I thought today was going to be relatively uneventful.

That was, of course, before I discovered the article on Mashable followed by the fastly trending Twitter topic …

As a general rule, I am not the one to jump on the opinion-train after seeing only one side of a story, and today is really no exception.  I’d like, instead to take a moment of your time to demonstrate how NOT to preserve your company’s “good reputation.”

If you haven’t already heard about the whole “Horizon Realty Files $50k Lawsuit Over Tweet to 20 People” debacle, here it is in a nutshell:

1. Now defunct Tweeter abonnen tweets to an audience of 20: “Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment was bad for you? Horizon realty thinks it’s okay.”
2. Horizon Realty of Chicago somehow gets a hold of the tweet and decides to sue for libel to the tune of $50,000. It’s the first lawsuit over a 140-chars-or-less tweet ever.
3. The Chicago Sun-Times runs an article on the story, quoting Horizon’s Jeffery Michael as claiming the company has a “good reputation” to protect.  He qualifies this statement by adding “We’re a sue first, ask questions later kind of an organization.”
4. The ensuing chatter over the issue garners exponentially more attention to the situation than it ever could have were it handled more quietly.

“We’re a sue first, ask questions later kind of an organization.” - Jeffery Michael  of Horizon Realty, Chicago

I don’t know how the company came across the tweet in the first place, and I also don’t know if it’s true that they never asked this woman to retract or respond to her statement before escalating to this.  I don’t know what truth is in her statement or what further proof that Horizon has to be sure that she meant their company in the first place.  What I DO know is that, no matter what, Horizon Realty has now managed to make themselves look like absolute fools in the eyes of many, many people in Chicago and far beyond.

I am not sure what I find more amusing in this situation – Is it the web-wide commentary about libel and what @abonnen *should* have done?  Or is it the amount of people like me who’ve seen right through the issue of one woman’s complaint to the absolute stupidity in allowing someone whose Brain-to-Mouth filter is clearly broken be the “spokesperson” for your “good reputation.”

You tell me.

Either way, I’ll be here grinning with bells on, watching the topic trend  in anticipation of what Horizon does next.

Happy Tuesday!

(¢) Penny

But, I’m not here to rehash neither the original story nor the follow up in response to comments made internet-wide. Read those for yourself if you so choose.  I hope in doing so you can at least find some level of empathy – whether you’re Vegan or not.

What I DO want to point out does, however, fall in line with some comments I have seen in response to this story.  What I find most disturbing, but unfortunately not surprising, is that Vegans are being fed animal products under the guise of it meeting their moral code.  In any situation where you’ve made a choice to live a certain way, and the vendors/ companies you choose to deal with advertise that they support you and that lifestyle – it is absolutely unfair that you should need to make a science experiment out of discovering whether or not what you’re consuming is in fact, what you WANT to consume.  Whether it was a naive oversight or a deliberate ignorance to the truth on the provider’s part – it’s still not really fair to you, the buyer.

That said, I applaud the businesses (most notably the Vegan Joint and Pure Luck) who have, at least according to this report,  reached out in an effort to correct the problem.  On the other hand, I hope those that continue their denial are punished in the greatest way anyone can punish bad business: I hope that the message spreads and those businesses lose revenue as a result.  And no, that’s not because I like to wish ill of people – I just don’t think it’s right to capitalize on the needs of others by lying and/or turning a blind eye.

And that sentiment has nothing to do with my own personal life choices. As a matter of fact, I am a happy buy-as-local-and-organic-as-possible omnivore who has a number of questions about the Vegan lifestyle in particular and frankly cannot consider removing meat and animal products from her personal life entirely.

Speaking of questions, thanks, Quarry Girl, for one of the more cohesive answers to the ever-present question: “If you’re about not “using and abusing animals” why would those same people then be interested in eating something that tastes like those animals (or animal products) in the first place?”

But, this goes far beyond my own curiosities, and as such we’ll save that discussion for another day.

What is more important than our moral differences is that neither of us should be taken advantage of in this way.  Period.

I applaud the efforts of Quarry Girl and hope that what Truth may come of it is enough to stir the right people to send these businesses the message that this behavior is intolerable.  I am sorry that

Of course we’re already aware of the huge well-established sometimes-global organizations: from Habitat to the Red Cross.  These ALL have a special place in our hearts for what they do provide to people all over. And, no, we don’t see these as any less “real.” It’s just that we want to spotlight the myriad combined efforts to help one another and do our best to demonstrate their exponential impact in aggregate. (go fancy words!)

So let us know who you know that’s doing something great.  Maybe it’s a local Church or business reaching out to a suffering pocket of the community.  Maybe it’s just a family or individual on their way to starting something big.  Maybe there’s a news story we’ve missed & shouldn’t have …

Whatever it is, if its Americans reaching out to help one another — we want to know more about it!

Then two Saturdays ago, 20/20 aired a new story on her getting into more detail about her soon-thereafter-established foundation, Foreclosure Angel.  Apparently helping one neighbor on good faith and credit alone was not enough for cash-poor Mock.  Since then she has helped at least four more and continues to work at it – feeling that ‘anyone would do the same thing.’

As reluctant a recipient as she may seem to the publicity, it has certainly done her much good – causing a national outcry of people who want to “help, too.”

Now that, my friends, is what makes this so beautiful. Not only is this a story of one normal person turning to help a perfect stranger, but the act in itself has led to more supporting the same simple cause.  5 people may seeem like nothing to the cynical-minded, but if you consider the karmic repercussions and act like this must have on the universe… If you consider the fact that this is 5 less families on the street… If you consider the fact that it’s just plain wonderful… well, you get my point.

“…when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security…”

It is quite rare that I ever get off my “fix America first” soapbox to pay attention to world news, but after Neda and then the whole $3000 bullet incident a couple days ago I just can’t stay silent about Iran.  You have to admit, it is a hard thing to avoid, and honestly it’s something I think we all need to be conscious of. And, no matter where we stand on the issue, we need to have hearts open to the Iranian people – putting their necks on the line to speak out against something clearly atrocious.  Fighting against what many agree is a blatant violation of their natural-given rights.

I am sure you already noticed the quote at the top of this post, and I can only pray that you know where it came from.  I hope that you can also see the parallels between what is going on in Iran today and what our ancestors struggled against so many years ago.  It is the best light I have found in this turmoil that shows how I truly feel, and I hope you can agree.

photo by Pournik

I am proud to see the outpouring of support from fellow Citizens at home and abroad.  I think we need to not get distracted as we so easily are and instead continue to pour out that support as Iranian “revolutionaries” continue to fight for their freedom.  On that note, as much as I think we, as common people must continue to show both our outrage and compassion towards the whole situation: I cannot say I am so sure about how I expect our Government to behave in a situation like this.

At least, I don’t believe it is our job to be Rambo the Shit-Starter.  We do things like that and it scares me.  It scares me because we are selective about who we do it to, and no one up There ever gives us People down here any consistent reasoning.  And beyond reasoning, I just don’t think it’s our right to go making wars in other countries (defense is a story for another day).

On that note, I find it much easier to swallow the notion of a “condemnation” or some other verbal disapproval.  Again, it goes against my typical non-interventionism, but I think at the point where so many Americans have told the World that we do not approve it may be a fair time for Congree to consider backing us up.  We do make things like Congress possible, after all, right? They are supposed to listen to us People, yes?

Speaking of Congress, I certainly understand and agree with a large part of what Ron Paul had brought forth as concerns against such a resolution in recent hearings.  I understand the concern over us taking brute-force action, but beyond that I think I can swallow this one *see the last paragraph* – I only hope it doesn’t escalate into us being the one to be the bully.

So I will continue to follow this mess, and I can only pray it turns out alright.  Problem with that is my gut tells me it’s gonna get a lot uglier before it gets prettier.

I guess we’ll all have to wait and see…

And then it wasn’t over yesterday.

And, considering my missing plane ticket and at least one bill payment, it’s apparently not over yet, today, either.

I’ve been on hold just about 19 minutes at the time of writing this post.  Surprisingly, today, I called the “Real People” phone line and was greeted by a “We are experiencing exceptionally high call volume” prelude to the typical “we-love-dogs-heres-some-musak” hold experience I’ve become accustomed to.

I don’t know what else to say.  My money is settling back where it should be, and my ATM card worked without fail today FINALLY … but I still can’t track down my plane ticket or my missing bill payment(s) … and no, it’s not that I don’t keep track of my bills – I just can’t get a real view on my pendings with this new online system. And, since I can’t get a hold of any real PERSON, either … there’s no telling what is going on right now …

I’m at 23 min now (4th time this 5 days) … I suppose I’ll call Expedia instead and figure out if my travel plans are still solid.  I’ll try to call the company I’m trying to pay again tomorrow, they seemed to have some long hold times themselves today …

Meanwhile, I caught that sugary-scapegoat comment on the “glitches” with the system in an interesting-albeit-watered-down post from the Patriot News, and that’s really set me off.

Oh, and if you haven’t followed floor9 for this topic … do it NOW!

I gots nothing else.

Hope tomorrow goes a little better …

(¢) Penny

It’s not going to be an easy journey, but we’d rather die trying to set things straight than live long in someone else’s lie.

Anyway.  On top of a plane ticket that remains UA, I’ve just discovered at least one missing pre-scheduled payment I had arranged with that particular credit card company.  That means they tried to run my Visa check card and got nowhere with it.  Still unable to reach any one on hold (I’m beginning to think there’s no one there at all) … I can only sit and wait for tomorrow to come.

Meanwhile I can’t help but tumble over the details of this whole debacle … as a programmer and project manager myself, I find it incredibly hard to grasp some reasoning on why things were executed in this manner:

1.  Couldn’t you have done more work in a development/ beta environment with one final “dump” before you moved to live?

2. Did you REALLY have to upgrade the bank system, the phone system, the web system, AND restyle the website at the same time? (An aside, not only does the new site look like it was put together this weekend, but the new online banking is unecessesarily different from the friendly, intuitive interface we had before)

3. Do you think we LIKE when you leave your tellers in the dark?  At this point, they’re the only communication we have with you if we can even get the time to visit a branch – and it seems you’ve let them out to dry worse than us!

4. Who told you it was a good idea to do this without letting anybody know?  I was IN the branch on Friday afternoon … and this started Friday night.  There was NOTHING to warn me of this impending disaster.

I am sorry to anyone else who is going through this.  I want to thank people like floor9 for keeping on top of this and allowing a medium for others to share their rants.

I hope anyone going through this with me, too, isn’t too hard on the tellers and reps if they aren’t giving you reason (read: not being jerks).  It’s big-momma-FailBank’s fault this is happening – they are just the messengers!

So yes, I’m still on hold.

I give up for today.

Until tomorrow …

(¢) Penny

beef pho

This is exactly what I mean when I talk about the importance and effectiveness of public charity over holding your hand out for the Man. And no, let’s not start a debate about that today …

I just want to focus for a moment about the care and trust Mr. Pham has placed in the local community – “Don’t have a job? You can eat for a penny in my restaurant on Wednesdays and Thursdays. I trust your honesty, you don’t need to prove you are out of work …”

I actually ate at Ninh Kieu a little over a week ago. We noticed the 1¢ Pho sign and thought it a little odd, but honorable if it were true. With this proof, I am happy to see that it is, in fact, a reality.

It is people like this, who struggle to make a way for themselves and in hard times give back however they can, that remind me all hope is NOT lost for the rest of us. We don’t need to wait for money to fall from the sky or be printed at the mint. We need to do what we can with what we have NOW – for eachother. Our family and neighbors.

It’s the only way to survive and, more importantly, come out strong from all this …

Thank you Mr. Pham – I have a good job, and am grateful for it. If I hadn’t enjoyed my fantastic Pho enough, your grace and Heart have cemented me as a regular in the weeks to come. I would gladly pay double if I knew that could keep a bowl of tasty soup in front of someone who needs but can’t.

It’s MONDAY and my financial life is STILL in shambles.  If you remember from Saturday’s post – I’ve been a victim of this whole MetroBank fiasco since Friday evening.  As of Saturday I was mostly doubtful that this would actually be resolved by Sunday as promised by the bank, and as of now, I can tell you that my gut was right.

The news today is a transfer I had to make by HAND in the branch appears to be moving through THREE TIMES instead of only once.  And a cash withdrawl I made at the same time also appears to be coming out that much as well.  Apparently I decided to give the next two people in line behind me a handful of cash for their troubles…

…oh and have I told you about my plane tickets, yet?  … yeah.  One of my plane ticket purchases from Friday night is UA and I am concerned to say the least.

And that’s all I could figure out from the cryptic “new” online system that is sort-of running-when-it-feels-like it.

I tried to call the 800- “Real people” phone number … this is the second day I was on hold for upwards of half an hour …  So I 411′ed my local branch … And that poor girl.  I can’t begin to guess how many people have ripped her or her coworkers open over the past few days as if it were any of their immediate fault this was going on.

So I was sweet.  She couldn’t really help me anyway.  Offered to call back because her “system was still having troubles.” So I let her.  I don’t like hold music, anyway.

And so poor, tired, shall-remain-nameless teller girl calls me back.  And in so many words tells me “We can’t do anything because of this-that-and-the-other. Is it ok if you call back tomorrow?”  Well, what if it’s not?  Clearly you’ve just informed me I’m SOL.

So then we’ll wait another day, I suppose.  Fortunately I have use of my card back and my money, although it 2/3 in the wrong place, is in a right enough place that I can still put gas in my car …

…Can’t wait to see what the next day brings!

(¢) Penny