WE NEED UTILITY REGULATION NOW

Many of  may have missed the huge emergency in northern New Mexico. Some of you don't even believe we are a state. And during the huge storm that brought record low temps (-34F at my house) even the Weather Channel said it covered from Texas to Maine.

We were all huddled down in our homes and getting our news from each other via Internet, Facebook, and telephone. We are an area that has only weekly papers and spotty coverage on radio. Our television is from some other place. But news quickly spread when the natural gas began to run out beginning in Albuquerque and spreading north up the Rio Grande valley to the Colorado border.

First the media lied when they shut down schools. It was because of road conditions. Then various agencies began to make calls quietly offering vouchers to people that might be suffering from the lack of heat. Taos got hit particularly bad because they depend on natural gas and have all the stores we all use. After being house bound for a couple of days everyone hopped over the mountain to shop. Smith's pipes were frozen, and the gas was out everywhere. The electrical coop was in a state of emergency planning for a sudden surge of electrical use do to dependence upon electric space heaters. They quickly sent around e-mails and had mayors in the area post on the internet rules for conservation of energy. They included staying off the internet. This rather reminded me of the Egyptian crisis.

How do you run out of natural gas? Especially in New Mexico where there are huge deposits of it. The explanation was that Texas had shut down the compressors to the gas pipelines to the gas utilities in New Mexico because of rolling electric black outs in Texas due to the cold. Why was this reminding me of the Enron scandal in the early days of GW's presidency? Enron, a Texas based firm, pretended a shortage of electrical power in California and created black outs to enable a raising of the rates. But surely this gas crisis was just a lack of planning and consideration in the wake of a huge unexpected storm?

Evidently not. I was wondering why conservation of electrical usage would necessitate the shutting down of compressors. Surely they could be isolated from the blackouts and kept up and running? And evidently they were. The gas company just chose to send New Mexico's gas to Oklahoma. Why should that have even been their choice?

Some of our residents are beginning to get gas back. Natural gas is being obtained from other pipelines. Residential lines have to be re-pressurized and checked and relit. It is a slow process and natural gas companies from the surrounding area are sending in technicians to help in the laborious process. No doubt this will mean rates get raised. Businesses in Taos and Red River have been shut down since last week and may not have heat until Monday or Tuesday when a new Arctic cold front is coming our way. We are still in a state of emergency especially if this can be pulled on us anytime a corporation decides they want to to increase their profits.

There needs to be a congressional investigation of this and it needs to be now. And I have to ask why wasn't deregulation of public utilities stopped after the Enron scandal? Clearly we cannot depend upon people with a profit motive to act responsibly.

End of our side versus your side?

I "watched" the President's State of the Union Address this year with friends on Facebook.

I don't watch what passes for television these days but instead get my media fix via the internet. A Facebook friend had posted a link to the yearly address and I opened it in another browser window on my computer monitor. This allowed me to see and hear the speech while commenting to my Facebook friends about salient points. Let me say that I do believe HOPE is a strategy FOX.

In these iffy times in world history we need hope and not doomsayers or sowers of negativity and venom. We need our lawmakers to make good use of their time in office and by that I don't mean in planning for their next run for office but to insure the well being of the nation and its citizens. We need you to put aside the rhetoric and work together. My friends and I discussed the points of the speech openly on Facebook even though we clearly had different stands on some of the initiatives highlighted. During the Bush years I became a closet Democrat for fear of being burned at the stake. That wasn't good for me or the country.

One of the best things about the President's State of the Union, was for me not the speech. It was the bipartisan seating arrangement. There are reasons that college stadiums put the home team fans on one side and the visitors on the other and it isn't the spirit of cooperation. It is to foster an adversarial atmosphere. And the Republicans on one side of the House and the Democrats on the other (a few scattered independents down the center) only made the US vs THEM atmosphere in American politics worse. It even allowed one Republican  in Obama's first State of the Union to feel supported enough to Boo. OMG was that embarrassing.

So while FOX is calling this a ploy or trick I am calling it a first step not unlike our first step by man for mankind on the moon.

Hatched last week by Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., the idea caught fire over the weekend after a poll showed a big majority of the public wanting lawmakers of both parties to sit together at the presidential address. A spirited round of private phone calls and e-mails among lawmakers followed, and by Monday at least five dozen House members and senators had announced they had bipartisan dates for the big dance.

Bravo! Let's make America work again.

The Rest of the Story

When last I posted I was fighting with HP about a computer that did not work and a customer service department that was from HELL.

I finally received a replacement computer that did boot up and seems to be working. I have not blogged about that success because every time I turn it on I hold my breath. My faith in computers was dashed by the whole experience.

Windows 7 is not as "all inclusive" as Microsoft will have you believe and I still have one HP printer (my favorite) that even with new driver downloads I cannot get recognized. And I fear my monitor is going out. I stayed with the old one so I could get more bang for my buck with the tower. Found a great (not HP) one on sale recently and it is arriving this week. I have not cheered about that because I have lost faith in new products working.

That whole experience with HP Tech support and customer service left such an awful taste in my mouth I don't know if I ever want to call them again.  But in chatting with friends recently I have found that nobody seems happy with product support provided by any major company. I have a few tips following my horrendous 10 day experience:

1) Move all tech support back to United States. English is a complicated language and non-native speakers seldom get it correct enough for highly technical conversations. Or all the cuss phrases a frustrated customer will use. And Asian accents are very difficult for English speakers.

2) Trash all the canned phrases and script! This did not work for Ma Bell before we broke up the telephone monopoly. It just made everyone angry enough to want to break them up. That isn't working very well for us right now. Definitely by the second call a customer ought to be bumped to someone that has the permission of the company to actually dialog - i.e. compose their own responses.

3) Which leads me to the world escalate: ditch it. Yes, I know it is a well used phrase in tech support communities these days but it is also used in wars. So keep that in house because with customers it creates a hostile environment. Tell the customer you are elevating their complaint to the next level. And have it truly be the next level up; not merely the customer support person in the next cubicle. "Hey, Mac, get a load of this broad."

4) Don't put all of us in the same box. One of the reasons I so hate tech centers is I obviously have to begin at the dumb blond lady level. I have been an electrician, I worked with computers when they had only 17K, I know every possible version of re-set on any electronic device I own (though to be honest I still have not been able to setup streaming Netflix through my Samsung Blu Ray/DVD player - who writes these manuals?). By the time I pick up the phone to call the 800 number I know the computer, television, modem, vacuum cleaner, lawn mower, etc. is broken. I want permission to send it back. And not for repair but replacement.

5) Don't put us on hold. Every customer service division supposedly records this call for training, and keeps electronic files on our previous complaints (problems with your product). Get my telephone number, read the file, listen to the tapes, and then call me back with the answer! This is the era of no land lines or minimal land line service. Every single telephone call I made to HP cost me 3 cents a minute. And when the average length of a call is from 20 minutes to 150 I am not doing that on my cell phone with dropped calls and dying batteries. And verifying I am the same customer that called before and that the complaint has not changed routinely takes 2 to 4 minutes of every call.

6) Make it MARCH. Time is money for both of us. And continually hitting F11, F9, F8 while waiting for something different to happen on the screen is not marching. It is giving me carpal tunnel syndrome.

7) Apologize earlier and mean it. When I finally got an e-mail apology from HP I was already to I am never buying another one of your products level. It will, research shows, take me nine years to forget this experience. If I replace a computer on the average of once every three years you have lost out on a minimum of two other sales to me. And then there is the screen I just bought from Amazon, and the replacement printer I am looking to Epsom for.

In closing let me just voice a growing nagging concern  about the quality of the products being manufactured over seas by supposedly American companies.  My mother owned a Whirlpool washer that Dad gave away to a neighbor when it was 20. It still worked. My first cloned PC, with parts made in silicon valley, lasted almost ten years and the laser printer I gave to my ex-husband was still working at 20 years old.

Four years ago I replaced all my twenty year old baseboard electric heaters in my house because, while they still worked, they looked rather banged up. Two of those have already failed. My last Dell computer needed a new mother board at less than a year and I replaced the tower when it was 2. The first monitor with my last HP Pavilion burned out the day after the warranty.

I gave up buying electric drip coffee makers after going through 4 in 6 months. And a few years ago I returned three TV's within the 90 day warranty period because they failed. Does anyone else feel we are doing something very wrong here?

Thank You, HP, for Totally Ruining My Month

It was this or a rendering of the Spanish Inquisition. HP has be raped and strapped to the rack and is holding me hostage. I either have to wait for them to deliver the replacement for their faulty desktop or wait for them to give me a refund (5 to 10 days to process). The first way I don't get a computer before the 30th of December. And the latter way I don't get the money to buy a new computer before it is too late to get one before the end of the year from another computer company.

HP management is very fond of the word escalate, which too me brings to mind wars and hostility. And yes I am hostile now because I seem to be the only one escalating. They seem to move on at their funeral dirge pace. So I went to Wiktionary and looked up the word. Please note that definition one is my understanding.

to escalate (third-person singular simple present escalates, present participle escalating, simple past and past participle escalated) (transitive and intransitive)

1. to increase (something) in extent or intensity; to intensify or step up
   

   Violence escalated during the election.

   The shooting escalated the existing hostility.



2. in technical support, to transfer a telephone caller to the next higher level of authority
   

   The tech 1 escalated the caller to a tech 2

 HP has definitely escalated the hostility I feel for them at this point. They have been playing with my $800 without payment of interest. All other on line companies do not take the money from your account until they ship. So technically HP ought to have credited me the money back when I returned the non-working computer and then not taken it back out until they shipped the new (hopefully working) computer. But no. They gave me a $70 credit for my time fighting with their faulty computer this call but that does not get put into my account until 5 to 10 days after they ship my new computer (hopefully a working HP Pavilion).


Nothing seems to escalate the pace at which HP is handling their problem. And make no mistake it is their problem. They built and shipped a faulty computer. May I, HP Management, suggest another word - Expedite. Once you escalated my problem (which is fact your problem) you should have expedited my claim of faulty manufacturing and expedited the shipment of a replacement to me.

to expedite (third-person singular simple present expedites, present participle expediting, simple past and past participle expedited)

1. (transitive) To accelerate the progress of.
   

   He expedited the search by alphabetizing the papers.



2. (transitive) To perform (a task) fast and efficiently.

Your people do not perform fast and efficiently. I will be without a computer for 24 days longer than necessary. A company computer that should be updatng my website during the holiday season, that is needed for preparation of end of the year paperwork and tax documents, that should be available for photo editing to prepare submissions to spring and summer fairs (my bread and butter). But not only do I not have a working computer capable of such tasks but you won't ship it till the 28th of December.

In point of fact you are also making it impossible for me to get a refund and order another brand of computer in any faster time frame. You have ruined December and are well on your way to ruining half of the new year, because your build of a grossly inferior product has put me 30 days behind at the least.

Don't expect me to ever purchase another HP. You have escalated this issue to total hostilities as far as I am concerned.

PS - I used to work for corporate American and I know how the game is played. What I totally understand as a small business owner is that it is not a game from our point of view. And even if you think you have won all these little escalations you have ultimately lost the battle.

Why, HP, Must I Be Punished

I all fairness let me first say I am not really neutral on computers right not. I have been dealing for over a month with a three year old HP desktop computer that a local nerd, in the business to save computers, killed after losing 3 years of data.

Yes, I backed up, but to an external hard drive that failed. So I was forced to go shopping for a computer when I did not have the time nor the money. Nor quite frankly was I feeling warm and fuzzy about the boxes or the people that worked on them. But computer shopping I had to do. I am a small business and while I have a laptop for play I need the desktop for lots of year end business stuff and beginning of the new year submissions of art for fairs throughout 2011.

HP had a cyber Monday sale that extended through the following Tuesday and I found a computer, that while not the one of my dreams, met my minimum requirements, fit my budget and would be delivered within a week. The HP Pavilion arrived on December 6th and I unpacked and plugged it in. Suffice it to say I am not a novice at this, but the HP computer with Windows 7 would not boot up so I called tech support and was shocked to find that in spite of all promises to move their tech support back to the United States they are in Manila.

After 2 1/2 hours of trying to become belatedly bilingual I threw in the towel. The HP desktop would not even complete a short smart disk check and would not even begin a long one. I asked to speak to a supervisor. NOW. That took about 10 minutes of waiting. The supervisor, after getting my summation of the problem, wanted to refer the matter to a case manager (they are in the US) so they could get approval to repair my brand new, non-functioning HP computer.

Up to this point (well, accept for the NOW demand) I had been rather nice in spite of carpel tunnel from hitting F8, F9, F10, and F11 keys while rebooting. But repairing the HP Pavilion was not my problem. I bought and paid for a working computer not a repaired computer. They played broken record that they could not okay this. I played broken record that the only acceptable solution was a brand new working computer or a full and immediate refund. The Case Manager would call me back before 48 hours. I could only think of all the files that had to be rebuilt before the end of the year for my small business. Tick Tock.

Twenty-four hours, and two case report reference numbers, later I was called by a case manager. And like being in a doctor's office I had to again repeat all the symptoms of my still born HP Pavilion. I think they had the file in front of them and were looking for any discrepancies so they could negate my claim. Ok, I was getting paranoid. They did approve a new computer which they told me would be $35 more expensive. "Oh, no you don't," I said in a voice that made all the fur kids run and hide, "You eat that." We compromised on $5.35. Let them win the little issues.

I packed up the HP computer in its original box, printed out the approved pre-paid return label and dropped it off at the designated Fedex pick up spot. HP got it the next morning. Time was of the essence because I was informed they would not build my new replacement computer until the non-working HP was returned even though they have kept my money. I was pleased this morning to see they had processed my order. Build Date: December 28th! Maybe.

So I have two questions, HP. One, is why am I being punished for your errors on this Pavilion Desktop? And two, given that I would go pencil and paper before I went Dell, which computer company do I go to when I want to replace my HP Pavilion Laptop? Currently you are out of the running.

Customers used to be right. Now we have to prove we are not guilty and we are still punished via time and money for our mistakes. This mistake, HP, could cost me way through next June because of the fairs and exhibits I cannot apply for because through no fault of my own my old HP failed and my purchase new HP was trash. And your response to a small business owner that used your products has been hostile and frustrating.

More Evidence That I am Strange

WARNING: This blog is not politically correct. I will probably be accused of defaming a national holiday.

Mother used to stare at me from time to time and then pronounce that I was a strange child. Her early decision has been seconded by others. And today, on this eve of Thanksgiving, I am going to just supply more evidence that I am strange. In fact, I take a rather perverse pride in it.

Case in point: I am not fond of roasted turkey. Oh, I love the dressing - well, most dressings. Some families just have really strange tastes in dressings.  I don't like stuffed celery or jello salad and I get barfy just looking at candied sweet potatoes. Why would someone want to ruin a perfectly good food item that way? And I will eat only about an obligitory spoonful of the tradition French cut green beans with slice almonds and canned mushroom soup (see previous statement about ruining sweet potatoes).

I was an adult before, out of courtesy only, I would have a thin slice of pumpkin pie. Not my favorite. Mom always did two pies for this All American stuffout and I preferred the pecan. Really preferred the pecan. Mom made a superb pecan pie. I soon found out this is not true for all people that attempt this delicacy. For self-defense I have learned to cook a nut topped pumpkin tart (made from fresh pumpkin and not canned) to take to all invitations to Thanksgiving dinner.

All that said I love this holiday on one major level - all the men are out of the way in front of the bowl games, and all the women are in the kitchen cooking, sampling, and dishing the dirt. The TV is on loud enough they cannot hear the peals of laughter. If the men knew what we were up to (beyond cooking) they would never let us alone! Even clean up is fun. Men are back in front of the TV (awake or snoring) and us women are washing dishes while telling horridly funny tales of Thanksgivings past spiced with a few instant replays of the feast just over.

Tomorrow's Thankgiving is all women, and we are mostly thankful we have survived this year thus far. We have relationships that go back 20 years or more. I have known my sister all her life, and Dianne since 1972 and the incident of the burnt lentils. Not a single football game will be watched though Macy's Thanksgiving Parade will be on for the random tea break while cooking and catching up goes on in the kitchen.

I am not sure historically what the men did on that first pioneer thanksgiving. Probably pitched horseshoes in the barn, but I am willing to bet the women did about the same thing we will be doing minus the temperature controlled oven and the microwave. I am taking along all the fixings for that pumpkin tart I mentioned. And I have been assured the sweet potatoes will be baked as they should be.

May your Thanksgiving meal include all your favorites and that Aunt Alice leaves home the cool whip and jello fruit salad with the miniature marshmallows.

We Need Change

No this blog is not about you choice between Republican or Democratic candidates. This blog is about how we allow politicians to campaign. Three years ago I turned off television service in part due to political ads. Haven't missed it a minute. And more and people are disconnecting from their satellite and cable services for any number of reasons ergo politicians are looking for other ways to get your attention: calls on your cell phone so you have to pay for the minutes, calls on your land line if you still have one, fliers, junk mail, e-mail spamming, and billboards and yard signs.

The "off-year" elections have to be the absolute worse for yard signs and junk mail. I appreciate the political contribution of junk mail to my stack of paper for lighting fires since you vetoed my SS increase again this year and the local electrical coop is again raising my rates. Just a tip: I hardly ever bother to open it except to make it burn faster.

Every state has rules about the placement of yard signs but as far as I have noticed they are never followed. One of the rules in my state is they have to be taken down within 48 hours of the election. Like that ever happens. And they are suppose to have the property owner's permission. I know that doesn't happen. I say we just ban them. The candidates can spend their money on holding town meetings and explaining their views if they have any.

But I think it is past time to do away with the 2-year term for congress. I worked for a United States Senator and it is virtually impossible to get up to speed on all the issues within the first two years. What representatives do the minute they take office is begin running for the next term and collecting money to pay of the yard sign bill so they can start ordering more.

Let's change their term to 4 years and elect them on off years from the president. And limit their consecutive terms of office to just two for a total of eight years. If they want to hit the ground running their first term they should maintain 50% of the previous representative's staff for at least the first two years. Believe me it is the staff members that are up on all the procedures and legislation. The only thing the newly elected representative knows is how to get elected.

We are wasting entirely too much time and money on this election stuff and not spending enough of our resources or attention on solving the problems of this nation or world. And that, my friends, goes for both parties!

Oh, and voters - don't select who you vote for based on name recognition. Know their campaign promises. And if you don't know that candidate then don't cast a vote for or against. You can leave blanks on your ballot. Make an informed choice. Not a choice based on that yard sign