Reaction to Obama's inauguration

My seven-year-old grandson says it better than I can:

Paul, I felt very happy as well. I also believe it will be a good four years. Or eight. - Grandpa

Silence or insincerity? Your preference

On a recent trip to Mexico, a car I reserved with Hertz was not available. My letter to Hertz on my return:

Dear Sirs and Madams,

I am writing to express my disappointment with your services in Cancun, Mexico in regard to the reservation below. [email with original reservation and confirmation number was attached] Despite having a reservation and calling to confirm it prior to arriving in Cancun, I was told on arrival that there were no cars available. I was not allowed to speak to a supervisor. No time or day was given for when a car would be available. I was forced to rent from National at a rate five times higher than the rate quoted by you. My $118 rental wound up costing me $425 - at that for 5 days instead of 7.

I don't expect to hear back from you but know this - I will NEVER rent from Hertz again and I will tell everyone I can find of this service. As a professional speaker, presenter and writer, I rent cars between 15 and 25 times a year.

Doug Johnson

So after 15 days this is the Hertz response:

Dear Mr. Johnson:

Thank you for letting us know about the difficulties you recently encountered in Cancun. We appreciate the opportunity to review your concerns.

We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience you experienced when we were unable to honor your reservation. Although our reservation system is designed to provide a vehicle at the time and place requested, situations can sometimes develop that prevent us from honoring a reservation. Normally our inventory of vehicles is more than sufficient to meet confirmed reservations; however, on occasion, customers do not return vehicles as expected, and the resulting shortages cannot be overcome immediately.

As a service oriented company, we rely on customer feedback to help us maintain and improve our service performance standards. The information you have provided is very important to us, since it tells us how our various locations are doing and where improvements are needed.

Please be assured the appropriate Hertz Area Manager has been notified of your experience. In addition, your comments have been entered into a special report that is reviewed very closely by Hertz Management.

Thank you again for contacting us. We appreciate your business and look forward to the opportunity to serve your future rental needs.

Sincerely,

Shonda Walkup
Customer Relations Administrator
OKC Customer Relations
The Hertz Corporation
P.O. Box 26120
14501 Hertz Quail Springs Parkway
Oklahoma City, OK 73134
U.S. A.

Telephone: 888-777-6095, Ext.4027
FAX: 405-290-2899
E-mail: CustomerRelations@Hertz.com

For all correspondence sent USPS, please use the address below.

The Hertz Corporation
Attn: Customer Relations Department
P.O. Box 26120
Oklahoma City, OK 73126
U.S.A.
---------------
This message (including attachments) may contain information that is privileged, confidential or protected from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that dissemination, disclosure, copying, distribution or use of this message or any information contained in it is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please immediately notify the sender by reply e-mail and delete this message from your computer. Although we have taken steps to ensure that this e-mail and attachments are free from any virus, we advise that in keeping with good computing practice the recipient should ensure they are actually virus free.

Somehow not hearing from Hertz at all would have been better than this letter oozing with insincerity. Why don't I think Hertz will do one damn thing to change how they operate?

So I am doing what I can. Telling you of my experience. And never renting from Hertz again.

O.K. On with life...

Remember Seinfeld???

Your recurrent nightmares?

If you're not 10 minutes early, you're late. My dad

I have a similar nightmare at least once a month. No, it is not Mr. Bean's head on Pamela Anderson's body. It's even worse.

Invariably in my dream I am scheduled to do a presentation and I am either late, far from the presentation site, can't find the right equipment, or am supposed to speak on a topic of which I know nothing. And what makes it particularly nightmarish is that I willfully seem to do everything possible to make the situation worse - usually wandering around and getting lost or doing absolutely trivial things.

Yesterday, for the first time in 15 years of doing professional presentations, my nightmare actually came true. I got the wrong date on my speaking calendar. I was in my office in Minnesota when I should have been five hours away in Madison, WI. Actually I got the date right, but it was changed to a day earlier and I somehow missed recording that change.

I keep a semi-accurate list of organizations for which I've worked. I count now well over 200 days of doing talks or workshops - or probably a low ball estimate of 600 individual talks or workshops. I've driven all night because of cancelled flights to makes some of these. I've never "called in sick." Even equipment failures have been blessedly rare (knock wood). So you might say missing only one out of 200 ain't bad.

Well, it's bad to that one who counted on you.

I feel terrible about it. And I am genuinely sorry.

I'm adopting a new procedure to verify all information at least a week in advance - including the date I am speaking. Just the first of a series of compensations for an aging brain?

Photo from http://www.wayodd.com/baywatch-nightmare/v/4986/