Images by John 'K'
Life as seen through my lens…
A great place to work.
Posted by on June 21, 2008
I joined the company I work for a little over 9 years ago. At that time we were around 1000 people world-wide, and at our headquarters site, we were just moving into a new building. 9 years on we have around 7000 people world-wide, still growing aggressively, and the one HQ building is now a campus of 10 state of the art offices on a beautifully landscaped campus. I was walking between buildings the other day in the warm California sun, and thought "I am sooo lucky to be working here – this is a great place to be."
Not only are the surroundings beautiful, but the people are 2nd to none. We’ve somehow managed to pick (and keep) a workforce that is the envy of most companies in Silicon Valley, and as I walk around our campus, and interact with the people here, I can’t help but wonder when I am going to wake up. It’s no surprise we’ve been high in the Fortune magazine "100 best places to work" survey for the past 6 years.
Don’t get “The Midas Touch”…
Posted by on June 7, 2008
It’s been a while since I’ve had something to have a good moan about, but take the followig rant as a lesson to always be sure that 1) instructions given are clearly understood by all concerned, 2) that you make sure that everyone concerned knows to not be afraid to tell you if something unexpected happens, and 3) that if you pay to have something done at a shop, check it while at the shop – don’t just take for granted that it’s done right.
So on to the story. My youngest daughter learned to drive last year and got her license. We brought a relatively cheep car for her to use – a little 1999 Saturn SL2. We knew it’d need some exhaust work doing when we got it but as a temporary measure we patched it until such time as it would need replacing. That time came this week, so I took it into the local Midas shop in Dublin (CA) for them to check it out with a view to replacing the exhaust. They got it up on the ramp, examined the exhaust, and then called me over to view. Sure enough, the area previously patched was beyond patching and so the whole of the rear exhaust system (middle and rear muffler, and pipes) would need replacing as it’s an all-in-one unti. In addition, the catalytic converter will need replacing sometime soon, but as I wasn’t expecting to pay for that at that time I deferred that for later.
As the part to be replaced was not something they stock locally, they took the details to place a special order, which meant I had to pay then. I did the necessary paperwork then left the stop, and 45 minutes later while I was driving around I had a call from the service rep who told me it should be in the next day. Initially I wasn’t sure of my schedule so I suggested that the day after would be better. On getting home and checking things out I found I could to the next day so phoned them back and was told that it would be OK. – bring it in any time.
The next day came, and things got a bit busy in the morning, so I didn’t get the car to Midas until around midday. I arrived and identified myself, to be faced with "we were expecting you tomorrow" so when I explained about the subsequent call I had made, they said "oh – OK – well if the service manager said it is OK, we’ll do it now". I explained that I would wait for the car (I had no other way of getting anywhere), so they took the keys and started working while I sat in the waiting area with my laptop and phone doing some work.
About an hour later, they drove the car to the front door, I was handed the completion paperwork by the service manager, and was told it was all done – he even explained that as I was waiting they had 2 guys work on it so they could get it done quickly. I thanked him, and as I could hear the car wasn’t anywhere near as noisy as it was I assumed they’d done what was needed and duly drove off.
As I drove home, the overall level of noise from the car sounded odd. It was like the rear of the car was more noisy than before, so I pulled over and looked underneath. That is when things took an interesting turn, as what I saw was that rather than having a new exhaust system with new pipes, and new center and rear muffler, they’d simply removed the old center muffler and about 2 inches of piping each side, and welded in place a section of pipe. I was livid – I got straight on the phone and spoke to the service manager who said I should bring it straight back. Needless to day I turned around and was back at their desk in about 5 minutes, and in front of 3 other waiting customers started to very vocally complain about that they had done vs what was the "agreed" work I was paying for. The manager was most apologetic, and went off to the work area. I heard loud voiced (mostly his) and a minute later he came back with a senior engineer who then took the car, and put it back up on a ramp so we could all see the bodged job they had done.
After I explained the conversations from the previous day and again expressed my dissatisfaction in no uncertain terms, I was told to leave it with them, that they’d sort it all out and make it right, and that they’d hire a car for me so I could get around while this was sorted. As I sat in the reception area waiting for the hire car company to come pick me up I heard the manager making frantic calls trying to find someone with the right part. After 3 attempts, he found one, and sent one of the mechanics off in a truck to go get it.
The hire car duly arrived, so I after making sure they’d call me when completed, I headed off home to do some work – I’d already lost 2 hours to this – wasn’t going to waste the whole afternoon. A couple of hours passed and we got close to the time that they had said it’d be done by and there had been no phone call. Conscious that they’d be closing in less than an hour, I called them to be told "it’ll be done before we close". Well not wanting to chance things (I couldn’t let this lapse into another day), I hopped in the hire car (actually a Dodge RAM truck!!) and drove back to the hire car place – finished off the paperwork there, and asked them to run me back to Midas, which they happily did (the local Enterprise car hire office in Dublin – VERY HELPFUL and I can’t recommend them enough BTW).
As we pulled up at the Midas shop, I could see my daughters car parked up at the back of the lot. There hadn’t been a call to my phone telling me they were done, so I assumed the worse. I walked up to the desk and asked how things were going with the car. It was done. I proceeded to launch into a rant about them not contacting me as agreed (more apologies), and sorted out with them a refund on the car hire fees (as Midas don’t have a direct bill contract with Enterprise – something they by the looks of things should consider). They got the car and popped it back up on a ramp so I could see that they’d done the job properly this time.
It transpired that they’d ordered the part on the previous day as was told to me, and it was due to arrive that morning however didn’t show. So rather than when I arrived them tell me that they didn’t have the part, they’d taken it on their heads to do what they did. This sparked another interesting and very loud conversation in front of other customers in the waiting area about appropriate responses when faced with this sort of situation.
So at the end of the day the exhaust was sorted on the day promised, but whereas I would have been OK re-scheduling for another day when they had the part, the exercise in miscommunication ended up costing me a couple of wasted hours and a lot of frustration, and cost Midas 2 mechanics time for an hour on a bodged repair that was then removed later that afternoon, cost them another mechanics time for an hour to go collect the right part, cost them a day’s hire of a truck so I could use it for a couple of hours, and cost them a lot of embarrassment in front of other customers (who were clearly sitting there re-thinking their decision to use Midas as things unfolded in front of them). They also now have another Saturn SL2 exhaust sat around as the originally ordered part arrived shortly after the mechanic returned back to Midas with the one they went to pick up.
"The Midas Touch"… I won’t be touching them with any of my cars again.
RIP Wanda, and some less important stuff
Posted by on May 27, 2008
Yes it’s been a while since I did one of these – for reasons that’ll become obvious as you read this it’s not been top priority in my life just lately…..
Lets start with that then. On April 29, 2008 my only sister (I am the youngest of 3, a brother and a sister came before me) was killed in an accident while driving to see my mother. From all accounts she was killed instantly, but that is little comfort to her remaining family. I went back to the UK to spend some time with my mum, brother, brother-in-law and family, and to be there for the funeral (which was a wonderful send-off for Wanda), and while it was nice to have the time to catch up with many members of my family that I haven’t seen in over 3 years, it was unfortunate that it had to be under such tragic circumstances. It was also unfortunate that we were unable to have my wife and two younger daughters attend too, but under the circumstances and given the timing that was not possible. I was also able to visit my eldest daughter and her family and celebrate the birthday of my youngest grandson (all be it aday early as the actual day of his birthday was the day of my sister’s funeral).
RIP Wanda Mary, you will not be forgotten. You leave behind a loving husband who has 38 years of wonderful memories, two beautiful daughters, and 3 lovely grandchildren who (as with the rest of us who knew you) will have you in our hearts always.
Next to that, anything else I could write hardly seems worth it, but life must go on….
Before that fateful day in April, my wife and I had the pleasure to spend what was a far too short trip travelling to China. It was a package my wife heard about through a group she is a member of, and as we had yet to organise anything for our 25th anniversary (which is later this year) we decided to treat ourselves as an early present to one another. China is an amazing place – full of contrasts between new and old, modern and traditional, rich and poor, and it’s the only foreign country I’ve visited where I didn’t need to travel with any of the local currency. Most situations that needed cash the dollar was perfectly acceptable, and for the few situations where only the local currency was accepted we were able to use plastic.
During our all to brief 9 days, we spent time in Beijing, saw the great wall, the Temple of Heaven, Tienanmen Square, the Palace Museum (aka the Forbidden City), the Ming tombs and the Summer Palace, we travelled to Shanghai, and then on to Suzhou where we visited Tiger Hill, took a trip on the Grand Canal, went to Hangzhou where we went to the national silk institute and the "Lingering Gardens", took a cruise on the West Lake before visiting the Longjing Green Tea plantation and the Lingyin Buddhist Temple before returning to Shanghai where we took in more gardens, the Bund, and before returning to San Francisco via Beijing we saw the Era show. Way too much to do justice to in 9 days, but a wonderful trip none the less. In hindsight too this is rather a special trip, as the last significant trip my sister took with her husband late in 2007 was China too.
Since then we’ve tried to get back to normal, however have had a number of other unexpected issues to deal with. My elder daughter injured her knee at work, and has been walking around on crutches for the past couple of months while she’s worked through a series of doctors appointments. As it was a work injury this is all at their expense, but it’s dragged on. My youngest daughter has split up with her boyfriend, and what started out as an amicable split turned a little ugly last week (hopefully now all resolved). My 2nd eldest daughter go engaged earlier this year and has now moved out of our house and the area she grew up in to be with her fiance in Warrington. As a result of this, my wife will be back to the UK in a couple of weeks to sort out what needs doing to the house to get it in a state where it could be rented or sold.
My plans to get in shape for my "Mount Diablo Challenge" got somewhat put on hold, but since my return from the UK my wife and I have new bikes, and now I’m on something that’s much better suited to my size than my old bike I’ve recommenced regular cycle rides in the hope that I can still get myself ready for a ride up Mount Diablo before the end of the year.
This past weekend saw Memorial day here in America, and we had the pleasure of seeing a flight of old World War 2 planes at the local airport at Livermore. Having had the chance to get inside and crawl through some of the planes on exhibit there, I am left in awe of the brave souls that flew these into battle to try and keep the freedoms we all to often take for granted.
If there is one thing to come out of the past couple of months it’s an appreciation that life is too short to be taken up worrying about some of the petty stuff we all too easily fill our days with. Worry less about the petty stuff, and live life to build memories that you hope you don’t have to leave to your loved ones as a legacy.
Needs random funny title….
Posted by on February 26, 2008
Haven’t done one of these for a bit – been very busy with work – but I thought it was about time I said something here before I get moaned at for my silence… 🙂
Since January it’s been pretty much business as usual for us – no major news to speak of, and no major problems either. We’ve hit the rainy season which has put a bit of a hold on some of our weekend trips out, but we managed to head over to the coast for the long Presidents’ Day weekend and spent a fun afternoon mooching around Half Moon Bay on a pleasant but slightly chilly Sunday. We also had a pretty spectacular view of the recent lunar eclipse, and we spotted what we think is a female golden eagle in a nearby tree while out in our back yard and managed to get a couple of pics before it flew off. (if you know what type of bird it is that we captured, do let me know)
The basketball season is now over for our youngest daughter, and she had the pleasure of scoring the final basket of the final game against their local high school rival team in an away game, so she was really happy about that!
Not really got much else to say right now – we’re getting more excited about our trip to China that is now just under a month away – we have our visitor’s visas, have received the final itinerary, and there is the possibility of some interesting changes at work for me in the next month, but more on that as I know the details.
For now that’s it – probably the shortest update I’ve done here in a while…. 🙂
… and into 2008
Posted by on January 16, 2008
We’re a couple of weeks into 2008, and in an attempt to try and keep things sort of up-to-date here, I thought it was time to put a little update together…
So things have settled back into a normal routine again at work after the holidays, and as the company I work for continues to grow we are being moved into a new building on our ever expanding campus. We actually move at the start of next week, but we took an informal tour around the new building yesterday and it’s cool 🙂 No doubt there’ll be more on this from me after we’ve moved in.
Things also seem to be settling into a normal routine at home. My wife is back to work too, back to those "lovely" early morning starts, but for her things are a little uncertain for the future as in an attempt to address some interesting state-wide budget issues there have been a lot of education cuts announced, and if they are executed the program that she tutors on for the district is likely to be cut. Sarah is seeing a reduction in her hours after the holidays – she’s still working "part time" so her time is more flexible than her full-time colleagues. It looks like she’s making a bit of an effort to socialise there too, and some of her colleagues have invited her on a trip down to LA (and Universal Studios) in March. Paula continues to have "fun" trying to challenge her school activities, with time requirements for Drama class performances clashing with the JV basketball schedule. Add to that she has picked up yet another injury during practice; after breaking her nose towards the end of last year, she’s now injured her knee (however it seems to be mending well so she’ll hopefully be playing again before the end of this week).
As members of the Monterey Bay Aquarium, we make occasional trips down to Monterey as a family, and this past weekend saw us making our first trip of 2008 to the aquarium. After a slight detour at the outlet mall at Gilroy to do a bit of shopping we made our way down to Monterey and the aquarium. Last year on my birthday they had a new freshwater otter pup born; Shani (which means "curiosity"), the third African spotted-necked otter born at the aquarium, was recently put into the public exhibition and so we spent a lot of time in the "Wild About Otters" wing admiring these cute and playful creatures. Turned out we had timed our visit to that section perfectly, as shortly after we got there they were fed, which led to a lot of really fun play activity while they ate. I can’t recommend the aquarium enough – if you’re ever lucky enough to visit the San Francisco Bay Area in California, be sure to spend some time in and around Monterey and be sure to visit the aquarium. I’ve popped a few photos up… see here.
I’ve also popped some photos from a recent trip up Mt Hamilton (another of the East Bay peaks) here.
That’s about it for now – I’ll try and keep things updated a little more frequently than I did last year.
Images by John 'K' 