Authors
Volunteering
Volunteering is a great way to give back to the community and get a bit of experience. I am currently volunteering with Habitat for Humanity at their donation store. The store sells everything from furniture, cabinets, to sinks. It’s a good experience even if lifting heavy objects can get tiresome after a few hours. The people at the store are really Friendly and joking around with the other volunteers during the few moments the staff doesn’t have some task for you makes it fun.
My Experience leaving Kingston
Leaving Kingston at 9:13am, I was expecting to be in Toronto by noon. Sadly, that’s not the way it worked out. Let me lay down the timeline.
7:50am – Woke up on time, so far so good. Already packed even!
8:15am – Called Modern Taxi to request transport to Via Rail train station.
8:30am – Called Modern Taxi again about taxi.
8:40am – Realized mobile was out of credit (this comes into play again later)
8:50am – Modern Taxi shows up! Back on schedule, woot.
9:03am – Arrive Via Rail station, check baggage and wait for train. Train is 15 minutes late, so check email from station.
9:30am – Train arrives, board as normal. Still confident about schedule! Though peeved that train wi-fi is iffy today, confident this won’t hurt day.
~10:40am – Big bump. Wi-fi dies totally.
~10:50am – Train slows, then stops. Odd, but being a railroaders daughter, I don’t question it. A stopped train is better than a train moving when it shouldn’t. 
~11:00am – Via Rep announces that a CAR hit our TRAIN. Will be detained indefinitely.
11:47am – Arr Bellville, ON, approximately 2 hours from Toronto. Train was meant to be in Toronto at this time.
12:30pm – Via Rep announces OPP are speaking to engineers and will be detained at least another half hour, possibly more.
12:45pm – Train cleared by OPP and allowed to continue. Approximate arrival time in Toronto, 2pm. (How the math worked out on this I’m not sure, but
During the time we were stopped in Bellville, the Via personnel on the train were very polite – one even stopped to explain to me where Bellville was in relation to Toronto after hearing I wasn’t from Ontario! Beverage and snack service continued during stop time, and free snacks were handed out.
Very luckily, the woman in the car that hit the train was shaken up but not hurt. From what I saw, Via Rail acted very responsibly in their reaction to this situation, and as per their policy, offered a 50% discount off your next fare with your receipt. This doesn’t help me in the slightest as an American citizen visiting Ontario, but I appreciate it nonetheless. I was told by a member of staff I can request a refund for my wi-fi purchase since it was down, which is a plus in my book.
All in all, when this situation started to unfold, I was prepared to write a scathing criticism of Via Rail, as I was certain they’d find a way to cock up the situation the way amtrak so frequently does. However, I have nothing but good things to say about the company and their staff and will continue to travel Via Rail on future trips to the “Great White North” and will recommend it to friends as well.
NOTE – I had a flight out of Toronto at 2pm. Managed to talk US Airways into changing it to Wednesday, January 21st at no charge to me, which goes to show that american airline companies aren’t all bad! Would still prefer to fly Air Canada, but eh, maybe next time. 
Cheers to my brilliant friend that booked me a hotel room for the night on Priceline.com for $50, you’re fabulous!
Christmas Clothing
With the holidays now coming to a close, I’m sure many of you are cleaning out your closets to make room for the snazy (or fugly as it often is) new clothing that friends and family bought you this year. I know myself I got a pretty good selection this year…and a bunch of socks. I think I’ve been wearing this hoodie the most lately, love the style of it.
But like every year, you know there are some cool things you see that you just don’t get. For instance, lets start with these Freehands gloves. What makes these different from other gloves on the market is that both the pointer and thumb part of the gloves can be easily folded down. This is a great idea allowing those that need to use their fingers for things like texting and typing while outside this winter. No more need to take off the gloves (or type with your nose!). I’ll be getting a pair of these myself, they look fantastic. How about you?
But now with warm hands you need a warm head. How about throwing some top secret tunes in there as well with the Headphone beanie from ThinkGeek. What’s cooler than being able to listen to music at work? Tricking people into thinking you can hear them of course.
And last, but surely not least, you have your jacket. I’d suggest a jacket from Ardica [Via Gizmodo]. Not only do they come with built in heaters, but they can also charge your electronics while you wear it. What better way to stay warm while waiting outside the movie theater for the next superhero film right?
So that’s my quick winter recap. So what did you guys get for Christmas this year? Let me know in the comments below.
Problogger: The Book (Review)
Recently while browsing my local Chapters book store I came across a small soft cover book, among all the ‘big bad books’ on programming, with a strangely familiar name:”ProBlogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income
For those of you who are unaware, Problogger is one of the leading (if not the leading) blogs about blogging tips. The site is maintained by Darren Rowse, who is likely one of the best educated people on what needs to be done to get a blog off the ground and keep it there. With he updates daily, you can bet I’ve been a subscriber to his RSS for some time.
In this book, Darren (and co-writer Chris Garrett) go through the process of explaining how to set up a blog and make it work. They do a great job of setting forth introductory steps of choosing a topic (Niche), available platforms and how to write to your audience. Some of the more in depth topics that they go into are different kinds of advertising, networking and community building.
Though short (210 pages I believe) they pack it full of tons of information in an easy to read tone. I throughly enjoyed it and recommend it anybody looking to start out blogging, or even those just looking to do it better.
ATT/Dish Network Sucks
I’ve never had sattelite TV, ever, and I hate landline phone. That said, I tried so hard not to hate this. But I can’t get cable where I am, and that sucks. But, you live with it. After receiving a $1030 bill from ATT Wireless for 7.5 GB of internet usage, I didn’t think my week could get any worse.
Then ATT struck again.
First, my home phone stopped working… and hasn’t started working yet, for three days. Now, my dish is all pixely and sucky. And me without any Family Guy DVDs to keep me company, what’s a girl to do? Call ATT and bitch? Yes. Cancel Dish Network immediately? Yes. Order DirecTV in the morning? Yes and Yes.
Yay for fucking everything up before I leave!
As a side note, I promise all of the IR Blogging reader(s) (Hi Del) to prod Eggo with a cooking spoon until he writes blogs while I’m there earning my money err.. distracting him while I steal his Rock Band cooking and cleaning for him.
What’s your best customer service story?
Everybody has their ups and downs with customer service, usually down. But how about those times where you get off the phone and think “Wow, that rep was freaking awesome”. Given that I work in a call center, I usually try to leave the customers thinking that as much as possible. But when the shoe is on the other foot, it rarely happens. What is the best customer service that you’ve received? Here’s my latest.
On my way home from work, I had to catch a cab so went to the bank to get some money from the ATM so I can pay him: It was rejected because “Couldn’t process. Contact Service”. Twice. Turns out I had just enough on me to pay the taxi fare ($0.26 cent tip!). Then it was rejected at Wendy’s. When I came home, I decided to give them a call and find out what was going on with my card.
I called up my bank, expecting to have to go through a million automated messages and never get to anybody to help me out. I put in my card number, it told me it couldn’t be processed and the next thing I knew Michelle was on the line. Michelle was awesome. It was 9pm and she sounded like she had just woken up. I asked her what’s going on, and she said my card was put into ‘deposit only’ because fraud thinks that one of the places I used it at might have duplicated it. It’s not likely, but whatever. I just have to go into a bank and change my PIN on Wed (my next day off). That whole conversation took 5 minutes, tops.
She then asked me if I had the funds to last me until Wednesday, I said I’d just use my VISA the next two days if needed, I should have enough change kicking around for coffee. We then talked about coffee and debating the whole ‘quantity VS quality’ between Tim Hortons and Starbucks. Needless to say, on Wednesday I guess I have to go buy a “signature hazelnut hot chocolate with a double shot of espresso”. I never was very good at debating with females. But it was a great conversation, and is awesome to see a place with real people on the other end of the line. TD, you’re cool. Michelle, you’re fantastic, thanks for the chat.
Post your best customer service story below, the one I think is the best will win $1 via paypal in 2 weeks from today. Cheers!
Vampire Game
Vampire game
One of the only shojou manga I have ever read. Started reading not knowing it was shojou since I tend to keep away from them as they are targeted towards a female audience. Since it is a story mainly targeted at females, it has some story elements that I didn’t really like sometimes even though the overall story was really good.
Vampire Game is about the reincarnation of Vampire king, Duzell, who died 100 years ago in a fight with King Phelios who defeated him using a powerful spell that sacrifices the caster. Duzell vows to reincarnate after 100 years to get revenge and destroy the reincarnation of Phelios. Fast forward to the present: The descendants of King Phelios are all fighting for the throne, like you’d expect from any royal family. Princess Ishtar, the main character of the story, is 15 years old and currently first in line to the throne. She is a willful and troublesome princess, always causing trouble for her head bodyguard Darres. She escapes the palace one day as usual causing trouble only to happen upon the reincarnated Vampire King Duzell, who is in the body of a cat. She adopts the cat and promises to help him find the reincarnation of her ancestor Phelios so he can kill him. Through out the 15 volumes they set out to find who in the royal family is the reincarnation of King Phelios; all the while trying to stay ahead of power hungry royals aiming for the throne and Ishtar’s head. Full of political intrigue, Vampire game is a an excellent manga with lots of twits and turns to keep any reader entertained till the very end.
Seto no Hanayome
Seto no Hanayome – The Inland Sea Bride
Nagasumi Michishio, a young middle school student on a trip to visit his grandmother at the beach with his family, is drowning only to be saved by a mermaid. As if almost drowning wasn’t enough of a hassle, according to mermaid law if a person sees mermaids true for they must both be executed. Luckily for Nagasumi the mermaid who saved him, Sun Seto, has decided that in order to save both of them she wants to marry him. Sun’s father, the leader of a merman fish gang, is overly protective of his only daughter and He is constantly trying to kill Nagasumi so that he can “protect” his daughter.
Seto no Hanayome is a pretty good shounen Manga with a good mix of comedy and ecchi material to keep readers happy. There is even a pretty good anime adaption of the Manga that started in April of 2007. Seto no Hanayome is a good Manga that has a solid plot with great art.
Come along, you belong!
Feel the fizz, of Coo Coo cola.
It’s the cola for makin’ you proud
Take another sip and be one of the crowd
You belong with Coo Coo Cola.
Now for those of you NOT totally cool, that is one of the songs from one of the coolest shows EVER Chip n Dale: Rescue Rangers. To be more precise, this is from from The Case of The Cola Cult (Part 1, Part 2) which is one of the best episodes ever.
Because of that, I decided to use the song as my ring tone. Bet nobody else will have that one on their phone. Unless of course you click the big picture at the bottom of the post, which is totally cool too.
And don’t forgot to buy it on DVD. Or Just Buy it for me!
Come along
You belong
Feel the fizz of Coo Coo Cola
Get to the store and take all you can carry
We got the flavors- orange, grape and cherry
Feel the fizz of Coo Coo Cola
Come along
You belong
Feel the fizz of Coo Coo Cola
It’s bottled in Pensacola
Come along with Coo Coo Cola
You belong with Coo Coo Cola
