Monday, November 5th, 2007 · Comments Off on Halloween @ Alex & Cati’s
Happy Standard Time, Dear Readers! I trust you all enjoyed the extra hour of sleep or leisure time this weekend. Even though it’s only an hour change, it felt like it threw off my internal clock more than that.
Lots happening lately, but today I blog about the October 20 Halloween party hosted by Alex and Cati in Albany. Some of you have already noticed the photos in my Flickr stream in my sidebar, so I thought I’d make it official. Last year we put the costume in the costume party at AleCat’s, so this year they decided to embrace the costume and challenged attendees to dress either like someone famous they’ve been told they resemble, or like a superhero.
If you’ve been keeping up with my bro’s hilarious new blog, you already know that my costume was a given for me: Nicolas Cage from Con Air. Mr. Cage — whom I actually met in person in San Francisco once upon a time in a magic shop (I at least said “hi” to him — does that count as meeting? — he looked pretty much like the character he plays in Con Air and was wearing a shirt that said Grandma) — is the only person anyone’s ever told me I look like. And there was a time when I would get that often. So my choice was obvious.
Though she could’ve also passed as Ashley Judd or Trinity, Jen opted for Rogue from the X-Men, complete with black cape and homemade “X” belt, which was a hit of the party.
Before hitting the actual party, we had to show off our costumes in town — especially funny given that it was a full 11 days prior to Halloween — so we met up with our partners in crime, Celine Dion and George Michael (also known as Jami and Hugh), and posed for a photo among confused lookers on at Wheatfields.
Our hosts were Dirk Nowitzki from the Dallas Mavericks and Elaine from Seinfeld (Cati even did the dance), and I’d say they pulled it off pretty well:
This was the only official Halloween party we attended this year. Last year, along with Alex and Cati’s party, we also hit parties at Hugh and Jami’s, and Karen and Joti’s.
Finally, if you haven’t already done so, be sure to read my bro’s Halloween post about his night out with his dick in a box (inspired, of course, by the SNL skit of the same title).
Comments Off on Halloween @ Alex & Cati’sTags:photos 2007
Wednesday, October 24th, 2007 · Comments Off on Birthday Dad
Now that my brother is on the blog scene, I’m inspired by him to blog more often. Pete has a great birthday post to our Dad, so I thought I’d do the same. Happy birthday, Dad!
Here’s the email I sent to my Dad this morning:
HAPPY 60TH BIRTHDAY, DAD! this is the only time in both our lives that you’ll be exactly twice my age, and i’m honored to be your half-age son.
you are a great father, a wise man, and an inspiration to us all. thank you for all you’ve done, and thank you for being you!
(Above photo is from Christmas Eve 2006 in Kinderhook — Pete, Dad, Jen, Gabe, Mom.)
I was psyched last night to learn that my little bro has launched his very own blog, Hegemony. Like both my parents and other members of our family, he’s always had a gift for writing. Pete’s writing is intelligent, fun to read, and just plain hilarious. I try to be funny sometimes, but my bro is the real deal. His writing makes me laugh out loud, and puts my weak attempts at comedic writing to shame.
Pete’s first (and, so far, only) blog entry, Welcome, Suckers, begins:
Welcome to my world. A little about myself: I’m 6’4″, carved out of stone, cause IQ tests to spontaneously combust when I enter the room, rescue kittens from burning trees, rip my shirt when I flex, and have been told my hair is what Angels use to weave dreams. Really, really good dreams. I have a dog named Chase. She wears a bandana, reads voraciously, is a member of several violent international motorcycle gangs, and was drafted number seven overall as a catcher by the San Francisco Giants. I’ve been evicted from two homes within the past year, and am currently letting my mom live with me in her house. This is my first ever blog entry.
Bring it, Pete Dog! I can’t wait to read what’s next.
(The photo of Peter on the tractor, which he chose for his inaugural blog entry, is from mine and Jen’s pre-wedding week, and was taken by yours truly at my in-laws’ house in Kinderhook.)
“When was the last time you were at a rock concert and got to see a fucking triangle solo?”
– Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters
Glens Falls Civic Center, October 9, 2007
Tuesday night Sarah, Patricia, John, and I cruised up the Northway to see a rockin’ Foo Fighters show. (Jen, unfortch, could not make the show, since she was busy getting an edumucation.) The band was excellent as ever and played a great mix of old and new songs, including Times Like These, My Hero, Monkey Wrench, and selections from the new album, Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace.
Grohl is a man of the people, running across the floor of the not-so-crowded Civic Center at one point to rock out from the back end of the building. Later, when a fellow band member refused to smash his guitar as he had at a previous show, Grohl took matters into his own hands and, much to the pleasure of the crowd, smashed his own (then later told us how the equipment manager was mad at him for doing it). His comments about the triangle solo were followed by something to the effect of, “See? You thought your Ticketmaster surcharge wasn’t going to get you anything.”
The last time I saw the Foo Fighters live was with Jonty during our freshman year at Vassar. We saw them at the Roseland Ballroom in New York City (it must’ve been either 12/01/1995 or 04/06/1996). It was shortly after Nirvana was no more and that band’s drummer (Grohl) started his own. I was also lucky enough to see one of Nirvana’s last shows (12/31/1993 @ Oakland Coliseum) before Cobain capped his own ass.
Jen volunteers at the shelter, which is in rough shape and is trying to get a new facility built. The current facility is one of the few in the country that does not require mandatory spaying or neutering upon adopting. This is unheard of and unacceptable.
Luckily, the new facility will have the resources to require spaying/neutering upon animal adoption.
Please attend this event to support the new shelter (downlaod PDF invite). It’s not too late to RSVP @ 518.885.4113 (I did just this morning). Do it for the dogs (or cats) and enjoy some delicious food from Sargo’s while you’re at it.
The above dog is Jen’s friend Dusty, Animal#5628/Kennel#4, who is a “13 year old male who is housebroken and good with older kids. He came to us because his owner is moving.”
My primary bank since at least 2001 has been NetBank. Overall, I was always really happy with them, but in recent years was much more enthusiastic about ING, and have written about the great savings rates offered by the ING Orange Savings from time to time.
ING recently launched a checking account — ING Electric Orange — in addition to its savings account, which pays more interest than most banks’ savings accounts. So I opened up one of those and have been using it for some of our banking in recent months. However, it lacked the flexibility of NetBank’s bill pay — for example, scheduling irregular payments, such as bimonthly or quarterly — so I never fully transitioned to the ING checking account.
It looks like it will soon be all one in the same. Over the weekend, it seems, NetBank was shut down by the federal government for failing to repay millions in loans, and the remaining assets and NetBank customer base (110,000 of us) were acquired by the much larger ING ($78 billion in assets and 6 million customers):
U.S. bank regulators shut NetBank Inc on Friday but said the Internet bank with $4.8 billion in deposits and assets remaining would reopen with online rival ING Bank taking over most of its operations.
…
ING agreed to pay a premium and take control of $1.5 billion of NetBank’s insured non-brokered deposits and buy $724 million of liquid assets, the FDIC said.
…
He said the transaction will add 110,000 new customers to ING Bank’s 6 million customers. ING Bank has $60 billion in deposits and $78 billion in assets, making it the 4th largest savings bank, or thrift, in the United States.
Hopefully ING will keep the best of NetBank features — like bill pay — so that I’ll now end up with the best of both banks.
As much of a tech guy I am and have never had a problem with virtual banking, it’s also nice to maintain an account at my local bank, where I can visit a branch from time to time.
Beers were rated using the informal homies rating system — if you like a beer, place one or two homies, drawn from a big bowl of homies, into a cup in front of the beer; if you don’t like a beer, don’t give it any homies. I liked most of the beers and gave pretty much all of them a single homie shout out. The only beer I didn’t grace with a homie was the Saranac. I don’t think anyone else liked it, either. Jen, P-Oz, and I also had fun pairing up homies that made good couples and photographing the hookups.
It was a fun event and cool meeting some new people. Oh yeah, and I was that guy who ate the last piece of cheese.
After the beer tasting, P-Oz and I talked Jen into putting off studying until today, and instead hitting the brewery with us. Anne and Tom met up with us, too, and we played a mean round of Uno while enjoying the brew (after Jen kicked mine and P-Oz’s asses in a rapid-fire round of Set).
It’s fun being a bit of an Internet celebrity. I really miss that part of having my blog be more public and findable by search engines. This week I’ve gotten to relive that exhilarating feeling all over again, thanks to the Chez Sophie saga, which I posted to my blog on Wednesday.
On Thursday, Times Union food critic and blogger Steve Barnes had posted a link to my blog, which drove my usual 30 or so daily visitors up above the 200 mark (nothing, of course, compared with back in the day when my blog got 20,000+ unique visitors per month — ahh, the good ol’ days!). Steve’s post has generated 10 comments so far, and by Friday, my original post had 20+ comments.
After moving to Saratoga, my blog was still easily findable, so I made a bit of a name for myself around town and was called a prolific blogger in a Saratogian article.
Then there were the non-blog-related brushes with local fame: appearing on the news during a peace vigil; having the back of my head featured in the Go section; and having my profile shown on the news during Gillibrand’s run for Congress. During the same time, Jen appeared on the front page of the Post Star, and I spotted my Dad’s head on the front page of the Saratogian in a crowd shot of the track.
But I digress. Back to the blog.
I don’t really look too closely at my referring site stats these days, but thanks to spirit’s tip this morning, I woke up to read this most awesome post by Si Punic, Sr. — who’s apparently my new biggest fan — of Little Sour Lemons. The post is all about the Blog Master G love.
I hope you don’t mind, SPS, but I’d like to quote your entry in its entirety here:
*Sigh.* Is this your Earth emotion called blog-envy?
In any event, G.’s latest posts chronicle a customer service nightmare at a recent visit to Chez Sophie. That, plus his letter to the chef-owner, her hysterically spun response, and his further reply. Catch up with the saga now.
G., I salute you. As your blogging pal reminds you, we are everywhere. Too bad, so sad.
What can I say? I’m flattered. Thank you, SPS. You rock.
If I get this much love with an under the radar blog, I can only imagine the level of awesomeness that would be directed my way were I decide to remove that little ol’ robots.txt file.
Wow, yesterday’s blog entry about our terrible Chez Sophie experience really struck a chord with all of you! I haven’t gotten that much feedback on any blog post in ages. I guess that tells me what’s important to people — that being treated well in dining is universally important, and that the controversy is fun.
Based on all your great feedback and encouragement, here’s the final version of my reply letter, which incorporates some of Alex‘s feedback and is on my mailbox going out today:
Dear Ms. Clark,
Thank you for taking the time to respond to our concerns about our evening at Chez Sophie. Unfortunately, you missed the point: Our table was abandoned.
Regardless of the type of wine service you offer, no one ever returned to our table – not to fill the water, not to ask us how our food was, and not to fill our wine glasses. If our server misread what we wanted, then how should we have informed him that we would have appreciated more water and wine, and to be asked how our meals were? Should we have flagged him down as he walked by without checking in?
You singled out and defended the wine service by implying that our waiter misread our desires. I think you are being too kind to him on this one. Our glasses sat empty on our table and were ignored because our entire table was ignored. If our server was truly interested in providing the most appropriate wine service for his customers, don’t you think he might have noticed the empty glasses that sat there waiting for him to fill?
Although I found your citations on wine service educational, they don’t apply when considered in the context of our evening. Our waiter had plenty of time to chat with his colleagues, but no time to ask if our food was satisfactory.
We’ve eaten at countless restaurants from San Francisco – where we used to live and enjoyed many evenings of excellent restaurant service – to London to Barcelona, and never can we recall a time that our table was simply abandoned like it was that night at Chez Sophie.
Since sharing our story with friends who also live here in town, I was shocked to learn that another couple had nearly the identical experience at your establishment – also with (name removed). They don’t plan to return, either.
Finally, I may not have experience running a restaurant, so I would certainly never tell you how to do your job, but, as director of customer support for an international software company, I do know quite a bit about good customer service.
Next time someone complains, you might consider not debating the complaint or making assumptions about the clients’ age sensitivity. I think you’ll find you’ll have happier customers – some who may even give you a second chance – if you acknowledge the complaint, apologize, say you’ll do better next time, and invite the customer back again for another chance. Heck, we might even have given you another chance had your letter not been so defensive and argumentative.
Be it dining or software, good customer service is universal.
don’t businesses get that bloggers are all around and spreading the good/bad word about their services? don’t they know who we are?
I know she was half-kidding, but it’s a serious point. One bad experience written about on one blog can have a tremendous ripple effect. People talk. Too bad, so sad for Chez Sophie. Maybe when they realize that word has spread about their terrible service, they’ll decide to do something about it rather than making excuses for it.
Contrast the Chez Sophie experience with the one we had in early 2004 at the Mexican Connection, shortly after moving to Saratoga Springs. My blog was then easily findable via Google searches, so the owner of the Mexican Connection sent me an email, apologizing for the experience and inviting us back in for another chance. We took him up on the offer and although he didn’t comp the entire meal, we were taken very good care of and did receive some comped appetizers. Now that’s how to turn a bad experience good.
(How awesome is the embedded photo set above? Tip: Click on the first or second photo, then use your keyboard’s right arrow key to scroll through the rest. It’s powered by pictobrowser and pulls directly from my Flickr account. Thanks, Amit, for the great tip.)
The food at Chez Sophie was excellent and mostly lived up to expectations. The service, however, was terrible. We had no check-back, no water refills, and no wine service. The sommelier/owner even condescended our taste in wine. So we wrote a letter. The response we received was similar to our experience that night: Bad customer service. She also completely missed the point.
Here’s the letter we sent on August 27:
Dear Mr. Parker & Ms. Clark,
On Thursday, July 26, we celebrated our fourth wedding anniversary at your establishment. We were eagerly anticipating the evening, as your restaurant has a stellar reputation, and we always appreciate fine dining. Unfortunately, our experience that evening was profoundly disappointing.
For us, dining is as much about the ambiance and the service as it is about the food. Although we did enjoy delightful food, we were shocked and dismayed by the poor quality of service.
First, we asked for a wine recommendation. Our server, (name removed), couldn’t make a suggestion, so he said that he would “send over the sommelier” to help us. A sommelier, by definition, is an expert in wines, but this “sommelier” clearly wasn’t. Even with the aid of her plastic binder, she took an uncomfortably long time to recommend a wine for us, and in the process, condescended our taste in whites. If, in fact, you don’t have a sommelier on staff, your servers should not claim to have one.
Next, (name removed) returned with a snide remark: “So, are we going to order food tonight or what?” – as if to imply that we had delayed the wine selection and he had somewhere he’d rather be.
Finally, the two biggest gripes for us – both of which should be part of Fine Dining 101:
Our server did not bother checking back to ask us how our food was. Not once.
We were left to pour our own wine refills. We waited. And waited. And no one came to do the pours.
After our (more than generous, 20% tip), our bill came to $172 (check #114559/1,2). For that kind of bill, the least we should expect is for someone to keep our wine and water filled, and to check back after the food is served to ensure we’re satisfied – neither of which happened.
Maybe our shoddy experience that night was due to our relatively young age (we’re in our 30s) compared with your other clientèle. Or maybe it was just an off night. Either way, we won’t be recommending Chez Sophie to anyone, nor do we have plans to return.
Please consider this feedback as an opportunity for much-needed improvement in service. Hopefully your future customers will have a better experience than we did on our anniversary.
Sincerely,
Gabe & Jen A_nderson
Here’s the ridiculous, 3-page letter we received in response, which completely missed the point of our complaint:
Since receiving the reply letter, Alex and I have exchanged emails about how best to respond to the above letter. Below is the draft of the reply I’ve been considering sending (the version Alex “meaned up” — not shown here — was even more biting):
Dear Ms. Parker,
Thank you for taking the time to respond to our concerns about our meal at your establishment. Although other customers may like to pour their own wine, I think you may have missed the point of our feedback: Our table was abandoned.
Regardless of the type of wine service you offer, no one ever returned to our table – not to fill the water, not to ask us how our food was, and not to fill our wine. If our server misread what we wanted, then how should we have gone about informing him that we would have appreciated more water and wine, and to be asked how our meals were? Should we have flagged him down? Grabbed his shirt as he walked past our table without checking in?
That’s the point: We should not have had to ask. Our empty water and wine glasses – which we left empty long enough for a number of servers and staff to walk past our table more than once – just sat there. And what if our food had been bad or my ahi overcooked? Thankfully it wasn’t, but had it been, no one bothered to find out.
We’ve eaten at countless fine restaurants from San Francisco to London to Barcelona, and never can we recall a time that our table was simply abandoned like it was that night at Chez Sophie.
Finally, I may not have experience running a restaurant, so I would certainly never tell you how to do your job, but I do know quite a bit about good customer service (I’m director of customer support for an international software company).
Next time someone complains, you might want to consider not debating the complaint. I think you’ll find you’ll have happier customers – some who may even give you a second chance – if you acknowledge the complaint, apologize, say you’ll do better next time, and invite the customer back again for another chance.
Be it dining or software, good customer service is universal.
Sincerely,
Gabe A_nderson
P.S. I was shocked to hear from a friend that she was overcharged by your establishment last week by nearly $600 – and that not only did she receive no return call or apology, but she had to call again twice more. There’s no excuse for not reversing an extreme overcharge (or any overcharge) immediately.
Jen doesn’t think I should send this reply since our friend at Chez Sophie will probably want the last word, so this could potentially be endless. I think healthy debate is fun.
My primary bank since at least 2001 has been 
