Last week was a pretty good week.  My week started off with an email from a New York Times reporter wanted to interview regarding a post I wrote about Amazon’s frustration free packaging.  Once I picked myself up off the floor, I emailed him back and told him it was okay to call.  I had a great conversation with their technology reporter, and I went on my merry way.  Seriously, my  heart was beating about 400 miles an hour while this was going on.  I asked for him to let me know when it gets printed, and I thought that was the end of it.

On Thursday, I was super surprised to get a call from the New York Times again!  This time they wanted to send a photographer to my house to get pictures of me and my kids!  I ended up with 2 hours to get me and the kids ready and clean the house.  It went well, I think, and I hope to find out soon when the article will get printed.

I feel incredibly blessed right now even though my mom is teasing about when Oprah is going to be calling. 

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I really do like Entrecard.  I really do.  However, some of the missteps that have occurred over are just crazy.  One of the ongoing missteps is their moderators on their forums.  This was an issue a while back before.  New forums popped up due to the censorship that a lot of the members were feeling on the Entrecard forums.  Seriously, that was how bad it got.

Now, I thought that was over and done with.  We were told that wouldn’t happen anymore and blah blah blah.  Well, I learned firsthand myself how much crap that was (I’m a little irritated . . . can you tell?)  Now, I have moderated before (I was moderator at the Izea forums over a year, so I know what a pain it can be.  However, we were never ever ever allowed to delete anything unless it was spam.)  Now, the thread in question is this one: http://entrecard.com/forums/7/15804/#p=21.  Now, they posted a question and people started responding. I happened to be one of them. And my response got deleted since he (the moderator who started the question) didn’t like the answer. He also removed the reference to another forum called Firestorm.   I’m sorry, you can’t ask a question on a public forum and then start deleting the answers you don’t like. Sorry, that is crap. The part that I especially love is that other forums are listed there. His reasoning? Firestorm and Forum Finder (which is the one I listed) are too close to what Entrecard’s forum does (huh?).  I wouldn’t be half as ticked if he didn’t leave other forums up there that do the same darn thing.  I don’t understand the double standard.  I am not one to kiss ass which is probably why my comment is gone (I’ve left two more comments questioning why — we’ll see how long those last).

Now, I don’t own either forum that got taken off the list.  I get no benefit for writing this post, besides releasing some of my anger.  I just am sick and tired of Entrecard’s double standard when it comes to their forums.  Obviously, the only way to get your posts to say is to kiss up or keep your opinions to yourself (which I would think is counterproductive on a forum).

Let me know your thoughts.

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I hate when your day starts off so well and then quickly goes downhill from there.  Sunday morning was one of those days.  Sunday started with the kids sleeping in till ten.  Yes, ten.  I was just as surprised.  I also decided that we were going to go to church.  I swear my husband is sometimes worse than the kids because he whined more than they did.  My kids have not gone to church very often which I know is my fault.  However, since Madison might go to Catholic school next year, I felt we should definitely go to mass.  Mass was at 11:30 AM, so we had plenty of time to get ready and go.  We made it to church with plenty of time to spare.  Will made it about three fourths of the way through the mass before I had to take him out.  Madison lasted till about five minutes left.  However, she had to go to the bathroom, so she had a good excuse.  we liked the church.  Madison told us she loved it and wanted to go back.  After that, Madison wanted to go to Denny’s and get alien pancakes.  That is her favorite food.  Since she was good in church, we decided to go there and eat dinner.  lunch took forever but it was good.  After that, we decided to go get Bill, Will, and Madison’s hair cut.  That also went well.  We came home, and Bill noticed that Madison seem to have gone to the bathroom quite a bit while we were out.  After being home for about 30 minutes, Madison was in the bathroom about four times.  I asked her if it hurt, and she told me she had “hot pee”.  as a woman, this definitely sounded like an urinary tract infection.  I personally have had a ton of them.  Now, it is Sunday afternoon, so there was not a whole lot of places we could go.  I first tried CVS minute clinic, but they would not treat her because she was under 12.  I took her to the local urgent care.  We got there one minute before they closed.  However, at CVS, Madison had went to the bathroom.  She did not have to go when we got to urgent care.  She also was refusing to drink any water.  While we were there she went four times, each time she only went about four drops.  the ended up giving us an antibiotic and sent us home.  However, Bill and I had a dinner downtown at Navy Pier for his work.  It started at six.  I got out of the doctor’s office at six.  Downtown is over a half hour for us to get there.  Seriously.  in my area, I went to the only Walgreen that was still open.  I hate that Walgreens, because they have horribly slow service.  They told me two hours, I told him I would be back in a half hour.  I went home and got ready in about 20 minutes.  While we were gone, Bill had packed the kids bags to spend the night at grandmas.  we packed the kids in the car and headed back to our brains.  Of course, her prescription was not built yet.  Also, while we were waiting in the car, Madison had to go to back them.  I then had to take both kids out of the car and go into Walgreens.  In the meantime, Bill had gotten her prescription and could not figure out where we went.  we finally caught up to him, and we were on our way.  Bill and I ended up being around an hour and a half wait for his dinner.  However, they had just sat down to dinner when we got there, so our timing was great.  The party was actually pretty fun.  All in all, I guess it was not that bad of a day — the afternoon just stunk.  Madison is doing well now.   I swear, my kids never get sick during the week — the only get sick after hours or on the weekends.

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Seriously, I love Sony.  You all may remember that I received a Sony Cybershot camera in April.  However, when I went to Izeafest in September, my camera was dead.  I thought it was the battery.  However, it was not.  Instead, I ended up contacting Sony about getting it fixed.  All I can say is that their customer service team rocks.  They were able to send me a label, and I sent my camera back.  In a little less than two weeks, I had my camera back working good as new.  They also able to help me when I lost the cables that connect the camera to the computer.  Since my Cybershot saves to the hard drive first, I need this cable.  They were able to send me one. This kind of customer service makes me want to buy more products like a Sony Vaio the next time I have to buy a new laptop (which should be about a year since that is about as long as my laptops last).

Do you know of any companies out there that have given you excellent customer service?

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Ever have one of those days?  I did today. Instead of my normal Tuesday routine, I got stuck doing other things I didn’t really feel like doing.  If you read my last update from when we went to the doctor’s office, Madison needs to get a hearing test done. I finally got around to calling the school district today, and what a mess.  Instead of being able just to schedule her for hearing test, they are making her go through an entire preschool screening again. Unfortunately, this means I had to prove residency once again. This is no easy task. To prove residency in my district, you have to bring in your tax bill, two utility bills, an original birth certificate, and your drivers license. Unfortunately, that isn’t always so easy to find. I spent the entire time while Madison was a preschool looking for these items.  My other problem was that the school closed at 4 PM.This normally wouldn’t be an issue except Madison had preschool until 3:30 PM. It takes me around 15 minutes to get from my house to her preschool. In theory, I should have made a back In plenty of time. However, I got stuck by two trains. I then turned on the wrong street to go to the school and got a bit turned around. What a mess!  Luckily, I got there with five minutes to spare. I literally ran into the building with the kids. Thank goodness the woman was nice, because it actually took me till five after four for me to finish all the paperwork. Seriously, there was so much paperwork it was like signing mortgage papers.  Now, I have to sit and wait for school to call me back and schedule a screening for preschool. I seriously don’t understand why they just can’t do the hearing screening like I asked. I think the lady said that testing would start November 7, so at least we don’t have to wait that long. It’s just frustrating because Madison won’t qualify for free preschool, so this is just a waste of my time.

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