughter's chin and we can zap that right out and send these off to you today.

Lessons Learned

1. Rely on the expertise of those around you.
2. Everyone likes to be the hero, even Customer Service 
3. It seemed like a big ask - how would Customer Service be able to check if the photos Y received were blurry, and how would they be able to fix the problem remotely, but in the end it worked out better than Y ever dreamed.
4. Customer Service and estheticians have more in common than you would think.

Things People Have Said To Me On The Book Tour So Far

1. I think you can read less from the book at your events.
2. I think you could read more from the book at your events.
3. You look way better in person. I had seen your pictures and I wasn't expecting you to look so - alive.
4. I'm also going to write a book. 
5. Everyone tells me I should write a book.
6. I ordered your book off amazon and it didn't come yet. Can you call them and get the book for me.
7. I didn't realize you were so good at public speaking.
8. You told me you were good at public speaking but I didn't believe you.
9. You missed your calling. You should be a professional public speaker.
10. Did you take a course on public speaking? Or did you read a book on how to do it?
11. I think you are better with a small crowd, more intimate.
12. I like your energy better with a big crowd, more fiery.
13. I didn't buy your book, I didn't feel like waiting in line.
14. How much money are you making for doing this?
15. You're not getting the money? Then who is?

How to Get a Complete Refund

Daughter T playing in basketball tournament in Atlanta.
I am in France.
Basketball television network (not its real name) offers several subscription models all of which have free cancellation.
I take the $9.95 weekly figuring I will cancel after a week.
Sit on beautiful rattan bench in courtyard and watch games on my iPad marveling at the miracles that got me here, her there, and me able to see her play.
Cancel subscription.
Wake up the next morning thinking I don't trust these people 100% and log back onto site, go on to chat help desk and ask for confirmation that I correctly cancelled subscription.
Chat help desk person KAW says I have cancelled your subscription for you.
I have a weird feeling about this so I keep the email with the chat script.
Two and a half months elapse during which time I miss the repeated charges and pay the bill anyway have gone through my credit card statement with a fine tooth comb but somehow miss this repeated charge.
Get an email from Basketball television network about how much they miss me, how they notice I haven't logged on in a while and how they hope I'm OK.
Which is very thoughtful of them.
But.
I thought I already cancelled this subscription. And $9.95 weekly is not a negligible amount of money.
Log back on to site and click on chat help desk.
Tell LBJ that I cancelled subscription on July 30th at 3:56pm.
LBJ says. I'm really sorry about that. Let me refund you completely and right now. Email confirmations will be sent to you immediately and expect a credit on your card within the next few days.

Lessons Learned
1. If you cancel a subscription, you still may get charged for it so be careful.
2. If your credit card gets charged incorrectly and you inadvertently pay the bill, you can still go back and get a refund.
3. If the only way to communicate with this website is over chat, don't despair, you may still be able to get what you want.
4. If your daughter tells you that under no circumstances does she want you to watch her game, and you go all the way to France to feign nonchalance, Basketball television network will help you outsmart even the wiliest teenager.

Life is the Flower for Which Love is the Honey -Victor Hugo

Background 

1. Jews eat honey cake on Rosh Hashanah (New Year)
2. Jewish New Year season is now
3. My book editors said not to use numbers unless the sequence is important, but I am having trouble breaking the habit

Honey Cake
I use my oldest cookbook which I think was written before I was even born called Second Helpings. Second Helpings gives vague cooking suggestions. For example, a casserole recipe might be something like: brown the onion, add the beef, cook till done, put in oven, warm when your husband gets home from his long day at the office.
I like the recipes because I find them forgiving, in other words you don't have to be exact (although possibly you may need a husband so please govern yourselves accordingly)
The honey cake recipe is simple and then it says, pour into 10 inch tube pan, which in my mind was a loaf pan although the two are not the same at all.
I pour the batter into a loaf pan.
There is too much batter so I pour it into a second loaf pan.
There is not enough batter to properly bake in second pan.
I am annoyed with Second Helpings until I realize that I mis-read the instructions and anyway I don't have a 10in tube pan.
I do however have two smaller tube pans that may have been Jell-O molds in a former life if you can picture what I'm talking about.
They are either  inherited from my great-grandmother or snagged at a Minnesotan garage sale (?)
Pour batter from loaf pans into Jell-O pans and put in oven.
Wash non-performing loaf pans by hand because dishwasher is still broken.
While drying pans notice burning smell coming from oven.
One of the Jell-O molds has a hairline fracture which is causing honey cake batter to drip out ever so slowly and form smaller-than-a-dime sized burning droplets on the bottom of the oven.
This is not good.
Re-take out re-washed loaf pan that a minute ago was looking insufficient but now is the answer to all my hopes and dreams.
Honey cake has already started to bake around the edges of the fractured Jell-O pan however I believe it is too risky to leave cake in there and wrapping it in tin foil I think will even form a greater mess.
Re-pour batter into loaf pan.
Now have one honey cake baking in Jell-O pan and one in loaf pan.
House smells divine, take cakes out of oven, leave them to cool.
Take sharp knife around edges of Jell-O pan to loosen cake, flip on to plate and -
Honey cake completely disintegrates. Part sticks to pan. Part crumbles. Part falls onto plate.
It looks like it has been baked by a swarm of bees with too much time on their hands and absolutely no expertise in the kitchen.

What Happens Next
I take a pic of the sad, broken honey cake and post it online. I wrap the good honey cake and put in freezer.
I re-wash the pans.
14 year old daughter T is leaving to basketball tournament in the US and asks if she can pack the "cake" up for car snacks. Seems like a happy ending for this pile of crumbs. Sure.

And Also
A few days later I get a message from a Mom that I like but I don't know that well.
She says that she really appreciated me posting a pic of my pathetic cake. She says that they were having a rough holiday season over at hers, and when she saw my cake falling apart she felt a little less alone. She felt like she could get through the holidays without everything being so picture perfect. She said my poor little disintegrated honey cake gave her hope.

What Went Through My Mind

1. I feel like holiday happiness is a lot of pressure to put on one little honey cake so I'm glad mine came through
2. I thought it was interesting and brave of this Mom to reach out to me and thank me for being a failure in the kitchen being honest about how the, er, cake was crumbling over here
3. All she saw was the finished, messy product, she didn't know (until now, if she's reading this) that it had actually been a more complex and difficult process involving fractured pans, a broken dishwasher and the smell of burning honey coming from my oven. 
4. So, it was even worse than I had let on, and the disintegrated finished honey cake was actually the least of it.
5. Which is something I think we should all keep in mind when watching each other's social media. Sure, it's true, but there may be more to the story.
6. And also when someone does something that helps or inspires you, reach out to them. It makes everyone's New Year a little sweeter

Best wishes to you and your families from me and mine.

Timing Part Two

Amy we could have used you this weekend. You gotta hear what happened.

We were at a five star hotel, you know, known for its white glove service.

There for a conference. Very hectic, morning till night, no time to breathe.

Come back to the room during a break and there are five guys in our room. Standing in the shower.

(Let me pause here and give you a chance to do what you will with that visual)

And there's sewage backing up, into the shower, and the guys with white gloves are trying to clean it up.

(Ew. and Oh.)

Smell in the room was kinda moldy, not as bad as you would think, so we just stayed there for the rest of the conference figuring something would automatically be taken off our bill.

It was not.

We paid the bill, but it's been bugging us ever since. This is a top, top, top tier hotel. How could they leave us to deal with a sewage back up and not offering any compensation.

They didn't offer anything? At all?

Well, they offered us to pack up all our stuff and move us to another room. But I didn't want those guys pawing through my delicates. 

(I hear you. Especially after they were pawing through less-than-delicates in the shower.)

Is it too late to do anything about this?

It's not too late at all. You can absolutely send an email explaining what happened and enclose a copy of your bill.

What Should Email Say:

1. I would start off by saying that you are loyal customers of this upscale hotel chain and that you always stay there when you can. You were thrilled to be able to benefit from their service when you agreed to attend this conference.

2. The conference was jam packed and there  was barely any time to breathe. One afternoon you ran up to your room to change and to your shock and surprise there were five guys in your shower fighting with raw sewage.

3. They offered to pack you up and move you but you had no time to think or consider this offer because you had to be back downstairs in fifteen minutes.

4. Also because no one had called/texted/alerted you in any way about the sewage issue, you were very much caught off guard and could not make a snap decision regarding your belongings.

5. In retrospect, you very much wish you had taken them up on their offer because your last night (or two) in the hotel were frankly a little gross.

6. Therefore, you are enclosing your hotel bill and you would like the last night or two taken off as if you would have had a chance to change rooms.

Comparison To Previous Example

• Both are first class and therefore you expect a high level of service from both.
• Composed salad didn't attempt to mitigate damage. White glove shower did, but you said no.
• In both cases you were disappointed with the service, you didn't react at the time, you have some remorse and you would like to know if it's too late to complain effectively

Bottom line
Hotels are more expensive than composed salad (in most cases) and therefore it is understandable that you would feel regretful weeks after the fact. Also sewage is more egregious than grapefruit (in most cases) so the margin for compromise is narrower.

 

Timing Part One

Out for white linen napkin dinner with one of my Fave people.

Fave wants the composed salad but one of the items in the composition is grapefruit. (She has an aversion to grapefruit and a general dislike for all things citrus.)

Fave asks waiter if can substitute something else for the grapefruit.

Waiter says No.

Fave asks waiter if can remove grapefruit from the plate so doesn't have to deal with leaky citrus juices, also smell turns her off and does not want to have to look at pink fleshy fruit.

Waiter says No.

(Hmmmm. I'm wondering if we were Wall Street Men or Expense Account Men, or anything else man-oriented, we might receive a different response.)

Fave shrugs and orders composed salad anyway. I ask if she wants me to get involved. She says no.

As evening wears on, can't help but notice people on my left and on my right eating things that were not on the menu. Also can't help but notice the wide variety of fruits and vegetables in dishes all over the restaurant so why was Waiter so committed to grapefruit. It seems like he could have asked the kitchen to cut a tomato in four considering dinner is costing more than my first car.

Rest of dinner is delightful and as far as I know, grapefruit incident is forgotten.

Except.

About six weeks later, I'm out with Fave and she tells me that she is still thinking about the grapefruit and why it had to appear on her plate. There were all kinds of vegetables on the menu, why couldn't the Waiter ask the kitchen to cut a tomato in four instead especially since dinner cost more than her first apartment.

Is it too late to do anything about it? She asks.

Issues to Consider:
1. On the one hand it's never too late to complain effectively, on the other hand it is kind of too late to complain about a salad that you ordered six weeks earlier.

2. If this is really bothering you, and you still have your receipt, you can write to the restaurant saying  that this has been on your mind for a while, and that you know you should have spoken up at the time, but you were shy/embarrassed/unclear on what to say, and now you would like to have the salad taken off your bill. I think it's a long shot, but I guess you won't know unless you try.

3. If you go back to the restaurant, you can raise your concern at the beginning of the meal with something like: Hey, the other day when I was here, we ordered the blah blah salad and I wanted it without grapefruit. Can you do that for me this time?

4. If you go back to the restaurant and it's very obvious who the manager is, you can say something to her/him like: Thank you so much the service was fantastic this time. I thought you might want to know that last time we were here, we wanted our composed salad no grapefruit and the Waiter gave us a really hard time. It was so unlike the service we normally receive here. (Although this will not change the outcome for you or your composed, it may bring this matter to the manager's attention for the future.)

Listen to me. 
This is why you need to speak up and ask for a correction when something happens. Because if you don't, the incident can grow and grow in your mind until quartered grapefruit turns into a metaphor for your nasty third grade gym teacher and/or your smelly first boss or anything that has ever gone wrong in your life. Speaking up might work, it might not work but at least you will have tried your best and you can move on.

Also.
This issue is covered in extensive detail in Chapter 8 of my new book: "How to Report a Rhyming Physician or Other Health-Care Professional: Consider Your Timing". (Spoiler alert: the rhyming physician does not order grapefruit.)