SunTrust joining the Evil League of Bank of America?

Hmmm… just saw that SunTrust has decided to try charging me a $9.95 monthly fee. No notification, no warning, it’s just there on my Quicken transaction list.

If you have a SunTrust account check and make sure they are not pulling a fast one on you too.

This sort of thing I’d expect from BofA, they exist solely to screw over their customers, but I’m very surprised to see this sort of sneakiness from SunTrust.

** Followup ** 5/9/2011

I spoke to a manager at the PC Banking service center and we got this straightened out.

Apparently there was a “sweep” done of all existing accounts to find ones that weren’t being charged but should have been. It *does* worry me somewhat that my bank is starting to look for sources of income like this.
Stand strong SunTrust! Nickel and Diming is BofA’s strategy. You’ve stood apart by being much more customer centric than other banks in my experience. Please don’t let that focus slip!

** End Followup **
** Followup ** 5/14/2011

Huh, turns out they lied. Just checked my account and nothing was done. I’ll need to follow up during the week. Thank you SunTrust for wasting my time like this.
If I do not get satisfaction I will switch over to a local credit union. You’d think the banks would try harder in this day and age…

** End Followup **

** Followup ** 5/18/2011

Called the Personal Banking number (1-800-786-8787) yesterday and found that there were notes on my account but they hadn’t been acted upon.
This was dealt with and this morning I see that all looks well. Hopefully I won’t have to revisit this.

** End Followup **

Flying to the Bahamas

Not quite there yet… but thinking about it…

Can you tell I’m starting to ramp up my interest in aviation again? 🙂

This video was posted on AOPA April 5, 2011 so – as of this blog post – the information and deals are still very relevant.

Of course there are still PLENTY of unknowns about the Bahamas (i.e. with respect to visiting the outer islands) so I think I’d prefer to experience these things for the first time with a small group of folks, especially those that know what they’re doing. The fly ins that Greg mentions in the video should be accessible from this page. I think this may be the way that I would do it.

 

Unspent Potential

Visiting a relative at Citrus Park Mobile Home Park, and pondering the meaning of unspent potential…

If you don’t die doing something glorious or youthfully stupid, have you not lived up to your potential?

Is old age the bastion of folks who are simply to cautious to live up to the full potential of what life has to offer?

Real musings, insight welcome…

Burger King Fries – Non-Offensive

Michelle and I just dropped by a Burger King to sample their french fries and stackers.

I’d give the fries about 2 and a half out of 5 stars. They are okay but they are certainly not spectacular. Enough flavor to recognize them as french fries but neither are they greasy enough to be tastey, nor are they crispy enough to be tantalizing.

While I’m critiquing the food, I have to say that the stackers were also pretty bland. I was rather expecting a hickory or barbecue sauce with them, instead the sauce seems to be a combination of 1000 island dressing and a little dab of relish.Anybody who knows me knows that I am not the king of spice but even I was yearning for a bit more zest. They are a good value as far as hamburgers go but the next time I will order them without the sauce and with extra ketchup and mustard, it is a passable burger with some bacon and cheese on it.

Five Guys (5 guys?) Fries – Very Good

I’ve been eating at Five Guys for a couple of years now. Given my love for fries, why do I keep eating ones that I rate as “Very Good” (4 out of 5 stars) and not necessarily “Excellent”? The answer lies in their other two biggest strengths:
The people who work there are uniformly pleasant to deal with, it must be in their credo.
Their hamburgers are also excellent.

I give their fries 4 out of 5 stars. They are usually fully cooked, a little greasy on the inside (a good thing) and often, but not always, crispy outside. When they are done right they are excellent but this is not consistently the case, so I ding them for being somewhat variable. When they are not done *just* right they are still very good, just not up to potential. The provided malt vinegar can go a long way to masking any imperfections so you are covered either way. Order the regular size and split them with a friend or significant other. If you can eat these on your own (even if it’s the only thing you order) then don’t wonder why you can’t squeeze your fat ass into that airplane seat..

If you get their hamburgers, get the small size. The buns are always fresh and the burger patty taste and texture is EXACTLY what I like. I found the large size, which is just two of the small hamburger patties stacked one on top of another, to be WAY more meat than I want or need at a single sitting (unless it is a filet mignon wrapped in bacon… but I digress).

As I said I eat there often. Typically once every 1 or two weeks. Considering they are not very handy to me at work or at home, that’s pretty good.

Two cons, at least for the Five Guys restaurants I patronize:
– They *do* break my first cardinal rule of restaurant music: Electric guitars should never, not ever be playing when folks are eating. They are great in other contexts but not while I’m eating. The music mix played by Five Guys ranges from “Pretty Good” to “I can’t wait to get the hell out of here”.

– Their chairs – they are actually pretty comfortable, and no doubt durable. They are metal made to look like wood – and do so very well. But EVERY time one of them is moved, everybody in the restaurant starts because they are loud. They even out peal the gawdawful music.

If you can eat outside, you won’t regret it. The food is a treat and the workers are great.

Shooting Water Jugs with Guns

This guy makes it seem almost cool to be Russian. Great accent and a fun little video to help eliminate the myth that you would EVER want to be on the wrong end of a gun.

It’s not until you shoot a gun for the first time that you truly realize the awesome forces at work when you squeeze that little trigger. It can be both exhilarating and terrifying at the same time.

I clearly remember the first time I shot a rifle (a .22 I believe at my uncle’s place). I even more vividly recall the first time I shot a full water jug. *That* was an eye-opening experience. When I retrieved it, the jug was inside out.

Please enjoy!

Ga. Bill Questions President Obama’s Citizenship

The South giveth and the South taketh away.  Getting rid of our backwards governor was a definite step forward (it remains to be seen whether our current governor proves to be any better), but this morning I read this article regarding a bill questioning President Obama’s citizenship.

Do our elected representatives really have nothing better to do than introduce conspiracy-inspiring / inspired bills and spend all of their time just trying to undermine the other party.

The Republicans have enough problems that they need to address within their party without pissing away their efforts on crap like this. Maybe spending some time becoming educated on, say, non-deficit budgets so the electorate can have a real choice come next election?

This kind of thing just helps Georgia appear as a suspicious backwater that’s still sulking about losing the “war of Northern Aggression”.

Get over it.

Does Blu-ray blow or is it just my imagination?

Last night Michelle and I received the replacement Blu-ray disc for “Salt”. We had returned the first one to Netflix as being unplayable. This second one suffered from exactly the same issue: The disc would churn for the infinite amount of time a Blu-ray disc likes to churn, it put up it’s little custom progress bar (because heaven forbid there would be some consistency in the interface between Blu-ray offerings) which then stops at about the 90% mark.

Of course there is the usual “take the disc out and inspect and/or clean it”, “Turn off the Blu-ray player and restart it”, “Check for updates to the Blu-ray player” and all that hokum.

So I’ve sent this replacement disc back too.

I’ve also gone onto Netflix and adjusted my profile. I’m no longer paying the $4/month premium for Blu-ray access. The money isn’t a big deal, but it seems to me I’m paying extra for everything I dislike about new discs that I have absolutely no use for:

  • Super fancy custom menus
    • Just give me a “PLAY” option and don’t hide it or delay it. Better yet, just start the damn movie.
  • Pop-up windows  that block parts of the movie with folks yammering about what a good time they had making the film.
    • For some reason this always defaults to on. I need to figure out (it’s different every time) how to “Enable” the feature, then “Disable” it to get it off my screen.
  • Extra Features
    • I don’t know, am I just from another generation? If I wanted extra features maybe I could just order another disc with only those on it?
    • Deleted scenes, in my experience, were deleted because they were awful. If they weren’t awful they’ll be in the director’s cut in a few months and I can watch them in context then
    • I really don’t care about the behind the scenes action. I like the *movie* precisely because it is fiction. Except for folks who are intent on becoming videographers, I don’t really see the thrill of the behind the scenes action.
  • Stops me from viewing as I see fit.
    • Don’t make me watch those stupid warnings, and those cowardly statements about how, even though you’re publishing this Blu-ray and making all kinds of money from it, you take no responsibility for its content.
    • Don’t make it hard for me to skip the “coming attractions” I’ve either seen them before or I don’t care
  • Do not prevent me from setting bookmarks – how on earth will this jeopardize the profits that are to be made from the sale or rental of this disc?
  • (I think this is just my Blu-ray player rather than Blu-ray per se) Why does it ONLY remember the position of ONLY the Blu-ray disc that’s IN THE MACHINE WHEN I TURN IT OFF? I’ve got scads of storage in that player, surely it can remember the last 50 items I put in there so that it can offer to pick up from where I left off?

FYI I have a Samsung BD-P2500 1080p Blu-ray Disc Player if you have ideas about why “Salt” doesn’t play.

I’m now waiting for the non Blu-ray version of “Salt” to arrive so I can watch it.

Powers of Ten Video

I’ve said it before (it’s buried in there) and this video emphasizes the point. We are not capable of easily comprehending big numbers. Our brains, our frames of reference, our entire life experience and the evolutionary path that led to us are all confined to a reality that seems to consist of around 4 orders of magnitude.

Most of us can easily grasp time in terms of days, weeks and years, but start to move over about 10 years and challenges begin to occur and events blur and merge or degrade. Around 25 years and it seems we are completely divorced from the person that we were over a generation ago. Around 100 years is the limit of true understanding for us. Beyond that, time becomes an intangible backdrop to history yet we can still seem to maintain some kind of understanding and relationship to it if for no other reason than we can still kind of relate to civilizations that have prospered within the 1,000 year time frame. After that, when folks begin to talk in numbers such as 10 thousand years or 1 million years we simply stop trying to grasp the oceans of time we are spanning and recoil into just working with numbers. These spans of time hold no personal relevance for us.

Distance is similar. For the whole of human history before the 20th century, nearly everybody lived, worked and died within tens of miles of  their birthplace. A travel-filled day might involve travel over single digit miles. Our conception of the earth (if we even deigned to consider such esoteric matters) was simply our village (homestead), some neighboring villages (maybe) and then everything else. This map is, while funny, is scarily accurate even today. It’s who and what we are.

Videos such as this can help put our egocentric view of the world into some perspective, but you will still not be able to fully grasp the true magnitude of what is being conveyed after about 4 or 5 orders of magnitude. This informs our view of reality. If we can admit that we have such a weakness with conceptualizing “big” and can be comfortable with that fact, imagine the impact that has when you don’t necessarily *have* to have the answer for everything right *now*….

A full description of this video is available here at the APOD site .