As nervous as I am to suggest another consumer revolt — the last time I did this the result was the immediate removal of the clock from the Bank of Montreal when we sought to have it repaired — I’ve got another issue burning a hole in my brain.

If you are a customer of Sobey’s, you may be familiar with their 10-litre jug of Big 8-brand spring water. The jug is a very nice size, and fits well in a fridge. In these days of water problems, and water scares, it’s become our primary source of drinking water.

When we first started buying these jugs last year, they had a very nice “push-pull” blue-coloured spout that didn’t leak and worked easily all the way down to the last drop of water. Recently Sobey’s has switched to a brown-coloured “push in” snub-nosed spout that, alas, meets neither of these tests: it regularly leaks water into the fridge, it’s hard to operate, and it just plain cuts out working once the water gets low.

If you have encountered this problem yourself, and want to make your frustration known to Sobey’s, I implore you to visit their website feedback page and send them your thoughts. I just received a very nice response back from Sobey’s consumer affairs people after doing so, and I’m sure if enough Sobey’s customers tell the chain of this problem, change will result.

Of course this probably means, with my track record, that they will immediately stop selling water altogether, but that’s a chance we’ll have to take.

It’s now been over a month since I last used my office PC for any regular work. I’ve turned it on twice, once to grab a file from its disk, and another time to use Quicken; otherwise I’ve been using my Apple iBook for all of my home and business computing, which is the longest time I’ve ever gone Apple-only to date.

I’ve got an admission to make: I absolutely hated the Mac way of doing things before Mac OS X (which is the completely new from scratch operating system that Apple introduced last year). While the conventional wisdom was the Macs were easier to use, I found the Mac OS was cumbersome and confusing. I had a PowerBook 1400 about 6 years ago, and it never really worked like I wanted: it was slow, flaky, and the Mac OS was just too foreign for me to be comfortable using it all the time.

All this has changed under Mac OS X: I can say with no hesitation that it is the best operating system on the market today, and is so superior to both Windows and older versions of the Mac OS as to render anything else simply foolish to use.

Why?

Here are some random reasons:

• Wireless — Yes you can get wireless cards for a PC laptop and use it with WiFi networks. But Apple was first to market with this, and it’s baked right into the operating system. How do you configure a Mac to use a wireless network? You turn it on.
• Easyness — Is that even a word? One of the things I’ve had to unlearn moving from the PC world is that not everything has to be complicated. On a PC, for example, if you want to change the IP address of your computer, it often requires a complete reboot of the computer; on a Mac you just change the IP, click Apply and that’s it. If I’m at home using my PC plugged into an Ethernet jack, and then unplug and go to GrabbaJabba to use a wireless network, I don’t have to reconfigure anything: it just works.
• Accessibility — If you have trouble reading, Mac OS X has the best accessibility features. Period. With no add-on software or gizmos required, the Mac will read any text for you, anywhere on the screen, including buttons, icon text and dialog boxes, in a nice, clear voice.
• BBEdit — This text editor from Bare Bones Software is the best text editor I’ve ever used. It’s got a clear, uncluttered interface, and has about any text editing function you might ever want baked right in. UltraEdit for the PC is a damn good editor; BBEdit is better.
• Mail — I used Microsoft Outlook to read me email for three years. Outlook is a very powerful program, and, by and large, it worked well for this task, especially when I switch from using POP to IMAP. But Apple’s built-in Mail application (it’s actually simply called “Mail”) is beautiful, elegantly designed, and has more features I can use more easily than Outlook. The nicest things introduced with Mac OS 10.2 (which came out in late August) are excellent junk mail filtering, and a unified in-box, where all the new mail for all of my accounts appears in one place.
• UNIX — Mac OS X is built on top of a Unix superstructure. That means that it’s heart beats Unix and that it has a beautiful, elegant interface to Unix built on top of all this. For someone like me who lives and breathes Unix maintaining myriad webservers in two different countries, this is wonderful because it means that it’s very easy for me to connect my little iBook to my big servers. For example, I don’t need any additional software, like SecureCRT on a PC, to use ssh to connect to my servers: it’s simply a default, built-in part of OS X. OS X also talks AppleTalk (to connect to other Macs), WebDAV (to connect to web-based fileservers) and Samba (to file share with PCs).
• Beauty — Mac OS X is beautiful and consistent. And people who make software for Mac OS X tend to create it in this spirit. As a result most if not all of my Mac software looks and feels the same. I like that.
• Sleep — Putting my PC to “sleep” — a low power state somewhere between “on” and “off” almost never worked. Either the PC wouldn’t wake up fully (for example, it would wake up, but the mouse wouldn’t), or it wouldn’t stay asleep. When it did sleep, it would often take 2 or 3 minutes to wake up. When I put my iBook to sleep (which I do just my closing its lid), I can wake it up (by opening its lid) and start using it literally right away. There is no delay like there was on my PC. This is great.

If you are in the market for a new computer, I can’t recommend more highly that you consider buying one of the new iMacs. Catherine has had one for a couple of months and loves it. Drop by the friendly people at Little Mac Shoppe in Charlottetown and check them out; you will not be disappointed.

At my 8,000 km Jetta checkup back in April, I learned of and reported on Volkswagen’s new Glaeserne Manufaktur plant in Dresden.

Dresden was one of the cities hit by recent flooding in Europe and as a result the city’s Opera House was damaged. This left Semper Opera without a venue. Volkswagen to the rescue: Carmen is being presented inside the VW plant starting October 26.

Back in January I wrote about dealing the George Stewart at Admiral Travel in Charlottetown. I’ve just booked another trip with George — a byzantine Charlottetown, Windsor, Boston, Charlottetown business trip for October — and it was again a pleasure. From initial inquiry to receipt of ticket by email took about 2 hours. And George saved me about $1000 in the process. If you’re doing anything but the most basic travel, travel agents are still very useful, even in the land of Priceline and Expedia; I can’t recommend George’s services more highly.

We are looking for an occassional babysitter for wee Oliver, our two year old son. We live in downtown Charlottetown, and the sitting would happen in our house, perhaps 3 or 4 times a month. If you are interested, or if you can point us to someone you know, please email me at peter@rukavina.net.

My friend Stephen pointed me to this power of 10 website and said it was “trippy.” It is.

I’ve been listening to the audiobook version of Hit the Ground Running by Mark H. McCormack, founder of IMG, an international sports marketing firm.

The book, which is subtitled “The Insider’s Guide to Executive Travel” is a rambling series of tips and anecdotes from McCormack about business travel. He covers hotels, airlines, taxis, expense accounts and more. He’s repetitive, and in some places confusing, but all and all it’s an interesting listen with some potentially useful information.

The greatest insight I’ve gleaned from the book, though, is McCormack’s approach to service, something he encapsulates as “the personal touch.” His explanation of this approach has made me think I might have it all wrong about customer service and, indeed, that I might have been digging my own holes for a long time.

My approach to customer service is based on a notion that people offering customer service should always be honest, genuine, hard working, well paid, and supported by the resources and management they need to get their job done. It’s also based on the notion that companies should want to give me good service, and that when they do not do this, it is my duty to inform them, sometimes in public, sometimes very loudly.

In some particularly dire situations — like those I’ve found myself in with Island Tel/Aliant over the years — my approach has been extended to include not only public complaint, but also an attempt to extract good customer service, or at least some customer service, from where ever I can get it.

And I think I’ve got it all wrong.

Here’s the anecdote McCormack offers to describe “the personal touch:” you’re in a restaurant and they have a special on, say it’s a ham sandwich and soup for $5, with no substitutions written in big letters underneath it. If you take my approach to customer service, you approach this caveat as an affront, and so when ordering you ask the server if you can get the special, but with turkey instead of ham: “I’d like the special, but could I get the sandwich with turkey instead?” Nine times out of ten, the server will say “sorry, there’s no substitutions” or “I’m afraid not.”

The McCormack suggestion is to take a different approach: make the server feel as though if they are able to achieve the miracle of getting you the sandwich with turkey, you will think very highly of them. He suggests asking something like “do you have enough influence over the chef to get me the special with turkey instead of ham?” My gut tells me that this will actually work much better most, if not all of the time. I know if someone asked me this question in this way, I’d probably take it as a personal challenge to get them turkey.

Indeed I know from my own working with clients that when clients phrase requests like “I know this is probably impossible, but could you…?” I’m usually quick out of the gate to prove to them that it is possible. And, conversely, when clients say “we need this by Monday at the latest, and it has to work like this,” I’m just as likely to slide the project to the bottom of the pile.

My one Big Success with Island Tel was getting them to install DSL service to our old World HQ in Kingston. Our house in Kingston was about 1km beyond the normal limit for DSL installations, but by working with a sales rep who I knew otherwise, the situation was turned from that of a demanding client into a challenge for the engineering team to see how far they could push the technology. And they rose to the challenge and provided me with the service I was looking for.

And so I’m starting to think that I’ve got it all wrong. Rather than taking bad customer service as some sort of bubonic insult that must be trumpeted and extinguished at all costs so as to not lessen human perfection, perhaps I need to become more Machiavellian and use social engineering to shape the world, or at least my little corner of it, into a place that naturally molds good customer service around me.

More thinking needed on this.

Here’s a special “Guest Note” from one the readership, Craig Willson:

Monday evening September 16th

7:30 pm my dial-up lines goes funky with static and what sounds like wailing banshees in the background. My connection to ISN is dropped.

7:45 pm I check all lines and devices in house - all is in order and line is still not usable. Bless ISN for using USR modems because my USR can at least connect at 12000.

7:50 PM to speak with nice lady at customer service. I call on the bad line so that she will hear the problem. Yep, she gets it. (I have always encountered pleasant and helpful CSR’s)

7:51 PM (we are shouting at each other to speak over the static) - she says she will be right back as she will give me a time that the repair person will come.

7:53 PM She is back and says she can have someone here on THURSDAY! (not possible to give a time)

7:54 PM I explain the importance of having a reliable access for the internet access - and that THURSDAY is far to long.

7:54:30 PM She calmly explains that I am not deemed urgent as we can still hear each other. Yup, that is what she said. (Remember, we are shouting to speak over the static.)

7:55 PM Thank you I reply - gently hanging up the phone in wonder.

Now walking around the house staring at the ceiling wondering when someone will figure out a way to do something about these incompetent morons. Do they actually think that going from Monday to sometime Thursday is acceptable? Jeeze, this is 2002 I think. For what it is worth, the last time this happened the telcoheads were at my home 9 times before I called Fred Morash personally.

CBC Radio is reporting that Santa’s Woods in North Rustico burned down this weekend.

This, on top of the ongoing shifts at Blue’s Clues must make it particularly hard to be a child this week.

Santa’s life in turmoil, Steve off to college and replaced by his seedy looking brother Joe… what’s a kid to think?

For those of you confused by the big “Steve out, Joe in” movements at Blue’s Clue’s, here’s some helpful information from the official FAQ:

Why does Joe wear a different outfit than Steve did?
Blue’s Clues with Joe will be both the same and different as it was with Steve. Blue’s Clues will maintain the same structure and game play but will incorporate many new songs, educational concepts, and locations. One of the things that’s changing is Joe’s clothes. While Steve had a multitude of identical shirts, pants, and shoes, Joe wears shirts in multiple colors to reflect his whimsical nature.

La Stampa and Corriere della Sera are two of the most influential papers in Italy. They are controlled by the same Agnelli family that controls Ferrari. And they are coming to Charlottetown. Maybe.

The chichi cruise ship Silver Shadow is coming to Charlottetown as part of a late summer New York to Montreal cruise. The cheapest room on the 11 day cruise goes for about $13,000 CDN, or about $1200 a day (this includes North American airfare). This seems a somewhat expensive way to spend less than two weeks. It’s also a down payment on a very well-equipped house.

Apparently one of the perks of shipboard life on Silver Shadow is access to a wide variety of reading materials: during my weekly stop at Tweel’s to pick up The New Yorker the cashier showed me a fax from a cruise organizer containing a long list of newspapers they want to have available to their guests and that they want Tweel’s to procure. On the list were such papers as the Financial Times and Le Monde, as well as the aforementioned La Stampa and Corriere della Sera. They also wondered if “any Japanese papers” might be available.

The cashier’s reaction to this? Well, after wondering with me whether La Stampa was Mexican or Spanish (neither of us are well-travelled or all that literate, obviously), she remarked “well, we can get them, but it will take a month, not a week.”

So if you find yourself in mid-October at Tweel’s and see some exotic looking newspapers on the rack, now you’ll understand where they came from.