Keeping Track

When one's sleep schedule gets off-kilter, it's easy to mix one's up and down, one's days and nights, the order they come in and where exactly you are in the grand scheme of things.

This is not a good place to be in while looking for work.

So I've been kicking my ass back into some semblance of a normal sleep schedule, somewhat succeeding last night by getting to bed at six at night and waking up at four in the morning. Hmm. Well, perhaps normal for the extremely elderly. Perhaps I should get a Hoveround and start hanging out at my local buffet. In order to keep track of where I am and what I'm doing, I've been reduced to filling out a little form every day just to make sure I do everything I have to:

Date:
Wake-Up Time:
Exercise(s) Performed:
Food Consumed:
Jobs Applied for:
Time Spent Writing:
Went to Bed at:

I think that once I get into the habit of filling this out, it'll be a little easier for me to lead a life based on pattern, despite my unemployment.

It's funny how without going to school or having a job one ends up in this sort of free-fall, and it's so hard to get out of once you're there. I'd rather set myself aright again by going to school, then adding work to that, but alas, we can't always get what we want.

On the bright side, though, Glen Ivy again in a week or so. A post-birthday, post-wedding soak in a nice mineral bath followed by sun-warmed mud and exfoliation! Pure joy. Hell, that may be all I need to get back on the right track. It's odd, talking about myself this way. I don't normally discuss the mundane day-to-day doings of myself online. I don't think anyone cares. I don't even think anyone reads this blog, but it's good to get this stuff out from time to time.

And so we got married.

It was very lovely.

Photo by Andre Nguyen - takenbyandre.com

Where are my mugs?

Final (hopefully) Update: 9/17/09 - I got my replacement mugs today via UPS, and they were nice enough to send me eight mugs to replace my two missing ones, so I have a few extras now just in case. Thank you, DiscountMugs.com, for fixing my problem - I just hope that nobody else has to experience this in the future. I also hope your customer service personnel have learned a lesson in handling customers from this experience.

Original post:

I'm pretty frustrated at this point. I ordered 96 mugs from DiscountMugs.com as wedding favors. My initial shipment of 96 mugscame in two boxes. Problem was, though, that I only received 60 of my 96 mugs split between these two boxes. Two 12-packs in one box, 3 12-packs in another. I waited a few days, just in case more boxes were coming, before sending in a ticket to DiscountMugs.com's customer service department. Within 24 hours I received notice that they were rushing an order through for the remaining 36 mugs for me.

I finally received the rest of my mugs two weeks later. I set aside some time to go through all the boxes and checked for damaged mugs. Unfortunately, I had not taken the time to go through all the boxes from the initial shipment before I received the rest of the mugs. This was a problem, as I found a serious issue with one of the 12-packs in the initial shipment:





Two mugs were missing out of one of the cases from the initial shipment of mugs and had been replaced with packing material! In my mind, shorting me once could have been an honest mistake. But having done it twice? Not just in missing boxes sent to me, but by deliberately hiding that some mugs were missing? There was absolutely no mention of these missing mugs. No note in the package, nothing to indicate I was shorted two mugs.

Damage happens. I understand that! I wouldn't have minded receiving a few chipped mugs. I would have been okay with it if there was a note in the package saying "Oops, sorry, two of your mugs broke during packing!" I haven't even brought up the one chipped mug I have found in my messages to customer service. I don't really care about that. But outright not delivering the item I ordered? If you're not going to give the customer the product they ordered and paid for, you need to make it right by either giving them what they need or refunding them.

Adding fuel to the fire was this response I got from their customer service about my issue:

Comment By : Johanna
Bel, Incorporated
6905 N.W. 25 Street
Miami, Fl 33122
Discountmugs.com

Comment : Note that this was done in order to avoid that the glasses would shift during shipment and cause the entire case to broken.

Do you have any other issues with the order received or if it was received in good condition.

We apologize for the confusion.

No comment on the fact that had the two mugs that were supposed to be there been in that box, there would have been no need to fill it with packing material. No apology for the fact that I was shorted on my order. That's just terrible service.

I sent them a response to this ticket six days ago asking that I either receive my missing mugs or that I be allowed to speak with this rep's supervisor. I sent them another ticket today informing them if I don't receive my order in full, I will be issuing a chargeback.

I know it's just two mugs. If it had only been these two mugs and not the prior issue shorting me 36 mugs, I probably would have ignored it. But this is ridiculous. DiscountMugs.com, get your act together.

UPDATE:
I finally received a response to my customer service ticket today:

Comment By : Nimet
Bel, Incorporated
6905 N.W. 25 Street
Miami, Fl 33122
Discountmugs.com

Comment : I believe that it is more clear that what you have stated is that you are 'missing' 2 glasses..

We will replace the missing items immediately at no charge to you.

Note that there are no notes on the account stating that the order was shorted '2' items..

We are very sorry for the 'shortage'.

Sincerely

Cust Svc

Date : 09-06-2009 08:57am

Wow, nice of them to send me a response now that I'm threatening a chargeback. I like how they rub it in that it was 2 mugs, as if to say, "Well, it's only two mugs!" That's not the point. The point is that I was shorted product not once but twice. That's unacceptable if it happens once. Putting 'missing' and 'shortage' in quotes like that make it seem like they don't give a crap about the fact I was not given the product I paid for. Maybe they should have put 'Cust Svc' in quotes too, it's barely that.

Still, it's good that they say they will be sending me replacement mugs. I'm not going to count my chickens before they've hatched, though. I may still not get the mugs. I'm still pissed about the way my issue has been handled (or rather, not handled for so long).

A Musical Adventure. Act One, Scene One.

Si je t'aime, prends garde à toi!

Translation: If I fall in love with you, you best watch your ass.

I used to sing every day. I sang in choir in school at various levels, traveled to China to sing in a vocal jazz combo. Beyond hanging around with one of my friends who sang a bit of opera and trying out a few of her arias, I have never been an opera singer.

These days, I find myself not singing nearly as much as I would like that. I've decided that all that is going to change. I'm going to pick up singing again, and I'm going to do it by poking out into a realm of the voice that I have only ever feared and respected. I'm starting with watching a lot of videos of singers doing what they do best. It began with some Mozart, specifically Die Zauberflöte, as my first excursions into opera as a child under the influence of my mother's taste in music. Therein lay vocal acrobatics that I'm fairly certain I will never be able to perform:


I am not so crazy as to jump right in and tell the world how der hölle rache kocht in meinem herzen, but I do want to set for myself a goal that will push me a bit. I just want it to be, y'know. Doable.

And so, the Habanera! Properly, it is called "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle" or "Love is a rebellious bird". So, what makes a good Habanera good versus a bad one? I'm not a trained musician, and I don't have the experience an opera critic does. That being said, here is the one I consider to be the best of the bunch:



This is the yardstick by which I measure the other renditions of this aria. Maria Callas, called La Divina by her admirers, of which I am certainly one. She is so expressive - her breaths seem to be little exclamation points in her singing, she pulls out little nuances in the notes that just tug at your heart.

In my wildest dreams, I am half the singer she was. And so I begin to practice.