Time Warner Cable: You Call That PR?

Time Warner is having some negotiation issues with channel providers. It's not new; it happens because everyone wants more for less. This round of cooperation turned into much less and led to a few channel blackouts. Okay, we understand.

But then I got this email from Time Warner. See if you can spot the terrible copywriting that stinks of an angst-ridden, petulant tween blogger:

On July 9, 2012 Hearst Television chose to black out their signals from Time Warner Cable customers rather than continue negotiations, and despite their CEO saying just two weeks earlier that broadcaster blackouts are unfair to consumers.

...

Q: Why is this happening again? It seems like this happens all the time.
A: Unfortunately, these kinds of disputes have become more common over the past few years. Cable TV prices are rising and one cause is higher fees being demanded by greedy broadcasters – as their advertising dollars decline, they want cable customers to make up the difference. And if we don't agree to their outrageous demands, they take away their programming. We don't think it's fair for TV stations to hold programming hostage for our customers, and we are working hard to keep the programming on our lineup while also trying to hold down the cost of TV.

Q: Why shouldn't I just go ahead and switch to DirecTV/Dish/FIOS/AT&T now?
A: Switching makes no sense; most of these contract blackouts are over within a matter of days. But switching isn't really the answer — any provider you switch to may eventually face the same kind of blackout threats. In fact, the American Television Alliance reports that broadcasters have blacked out signals in nearly 100 different cities since January 2011, with customers of DirecTV, Dish Network, AT&T U-Verse, Verizon FIOS and other major cable companies suffering actual or threatened blackouts. We think blackouts are unfair to viewers, which is why we continue to negotiate hard on your behalf to try to keep prices down.

Q: Will you be crediting me for the channel(s) that go dark?
A: Remember that customers do not pay for channels on an individual basis — they pay for a package of channels plus the technology and service required to deliver those channels. So we do not typically offer a credit for channels that have been blacked out.

This is considered Public Relations? This isn't even high-school level persuasive writing. "Greedy broadcasters?" "Outrageous demands?" So, being the gadfly I am, I went to Time Warner Cable's website and submitted a query along those lines: Was it really a good idea to take a serious issue with many facets and turn it childish and churlish in an open letter to all of your customers?

I even received a timely response. Tell me if this sounds familiar (emphasis mine):

On July 9, 2012 Hearst Television, the owner of several stations in our Midwest Market and one station in Hawaii, chose to black out their signals from our customers rather than continue negotiations - despite their CEO saying just two weeks earlier that broadcasters? blackouts are unfair to consumers.

Time Warner Cable is always negotiating new contracts with TV stations and networks. We've reached hundreds of agreements with other broadcasters without public dispute, and what Hearst is demanding is out of line.

We think it's wrong to put viewers in the middle of business negotiations. We know our customers are tired of these public contract disputes-and so are we.

Unfortunately, instead of continuing negotiations Hearst TV has chosen to black out there signals from our customers. They are demanding a 250% fee increase for the exact same programming, most of which is available for free over the air or online. We don't think that's fair.

There is more, but I think a rehash with spelling errors is enough to get the point across.

Time Warner has its issues (with cable and internet and customer service), but I've never seen both an angry PR letter and a customer service response that was so obviously ignorant of the original communication. They literally responded to a concerned message about an unprofessional communication with another unprofessional communication. When I posed this question to their Facebook page, my post was quickly deleted.

I'm not interested in an apology or creating a mess for them when they're already dealing with one. More than anything, this is a teaching moment:

1. If you're sending out a mass email to your customers that deals with a topic you are no happy with, argue your point with the facts, not name-calling invective. You will appear the petty fool and nothing more; you've already lost.
2. If you are offering to receive emails from customers and respond to their concerns, read their emails. Respond appropriately. And check your grammar.

Giving Thanks ...for My Life

Back from a wonderful weekend visiting my family up in Cleveland, it's hard not to reflect on giving thanks, as my very life was in danger the whole time.

After almost 500 miles of highway traveling, my wife, daughter, dog, and I got back to Cincinnati safe and sound. I ventured out to Kroger to pick up an easy dinner of pizza rolls and some staples for the house. During a slow turn after a stop, my left front wheel decided to detach from the steering mechanism and point in a direction contrary to my right front tire; I'd lost a tie rod.

Within minutes, seven guys were out of their cars pushing me to the sidewalk (literally linebacker-ing the dead weight - thank goodness it was raining and slick). I called AAA and all was well. But if that had happened at ANY point over the previous 4 days, specifically the drive there and back, my family's life would've been in terrible danger.



Shout-out to Ceiling Cat. I owe you one.

Love. Every. Day.

Monday

Why love Monday? It's your reset button, your hit-the-ground-running, your New Years Day of the week. Mondays are when we get a chance to look at what we can do better from the previous week and make that a focus.

Many people look at Monday as a plague - "a case of the Mondays" - but this is the day that owns the rest of the week, the day to wake with Success! in your head, to put on the conductor's cap and drive that train. Because if you don't, you're nothing but a passenger.

Takeaway: Monday is your engine!


Tuesday

Why love Tuesday? I've found that most people poo-poo away Mondays, so Tuesday is the busiest day of the week. We're getting things done, helping clients, taking calls, making calls, building new business and existing relationships.

Beside that, it's the "release" day of the week: movies on DVD, video games, new CDs, and - for the most part - books. This Tuesday, make business happen and find something new to love.

Takeaway: Tuesday is your genesis!


Wednesday

Why love Wednesday? Most people call it "Hump Day" while they slog through the week, the mid-point of a dismal outlook. NO! Wednesday is the first sign the business week is soon coming to a close, that there is a limit to what can happen in a business week. Get moving!

Send out your reminders, contact your clients, make sure something is happening before Friday.

Plus: New comics are released.

Takeaway: Wednesday is your lifesource!


Thursday

Why love Thursday? Based on the past few days, Thursday should be relatively quiet, so catch up on some things. Make Thursday the day you knock out your absurd inbox or make a weekly trip to your local networking group or just put on the headphones, hit the driving music (me: techno), block out the distractions and get it done.

As you may have heard, the weekend's on its way.

Takeaway: Thursday is your catch-up!


Friday

Why love Friday? What's not to love about Friday? It's the last "work day" of the week!

Most people fluff off on a Friday even more than a Monday. For some it's even more stressful because you've got to find some closure to the week, need to get X number of things done before the weekend.

But it's Friday! Make sure you spend some moments in the morning planning your day. Get what you can done and be okay with putting off the rest to next week. Close the deals, pause the conversations.

Plus: New movies are released in theatres every Friday. Popcorn time!

Takeaway: Friday is your closure!


Saturday

Why love Saturday? If you're like me, Saturdays are sometimes work overflow. But whether you work for yourself or someone else, Saturdays NEED to be yours! Do what you must - absolutely must - and nothing more business-wise. Get out there and fix that thing with the door or put a nail in that creaky step and retire in the evening with friends or family (and if you have neither nearby, call me) because you've been knocking it down hard for the last few days and if you work hard the general wisdom is that you must play hard - or at least play somewhat.

Takeaway: Saturday is your leisure!


Sunday

Why love Sunday? Football!

Just kidding. Yes, there's football, but from a business perspective, Sunday is the recharge day, the visualization day. If you want to preempt your Monday, knock through some emails. Follow-up on the Saturday gutter-cleaning or basement-organizing you didn't quite finish.

But relax. Please. Relax. Play some video games, catch up on your DVR shows, rent a movie, but spend your best parts of this day the way you want to spend it: in quiet peace alone, with family or other loved ones. Decompress.

And as you end the day, prepare for tomorrow, even if it's just mentally saying to yourself "Success!" as you fall asleep. Because Monday's coming and Monday's exciting because Monday's your reset button, your hit-the-ground-running...

Takeaway: Sunday is your recharge!


Every Day

Why love Every Day?

Because you're here. You're alive. You're doing what you do and you're going to be better at it every single day you do it.

You're going to Love Every Day because if you don't, you will lose. You will fail, as a business and as a human being. Yes, you are allowed some bad days, some idontwannas, but your motivation is your own, your conductor-ship of the train or bus is yours to hold or drop.

Drive your bus. Conduct your train. Make it count in both business and in life. Work your ass off and spend serious time with those you care about. And don't - ever - forget yourself. Quiet- beer- video game- movie- meditation- time is probably the most important part of the equation.

So love yourself, love others, love what you do. In that order.

Love. Every day.

As my father coined: "Love is the bond."

Make it happen in your life. Make it happen for you. And never forget to love every day.

Kill the Idontwannas

You've been there before: getting out of bed, waking up, answering the phone, checking your voicemail because you didn't answer the phone, running your business, making that meeting that you can skip...

I don't wanna...

I've mentioned this before about your thoughts defining who and what you are. When you hear that coming from inside your head, you need to snuff it. You need to step up and do what you know you need to do.

The Idontwannas will break you, and spill poison into your business and your life.

So get up, get a move-on. Make action your success, make motivation your mission. Live like you know you need to, even if - some days - you don't want to.

And if you can change that switch, even if you have to flip it every day or even every few hours, do it.

Make your life as beautiful as you think it can be. You're driving the bus. You're the one in charge. So do it. As Captain Picard said: Make it so.

Cincinnati Bell - Family & Technology FAIL

My wife and I have a 14 year old daughter. With having a 14 year old daughter comes some of the complications implicit in raising a teenage girl. Namely: goofy boys. They're mind-boggled, silly, and still growing up. Yes, even I was one once.

And boys will be boys. Prank calls will be made. But there is a line. And this is where technology comes in and Cincinnati Bell falls flat on its face in the protection of families.

Origins

Since there have been phones there have been prank calls. I'd bet after the famous "Mr. Watson come here I want you," when Watson was settled back in the other room the second call was "Watson, is the refrigerator running?" (anachronism noted - I can't even do Prince Albert in the Can!). So on occasion, if we get a prank call with some boys goofing off, I don't pay much mind and just hang up.

But about 2 months ago, the calls - though still rare - started to become more malicious. They started edging towards the middle of the night. And knowing my daughter was not allowed to talk on the phone that late, became targeted at myself and my wife with specific reference towards our daughter. Last Saturday night / Sunday morning was the last straw. Someone called our home and when I told them our daughter could not speak, they proceeded to become - let's just say sexually explicit. It was not nice. And as the father of the 14 year old girl, I was not happy.

The Research

I called Cincinnati Bell on two different occasions because the simple fact is that despite the caller(s) using *67 to block their identity, there's a server somewhere with that phone number on it. And living in a small community with responsive parents, the easiest way to deal with the situation would be to get the phone number and have a parent-to-parent talk. Not happening.

Harassing phone calls are a crime as soon as they're made, so Cincinnati Bell's policy for harassing - and even life-threating - phone calls is as follows:

No prior harassing calls made can be tracked (read: looked up). Period. It is my responsibility to talk to the police and file an official police report. It is the police department's responsibility to contact Cincinnati Bell and request a tap on the phone. At that time, Cincinnati Bell will place a tap on my phone (read: press a button or click a checkbox) for 21 days. It is my responsibility, when the next harassing call comes through, to myself make a phone call to a special voicemail box to log the time of the call as well as keep a written record. At the end of that 21 days, they will remove the tap and forward the list of phone numbers to the investigating officer. And then it becomes a legal matter.

However, if the calls become more threatening or more graphic or more frequent, nothing still happens for those 3 weeks. If the pranking trolls don't call in those 3 weeks? Nothing. I'll have to wait for another harassing call, file another police report, rinse and repeat.


The Conclusion

This is both lazy and unacceptable on the part of Cincinnati Bell. It would be like if your house was robbed and you had the license plate of the getaway car and the police said "Here's our policy: I know you've been violated, so we're going to install a camera across the street. If they come back, leave us a voicemail so we can timecode the rough time of the crime, and after three weeks we'll take a look. If they don't come back in that window, nothing we can do. But we'll come back to put up that camera if they come back after that."

They have that number on file somewhere that can easily be referenced with knowing the time of the call(s). Once there is (reluctantly) police involvement, there should be no issue of digging backwards. Unfortunately for all of their customers, with Cincinnati Bell, an efficient method of family protection is not anywhere on their agenda.


So what are your thoughts? Should retrieval of a phone number be available to civilians? To police upon request? Is the 21-day tap reasonable? Is Cincinnati Bell protecting privacy or being lazy? What if it was your child?

Lots of issues here - can't wait to hear your thoughts!

Inspiration: The Day TV Died

Today my Sony 36" CRT, only 9 years old, bought the farm.

And at first I was sad. I was troubled.

But then I realized how much I would get done if that infernal box was not a part of my life.

At least for now (already looking at LCD HDTV).

But over the last few weeks, I've had some of the best conversations with my wife - some of the best in the 10 years we've known each other. And today there's no excuse to catch up on our DVR (just finished Flash Forward last night), but more of a direct excuse to head back out to the deck, to talk like real people and not like the TV-addled masses in this world.

Yes, we'll eventually pick up a new (non)tube, but for now, I'm thrilled. We'll eschew the tales of crime and fantasy and live in our own heads, on our own time.

So the TV died. Long live the TV! But not tonight. And maybe not for a week or two. Maybe it's time to live with quiet, live with just us.

I'm not saying "Kill your TV," but maybe a couple days out of the week it should just stay off. Turn your phone to vibrate. And talk to someone.

Candid: The Loki Keyboard that Bit Me

In Norse Mythology, Loki is the troublemaker, the gadfly, the instigator (in case you needed that reference).



And in day to day reality, I am a fallible tech geek. Some folks who blog - especially those that have a business - hold themselves at a must-be-godlike standard. I understand, however, that occasionally exposing my flaws makes me more human, and we can all do with a little more human in our day to day interactions. It doesn't happen often, so enjoy the story:

Ghost in the Machine

About a month ago, I noticed that I was having some keyboard issues on my workhorse laptop. Specifically, on occasion, when I was trying to do anything from advance between the regular cavalcade of almost a dozen working applications to simply keeping a cursor in a web form, it wasn't working. Things were popping up or shifting fields as though there was a sticking problem in either my ALT or CTRL or TAB keys - or all three.

I would do anything from reboot to pound on the ALT key to scream and invoke Thor to take down this Loki in the machine. (Hey, when you're hand-coding and can't get a "<" out to start an anchor tag, things get a little crazy in the room.) I once did a Trojan scour, found one and thought it was all good - for about 30 minutes. And sometimes it worked, sometimes it faded for a time, sometimes it sent me to the Xbox360 demo of Bayonetta to do some virtual killing of demons with gun-shoes.

Yes, this has been going on for a month. I'd done some rudimentary searches for MS bugs on Vista, but only came up with a few minor operational errors that appeared rare. Bad thing was, when I was hard-up for a solution, I couldn't do a decent search because my keyboard didn't work.

Threshold | Epiphany

And this morning it hit a threshold: waking after a restless night, not yet enough coffee in me, the bug came at me with the first touch of the keyboard. I could send an email with the mouse, but couldn't type the contents; the pressing of buttons resulted in the on/of switch that is CTRL+Space, which takes my English letter combinations and translates them into a selectable tooltip for Asian characters. Basically, I could get absolutely nothing done.

I got another cup of coffee, took a few deep breaths, and - suddenly - it struck me. Not any more monumental than any other epiphany as I was holding back hope for disappointment, but there it was:

Redemption

With my graphics background on a Quantel Paintbox (pen & board), I have much greater preference for a mouse over the horrible touchpad that is on most laptops. About 6 months ago, I clicked-out my first, wired mouse and switched to a wireless Microsoft one I had previously purchased for my wife. It was a simple setup of a USB plug-in to a wireless receiver to accept input from the mouse ...and paired keyboard.

So, what if...? I went to the storage closet about 20 feet behind my desk, opened it up, and found said keyboard - sitting underneath a box of paperwork. I moved the keyboard to a higher shelf with nothing on top of it.

Guess what? No boxy, no pressy, no Loki.

Without pressure on what I thought was a do-nothing keyboard, the problem stopped: I'd been fighting with a keyboard in the closet with a box on it that was resting on the TAB, SHIFT, CTRL, ALT, and Space keys.


So what's the lesson here? Humanity, by definition, is fallible. Tech-savvy people, by definition, are fallible. And no matter how perplexing and unresolvable the problem you face, you may be surprised by the simplicity of the solution. Just pick up the box that's weighing you down.

Inspiration: Try Something New!

I wasn't here Monday, so here's your weekly inspiration, completely planted into my head by my recent trip to Los Angeles!

Sometimes, working as most of us do on a day-to-day basis and getting so into what we're doing, we whittle ourselves down into our specialty, we unconsciously have installed blinders to everything except what we're doing right now. We get tunnel vision.

And anyone who's experienced that phenomenon knows the reality of monotony. And monotony is living in a rut. It is drab, slow, and joyless. And who wants to lose the joy in their work, in their life?

(Note: If you're not finding some joy in what you do every day, stop now. Walk out the door. Then DO SOMETHING ELSE!)

So there's the problem: drab, slow, joyless. How exactly do you get away from that? Easy! Do something new.

Now I'm not saying you need to take off to LA for 5 days or even one day, but that's why vacations are so important to the vacationer: you get a breath of fresh air, do something new or different and come back with fresh eyes, a reinvigorated spirit. (European employers genuinely trust the productivity increase which is why you'd start there with 4 to 6 weeks of paid vacation per year. Yum!)

So you don't have the vacation time. So what? You can still do something different! Go for a walk after dinner. Spend your lunch hour in the park. Try writing a short story. Get out that To Do list and actually DO something on it instead of whining about how old some of those goals are. And if you've got a little over a hundred bucks, nerves of steel, and a Saturday afternoon, go skydiving. Seriously. It will change your life.

But all of these suggestions are for one reason: expanding your horizons. By doing something new or different, by changing your patterns, you change the physical chemistry of your brain - you actually alter how it works. So when it is time to go back to the daily grind, you will see it differently, gain new perspective on the day-to-day.

And if not? At least you've got the next new thing to look forward to.

Make it a great weekend!

Demonstrable Generally Works Better

Sometimes I find myself just being me and think it's a good idea to lay it out to let my readers get a little insight into who I am.

It's 11:30pm. I'm watching "How the Universe Works" (Black Hole episode), beginning a book to bone up on my PHP ninja coding skills, and drinking a Miller Lite. (and pausing in the midst of it all to blog)

Is that too much? Or refreshing?

Cheers!

Eric's Mystery Music: 3/13/10

I've been scouting my music collection and realized you might enjoy some stuff you, perhaps, have never heard before. Here are 4 wonderful selections:

The Blow: Parentheses




Menomena: Muscle n Flo




Bon Iver: Flume




Rasputina: Transylvanian Concubine

Twitter Today! Dalai, Irish, Not English?

I'd love to say this week that there's a whole buzz over some Twitter news, but after filtering out the useless celeb noise (like Adam Lambert's musings on hottest 12 guys), I'm not left with much this week.

Excitingly and somehow not-so-celeb, the Dalai Lama has opened a Twitter account - and is apparently using it. Founder Evan Williams suggested it and it was laughed off, but the next day, Here's Dalai! You can follow him at the verified account of the Dalai Lama.


And I don't usually toss out my differing projects, but my wife and I have been very involved as of late in helping get the Irish Heritage Center of Greater Cincinnati up and running for their theater opening this weekend. If you've got a few minutes, take a look at the IHC website, follow them on Twitter, and even join the Facebook Group. Thanks!


And, finally, what language you tweeting?

According to Semiocast, which examined 2.8 million tweets over two days in February, 50% of all messages sent on Twitter are in English. Japanese, Portuguese, Malay, and Spanish follow English with 14%, 9%, 6%, and 4% of tweet share, respectively. Several other languages, including Arabic and Italian, make up the remaining 17% of non-English tweets.

Very interesting that Twitter is garnering an international following. I actually picked up on the Japanese aspect a month or two ago when looking for tweets having to do with Xbox 360 game Fallout 3 and was answered with almost solidly foreign language tweets. Which raises an interesting question: Related to video games, how do the percentages fall?


Yeah folks, sorry. That's all this week. If you're really hurting for celeb news on Twitter, feel free to comment. I might be persuaded to add a "Celeb box" to each weeks' Twitter blog post if I get some comments on the subject. Cheers!

Monday Inspiration: Digging Out

If you live in the Cincinnati area, you need no reminder that there is going to be between 6 and 8 inches of the white stuff out there later today. We've already earned about 5 in the southeast by 2:30.

Turns out I had to get out on the road for a necessary grocery stop a little while ago and as I was preparing to step outside to dig out the car and shovel the drive, I paused as I opened the door. "This is going to be misery," I thought. Another piece of my mind immediately followed it with "Why?" It occurred to me that this task (and the subsequent driving) was either going to suck or it was going to be enjoyable. And that both were possible.

Letting it suck was the easy choice. Simply let go of hope and allow physical discomfort bleed into your emotional state. Before you know it, you'll be a grump, loudly cursing every strain of your back, every heap of snow you push off the drive, every chill under your clothes. That doesn't sound fun at all.

I wasn't entirely certain how to make it enjoyable, so I started with my standby: At the risk of appearing mad to my neighbors, I put on the biggest grin I could muster. I smiled and shoveled. I thought about the mailman and what a relief it would be to him to tread on a cleared, salted walkway. I thought about my wife effortlessly making it from her car into the house. I thought about how my shoveling was giving the car time to heat and that my drive would be nice and toasty. My smile grew and by the end I was genuinely enjoying myself.

Two lessons here:

Whistle in the Dark
Your actions and attitude will directly translate into emotional state. If you approach a task already discouraged, how do you think it's going to go if you encounter even the least bit of resistance? Smile before a physical task. Mentally smile before a non-physical one. The alternative is not pretty and will drain you.

Little Now, Little Later
I went outside today knowing that maybe half of the snow had fallen. There would be more snow. There would be more work. But instead of allowing that to frustrate me, I took comfort in the fact that now I'm half done and later today or tomorrow I'll be shoveling another 4 or 5 inches while others are hefting 10 at a time.

So let me know: how do you mentally and physically approach challenges? What works for you?

It's going to be a great week!

Monday Inspiration: Order from Chaos

Dom Deluise as Captain Chaos in Cannonball Run

Order can beget contentment, happiness, and even motivation in the same way that chaos can make you want to cringe or even crawl up into a little ball and cry out for your mommy.

I have a confession to make: I am not the most orderly person in the world. And that's okay. I keep things in my own form of organization (I say that "I organize spatially" - my wife disagrees with that categorization). But in today's non-stop pace of information and business and managing work and family time, things fall through through the cracks. Those things accumulate. And then they become a project in themselves.

So today's message is a simple one: Clean your room! If it's your office space or your inbox (or inboxes), make sure that you have a place for everything - and put everything in its place.

"Woah, woah! But Eric," you quiver, "that'll take me a whole day - I'll lose a whole day of work!"

Relax! You've let it go this long; don't break yourself trying to get everything done at once. Break the Gestalt you see as potential clean into bite-sized pieces. Create a plan. Write it down somewhere. Stick to it. Heck, make it a 30 minute scheduled appointment in your day. Before you know it, you'll be on your way to more order in your life and your work.

And the best part of the whole thing? Each step, each piece of your ordering lifts a weight off your shoulders. You will feel lighter. You will feel freer. And that, in itself, can be a motivation, can be the wind of inspiration blowing at your back.

Challenge: Do something small today to bring more order to your life. File some papers, disentangle your computer cords, throw something away that needs to be tossed. Post in the comments what it was and how it made you feel.

For my part? I have 4 very active inboxes, all of which need a good cleaning. I will clear at least 2 of them at some time today and update this post at the end of the day and let you know how it went.

What will you do to to make your life more manageable today?


UPDATE: In the spirit of full disclosure, I have only cleared one of my inboxes to less than 5 emails. Hoping -- NO! I will complete the other 3 tomorrow.

No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try.

Holiday Inspiration

I don't mean to get all Bill Murray on you...



...but Christmas was a special time for me this year. Not because of any specific event, but because I got to spend a wonderful few days with an amazing family. And my favorite part was the ability I have to give to them and the ability I have to give to others.

Not everyone has that time. Not everyone has the family I (or you) may have.

But everyone has the chance to experience that spirit of giving.

It doesn't have to be Christmas or any other holiday. It doesn't have to be yesterday or tomorrow or any day but today. Give. Give your time. Give your wisdom. Give your heart. Help someone. Now.

"You can make them a sandwich and say 'By the way: HERE!' ...then the miracle can happen to you too!"

I guess I did just get all Bill Murray on you.

Give.

You'll be better for it. All of us will.

Inspired on Monday by the Little Things

Inspiration does not always have to evolve from a magnanimous event or insight. Sometimes it's the little things.

This morning, I went out to have a 1-on-1 coffee (more in tomorrow's post) with a networking friend and on the way back stopped for gas. While filling up, I checked my fluids and noted I needed to top off my oil and my engine coolant. I unscrewed my oil cap, set it on the air filter casing, dumped the quart of oil through the lovely, BP-provided paper funnel, and pulled it up to take it to the garbage. Another paper filter later, I'd topped the coolant and dropped the hood.

On the way home, the feeling of contentment that comes with keeping up on basic car maintenance dropped into the pit of my stomach as I realized that I was driving on the highway and could not remember screwing the cap back on the top of the engine block where I put the oil in. Bad. So bad. Did I lose the cap? Is is going to spurt out hot oil and catch on fire under the hood? Ooh, I don't want to be that guy on the side of the road, holding up traffic while my car is on fire and the local fire dept. comes to put it out - always just a little too late!

But I made it home and immediately popped the hood. Yes, the cap was gone, but nothing was burning. And then I looked around. The cap was wedged into the fan assembly and hadn't fallen out.

Yay!

Bonus? The rake handle I'd cursed myself for not tossing out weeks before was instrumental in dislodging the cap so I could put it back on.


...and that made my day. It was wonderful. It was partially my own fault that caused the minor drama, but success at the end of anything is still success.


Message: Accept the little victories. Say "Thank You." And have a great day.

Lacking for Inspiration

This morning, inspiration wasn't an inherent quality in my drive to write to you today; I had to search for it.

There weren't any specific quotes that stuck out for me, or perhaps today I could simply not remember them.

I went through my morning exercises in order to drive up some emotion on it, to have something bubble to the surface, but wasn't inspired by any of the ideas that passed through my calming mind.

I paged through some books about business and about spirituality and even about quotes. I googled inspiration (and even used Bing). But came up empty. Oh, there was plenty of material out there, anything I could simply masticate and spit out sickly sweet to the world about how to drive and move the world, but I was not particularly driven or moved by the words. And being true to myself in passing along information like this is truly important to me.

I don't just fish out some glurge from the swamps of the internets and hose it off and put it in a pretty box and say "here: use this."

And I'm still looking, though I'm not sure I'll find it today.

And that's reality. Unfortunately, today you get not direct inspiration but a realistic vision of life: sometimes, some days, inspiration is difficult to come by and it just won't stick. Sometimes in searching and trying so hard to light that fire, by the time you find it you're exhausted for trying. Sometimes you have to accept that today's not a driver, not blow-out, crazy, get everything done kind of day. And you have to be okay with that.

I guess in that comes another kind of inspiration: knowing tomorrow will be a better day.

A Sidenote: Facebook Rant

I like you Facebook. I really do. And I like you, people I friend; otherwise I wouldn't friend you. But as I douse all the pending requests today with Ignore juice, I feel a need to rant:

I don't want to be a farmer. Otherwise I'd move 10 miles east and buy a couple acres and some overalls and a straw hat and a combine. I do not need a cow or a pig or a banana tree (banana tree?). I certainly don't have time to pretend to be a farmer. Please stop the Farmville requests. It's bad enough I have to see your farm snapshots in my feed.

The Godfather trilogy and Goodfellas was good enough for me. Even if I had a time machine to go back in time to when the mafia was a hard core, in-control group of legend, depending on the exact date, I'd end up at Woodstock or a Bauhaus concert. I don't want to be a gangster. Or a gangsta. And I don't want to pretend that part of my lot on this Earth entails fighting mob bosses and offing the competition - or asking my friends to help me complete said tasks. Please stop with the Mafia Wars requests.

See above paragraph as to why I am not interested in being a Gangster Battle participant, which is apparently the redheaded step-cousin of Mafia Wars.

I don't want to fling food, I don't have time to find out what Disney Princess I am, and What Greek God I am equated with due to a fluff quiz put together to sell ad space is of NO interest to me.

I have no L'il Green Patch. No Flair.

Facebook is good and kind and I love it as both a way to keep in touch with others as well as keeping people - those who choose to be a fan - up to date with my business. And maybe it's my lack of free time that turns me against these Facebook flourishes, but the amount of time people spend on these diversions truly boggles my mind.

Get out! Use social media to socially network! Meet up with others, share experiences, network, or just hang out. Do it in person!

I know I'll continue to get them, and really I won't mind hitting that Ignore button once or twice a week. But dang. It would be nice to get a week or two off.

Monday's Inspiration: What You Use It For

A yellowed, frayed piece of paper has hung from our fridge for years. It is my wife's and she had it for years before she met me. She reads it every morning. Sometimes I forget it's there. Here it what it says:

This is the beginning of a new day. You have been given this day to use as you will. You can waste it or use it for good. What you do today is important because you are exchanging a day of your life for it. When tomorrow comes, this day will be gone forever; in its place is something that you have left behind. Let it be something good.

I can't say there's much disagreeing with that sentiment. We have to realize every day that that there is great work to be done in one way or another. And we have no room to complain if we have not done our absolute best. So today, just today, do that; be the best - in interpersonal interactions, in business, online. I think you'll find it's addictive.

Have a great day!

It's Twitter! Somebody Call 9-1-1!

Twitter is apparently back online after a Denial of Service attack earlier today disappeared it from the internets. However, on the best of days Twitter can have a tough time keeping up with traffic. With one hand fighting the continuing attack and the other trying to keep it online and millions of people more insistent than ever to get on and update and thousands who never would hearing about the DoS attack and pinging the address and a handful of malicious fools sitting all morning hitting F5 because they have some misplaced aggression targeted directly at Twitter users, I'm guessing it's going to be a while.

(Why Twitter? Is the Iranian government posturing for the aftermath of Ahmadinejad's swearing in?)

The interesting thing is how one link in the social media chain breaks and everything else falters a bit. Twitter is down so when I post this, I won't be able to tweet about it for a while and that reduces potential clients getting to my website. So I'll settle for posting it on my facebook account and EJM Designs Limited fanpage for now and might even resort to friendfeed, which I just posted on my friendfeed is "like reading when the electricity goes out."

But we'll carry on. We'll bring out the candles and cards and Trouble with its pop-o-matic bubble. And we'll wait and hope and flinch every time a car goes by because maybe, just maybe, the power is back.

Episode V: Facebook Strikes Back or "Yes, I'm Human"

It was a long day. I was clearing the plate before the sun went down and suddenly realized that I'd promised to set up a Facebook group for an organization of which I am a member. Not so difficult. But I'd done the basic account setup for clients so often, I guess I went into autopilot. And I opened a new account instead of starting a group. And after I set it up I changed the contact email to my main email - which happens to be the same email as my Facebook account. There is no check or verification for that circumstance.

I quickly realized what I did and - just as quickly - saw that my account, vanity URL and all, were gone. Disappeared.

I've been contacting Facebook help for 2 weeks now by various means. To no avail.

For a while I had hope: eric.marschall vanity URL is not available and the old EJM Designs Limited business page was still there. But it's been too long.

Oddly (or not so oddly because of the time I spend on the internet), I actually uncovered an older Facebook account that I'd opened a couple years ago and have fully converted it to my needs in the anticipation that Facebook will fail on this one, at least in time (which is now).

So you can find and connect to my new facebook page at www.facebook.com/eric.j.marschall. The new EJM Designs Limited Facebook page can be found at this place. Become a fan!

I'm posting all this information because I'm good at what I do, but I'm also human. I can goof. And I don't have other-worldly powers to fix those goofs. But I do admit it and I do fix them and I get the job done. It may take me a couple of days to get my profile up to par, but my dedication will get it done in just a couple days.

As always, I'd love comments, but especially on this post: join me on Facebook and become a fan of the EJM Designs Limited site. Have a great day!