I’m feeling smug because although we’ve packed bathing suits, sunscreen, bikes, tennis rackets and thousands of board games to ward off rain, my boys have realized that packing beach books is as necessary as packing underwear.
For a while Drew was stuck on the Magic Treehouse books and he steadily read through the series until he had tackled the last one. Now he’s turned his attention to Lunch Money by Andrew Clements, along with his other books, such as The Report Card and Frindle.
Honestly, I’ve spent so long restricting their TV viewing and banning video games that he could be reading Playboy and I’d be equally excited.
Meanwhile, Porter, having made his way through the silly adventures of Captain Underpants(apparently that’s where he learned that “starch is the enemy of underwear!”) is now engrossed in James and the Giant Peach and has packed Matilda and The BFG for further reading. Aunt Lulu loved the latter book so much that she named her pet fish “BFG” for “Big Friendly Goldfish,” of course, and so I always forget that the BF in the book is actually a Giant and not a fish at all.
(I have the same problem with a popular type of sportswear, called Under Armour, but which I persist in referring to as ArmorAll , which is a car-cleaning product that’s been around since I was a child. Everytime I ask the boys about their ArmorAll shirts they look at me as if were hopelessly uncool, which I suppose I am.)
Currently I have a stack of five magazines and eleven books (I’m trying to whittle it down to five), set out to hide in the crevices of the minivan. The stack includes A Thousand Splendid Suns which has gotten rave reviews.
I have missed Several Virtual Book Clubs but since I’m heading to the beach, why don’t you re-read numbers one, two, three, four, five, six and seven and then laugh when I tell you that Bill has set out The Alienist for his beach reading?
Leave a comment– will this be the vacation where he finishes it? What books SHOULD we all be reading, or avoiding?
Also: pray for our trip down. The latest sound emitted by the van is reminiscent of the feedback produced by Jimi Hendrix during “The Star Spangled Banner.” Apparently starting the car and putting it into gear makes it long for Woodstock. Despite the cracked windshield and orange dents, it’s not nearly that old. I think it’s just caught up in all the hoopla about the Summer of Love.
Few things turn me into a crazed, hair-pulling shrew more quickly than having to place a call to “customer service.” I know I’m not alone here. I thought it would be therapeutic if we all shared some tales of hellacious experiences, complete with names and details. I’ll go first.
(Don’t click the link or your credit card number will travel from your wallet to their site and you’ll be charged $9.95 for the rest of your life and into perpetuity!)
While trying to get a free credit report through Experian, I was abducted by aliens and redirected to the CR site. Somewhere along the way, I allegedly (and I’m a lawyer, for God’s sake, so the print, if it existed, must have been microscopic) agreed to pay $9.95 each month for credit “monitoring.”
When the charges for $9.95 showed up on my credit card bill, I emailed the company and asked how to discontinue the monitoring service. I was told to contact customer service.
Thus began a miserable afternoon. First, the representative refused to cancel the monitoring service because I would be placing myself and my credit score in DANGER. He spent several minutes emphasizing that the company would no longer be able to alert me of “suspicious changes” in my credit report if I took this reckless action. I persisted, he reluctantly granted my wish.
It was when I asked that the previous monitoring charges be removed that the shit really hit the fan. I explained that I had not signed up for the service; the rep insisted that I had. I asked to speak to a supervisor; the rep countered that none were around. I commented that it seemed unlikely that he would be working without a supervisor; suddenly the the rep had a supervisor but she was on a conference call. I volunteered to hold; but the rep, who thirty seconds earlier had no supervisor, now was certain that the conference call would last until next Tuesday. He put me in the supervisor’s voice mail. I left a message I was certain would never be retrieved.
I was mighty pissy at this point. The only reason I wasn’t yelling was that I made the call from my office and I didn’t want the other lawyers to think I was uncool under pressure.
I called back. Service rep number two was impolite and cocky. We went through the same conversation, except that I refused to accept the supervisor’s voice mail and said I would hold. I got cut off.
According to the site, “CreditReport.com is designed to put the consumer in the driver’s seat when it comes to their credit report information.“ (Apparently subject/verb agreement is not part of the deal.)
After talking to Jason #604, I felt more like someone who’d been kidnapped on the street corner, bound and gagged, and tossed into the trunk.
2. Delta “Delivers” Delayed Baggage or “Let Me Pretend To Make A Phone Call”
I flew to New York recently to attend a conference. When I got to New York, everyone’s luggage arrived but mine. A kind lady in the service center at the airport told me my bag had been taken off the plane because the aircraft was too heavy, (Damn, I shouldn’t have packed two padded bras) but that it would be delivered to me by 9:30 that night. I filled out a form and asked that the bag be delivered to Aunt Lulu’s apartment, which has a doorman, and gave my cellphone number as the contact number.
I went to the apartment where I was staying, freshened up and bought groceries, got my nails done, then took the bus up to Lulu’s neighborhood and told her doorman about my suitcase. Lulu and the baby were out of town, and her husband was exhausted so I ate sushi alone then went to check on my bag at 10:00 pm. It hadn’t arrived.
Idiotically, I had packed my phone charger in my suitcase, so my cell phone had little juice left. Juan let me use the lobby phone to call Delta, where I reached Frau Know-Nothing.
Her first line of defense was that the people at the airport should not have told me that my bag would be delivered by 9:30.
“Look, I can’t help what the lady at the airport told me,” I said.
“She should not have said we could do that. The delivery truck does not get loaded until after the last flight in, which is–”
“Isn’t that really between you and the lady at LaGuardia?” I asked. “I just want to know when my bag will be here.”
It would be delivered no later than 6 a.m., she told me triumphantly, as if she were announcing that I had won a million dollars tax-free.
“I need you to be a little more specific,” I said. “I’m not staying at the address where the suitcase is being delivered. Is it coming in the next couple of hours, or closer to 6 a.m.? I need to decide if I should stay here and wait on it or go home and come get it in the morning.”
“It will be there by 6 a.m.,” she repeated.
“I don’t think you understand,” I said. “I’m waiting here, where the suitcase is to be delivered, but I can’t sleep here. But at my place there is no way for you to get in touch with me because there’s no doorman, the buzzer is broken and my cellphone is about to run out of juice. If you could give me a smaller window of time I could decide if I should wait here for it or if I should go home and sleep and come back in the morning. Can’t you call the driver and see where he is on his route?”
“I am not allowed to call the driver,” she said.
“Okay, I want to change the address where I’m delivering the suitcase. Can you call the driver and tell him that?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, call him up.”
“What is the address?”
I gave her the same address for Aunt Lulu’s.
“But that is the address he already has.”
“I know. I want you to call him and ask him where he is on his route, and which way he’s headed, so I know what to do. I need to get some sleep before this conference in the morning.”
“I cannot call the driver.”
“But you just told me you could.”
“Ok, I call the driver. You hold.”
I held. Juan was pacing in the background. He motioned at me to get off the phone.
Fifteen seconds later Frau came back on the line. “He says it will be there by 6 a.m.”
“You didn’t really call him, did you?”
Silence.
“Look– I can make it easy on this guy. You ask him where he wants me to be so I can get the suitcase. I’ll go anywhere between here and 50th Street to meet him. Tell him I’ll stand in the middle of Park Avenue topless, waving my arms, so I’ll be easy to spot if that will help me get my bag.”
“Please hold.”
This time she was gone several minutes, and when she came back, she said, “Your bag will be there by 2 a.m.”
I figured this was the best I was going to get, so I thanked her (“Danke”) and hung up.
The bag showed up an hour later.
Interestingly, Delta has a section on its website that answers questions about baggage. One question is “What can I take to ensure that my baggage will arrive with me?”
Delta has no real response other than to recommend that you stuff everything you can in your carry-on in case your real suitcase doesn’t make it.
I might suggest handcuffing yourself to your luggage, thus ensuring that you and your baggage travel together.
But Delta, please don’t blame me when the nice agent at LaGuardia tells me my suitcase will arrive at 9:30 and I believe her. And for God’s sake, when I call to ask about the suitcase, let the agent call the driver. Doesn’t helping the customer help you in the long run?
Okay, readers, I’m sure you have some customer service gripes. Or any gripes! Let loose! We’ll all feel better.
The promise of naked ladies is a powerful draw for the boys, so we’re off to the Museum of Modern Art as soon as the rain lets up.
We arrived in NYC Friday. Thank God we packed a soccer ball, because Bill and the boys have spent hours in the Park passing it and practicing killer tricks. In fact, Central Park has become our personal playground. There was a four mile run Saturday morning which Bill, Finn and Drew all participated in. After dinner (including grilled octopus salad, which I liked, but the boys didn’t) we wandered back over to the park and listened to Neko Case sing for a while.
Bill took the boys to a Yankees game yesterday, while Aunt Lulu and I strolled along the East River and checked out Gracie Mansion. Yo Bloomberg: the windows need scraping and painting!
After an early dinner Bill had to fly home. We all kissed and hugged and slapped knuckles on the corner of 3rd Avenue while he got a cab. The boys and I forlornly headed back home but soon perked up when we realized what a lovely evening it was.
We spent some time on our front steps. Drew carefully set out the 12 pictures of SpongeBob he’d drawn, and Porter approached passersby and asked, “Wanna buy a picture?”
The night was quiet and Drew only made one sale. The boys performed fantastic street stunts off the stairs while waiting for potential purchasers. I read the paper and drank a glass of wine. All were in bed early. Bliss.
Here’s the premiere of YO MAMA, the first ever Glamore-Us movie.
It does have sound, so be careful at work.
No animals were harmed in the making of this film, although we almost had to kill Porter during filming. He drank a Grapico while waiting for me at Jazzercise the morning of the shoot, and the sugar content damn near turned him into a pogo-stick.
Also, if IMAX bothers you, you may want to take a Dramamine before viewing. It’s not that we were able to replicate IMAX technology, far from it, but the camera was a little shaky and the movie is quite active.
I’m thinking that a “Behind The Movie” will be much in demand after this screening.
Please post your reviews below!
On the plus side, it’s also very short, at about 2.25 minutes including the obligatory Blooper reel.
We bought Drew a short-scale bass today (it’s smaller than a regular bass guitar), but he’ll have to keep taking piano keyboard lessons until he grows a little more. That will give him time to noodle around on it, though, and figure out some cool sounds.
Now that Finn’s proficient on the drums, Porter’s messing with both the acoustic and electric guitar, and the bass with a mind-blowing amp has been added to the lineup, you might call our house CACOPHONOUS.
The long-haired, multi-ringed guy at the music story found it odd that I drove up in a minivan wearing my Jazzercise clothes and then bemoaned the fact that Garbage doesn’t seem to be making any music these days, although I hear Shirley Manson has a solo album coming out this year. I didn’t fit his stereotype.
Apparently he had me pegged as the Michael Buble type.
In other news, Finn is currently preparing Beefaroni for his brothers for lunch, and pondering whether to add thyme or oregano to it. The movie “Ratatouille” has increased everyone’s interest in cooking, and thus my spice rack is no longer alphabetized, as I once bragged in my About Me page.
A couple of days ago the boys and I made our first film. Richard Schickel (remember him?) got a sneak peek and was swept away by the humor and pathos we captured.
I hope to unveil it Thursday for your viewing pleasure. I’ve uploaded it on YouTube but it hasn’t shown up yet.
The title? YO MAMA!
I smell an Emmy. Then again, that could just be an errant safety.
To Use the Pickle Player: Click the show you want to hear, press play, sit back and enjoy. To read the show notes click HERE.
In "It's Natural" I will tell your kids about the birds and the bees, but YOU must stay in the room and perform the coital finger movements.
I read this ten years ago and am reading it again. I want to read *Stargirl* but must avoid the library until Porter locates lost books.
The Boys Are Loving
Hooray-- there's a sequel to the original Diary. The guys are snarfing it up.
Porter finished all the Harry Potter books so I started him on A Wrinkle In Time, and he's enjoying it. I bought the whole set so he'd have plenty to read for the next few months.
After finishing the Harry Potters, Drew turned to the Hardy Boys. He can't tell a story "in a nutshell," so I've heard all about the missing jalopy, and the red wig. Solve the mystery already!
