Am I the only one noticing how bad customer service has become on this planet?  I swear that it feels like everyone I do business with is clueless.  I just discovered this chat thread I had sent to a friend to show him what I feel like I deal with on a daily basis.  This thread is from March 2006.  At the time, I needed an engine mount.  Here is that thread:

Vin: Welcome to Live Help! How can I assist you today?

Joe:

I see that I haven't blogged much lately, so I thought I should add a couple posts.  I notice that I apparently enjoy posting stories about what a moron I can be, so with that in mind here is a recent one.

About two months ago, I attended a Sharepoint seminar.  For those unaware, Sharepoint is a Microsoft web portal software package.  Did anyone say geek?  I was the first attendee to arrive at the seminar.  Did anyone say geek?  Does anyone see a pattern?

Since I was the only one there at that point, one of the guys that worked for the company providing the seminar approached me to talk.  He handed me his business card and introduced himself.  I replied with my name and the company I worked for.  He was familiar with my company and told me the name of one of the management team at my company he had spoken with in the past.  After these introductory sentences he then asked ...

I have been trying to remember the circumstances of this story, and my wife just remembered the critical part I could not remember.  Now armed with that piece of knowledge, I can tell the story.

First, I must set the timeline.  It was in the first half of 2006.  That's important because I had been watching Americal Idol.  That's right, I am not ashamed to admit I watched.  You saw Katherine McPhee!  Or, as her friends call her...Kat.

So, I am on the phone spelling some word, while providing a word for each letter.  You know, A as in alpha, B as in bravo.  Ok, hold it, I have a problem already.  Shouldn't it be B as in beta, if A is as in alpha?  Anyway, I can never remember the more obscure letters and words.  I don't even remember the word I was trying to spell.

I do remember I was on the letter K.  There I was, "K as in...".  It's amazing how fast you can think some ...

In a previous blog post I mentioned taking Ross Childress, the former lead guitarist for Collective Soul, an apple pie for Christmas.  That year I had a very Collective Soul Christmas.  This is that story.

First let me mention that my favorite band is Collective Soul.  This is quite a coincidence since I live in Stockbridge, GA, the town they are from.  But it didn't start out that way.

I first discovered their music in 1995.  I had heard their song 'December', but didn't even know who it was.  Later, I heard 'The World I Know', and not even realizing it was the same band, I discovered the name of the band was Collective Soul.  I then bought their second album, the self-titled 'Collective Soul'.  I soon discovered that 'December' was their song as well, not to mention all of the other, really great songs.  I was hooked.

I mentioned to a co-worker that I liked th ...

When I found out that Will Turpin, the bass player for Collective Soul, which is my favorite band, would be playing at a local restaurant on February 15, 2007, I asked my wife about us going for our Valentine's Day celebration.  She was all in favor of that.  She too is a big CS fan, plus, we could miss all the Valentine's Day crowds.

In addition to Will being there, I knew there was going to be a special mystery guest.  My imagination had me thinking it might be Ed Roland, or Ross Childress.  It was not.  I will tell you who it was in a bit.  The occasion for the event was a weekly song writer's event where local song writers get the opportunity to play their songs in front of a live audience.  This event is hosted by local musician, Bill Turpin, Will's father.  I wasn't quite sure what Will would be performing.  It is a song writer's workshop, and I wasn't aware of Will writing songs.