Normally, this wouldn't be a problem. Okay, well, it would. I should know -- I was a part of the last spillover problem, and that shit still gets bitched about. But...this was a very special, weird e-domestic-dispute containing spillover.

And it turned into a strange revenge-botting. By which I mean 'some idiot fills the room with similarly named sockpuppets to prevent others from getting into the room, in order to 'shut it down''.

Somehow, it had something to do with Islam:2 being full of bots, and...possibly someone from Islam:2 having looked at the chat list and noticing Religion:1 once. I honestly don't know -- there was zero sense being made.

I decided to go beyond zero sense, and into negative sense. I reported the user to Yahoo.

Subject: Auto Confirmation - Your Yahoo! Abuse support request was received
From: Yahoo! Customer Care [reportabuse@cc.yahoo-inc.com]
Date: 02-Mar-10 11:59

Hello,

This is an automated message regarding your recent request for Yahoo!
Abuse Customer Care support. We have received your message and will
respond within the next 48 hours with an answer.

Thank you for reaching out to us. We look forward to helping you!

Sincerely,

Yahoo! Customer Care

**Please do not respond to this message as no one will receive it.

That'd be their response. Also, there's more:

Subject: Re: Other Abuse (Not Listed)
From: Yahoo! Customer Care [reportabuse@cc.yahoo-inc.com]
Date: 02-Mar-10 19:42

Hello,

Thank you for writing to Yahoo! Customer Care.

We appreciate your report of abuse in Yahoo! Chat. I understand that you
would like to report abuse in Yahoo! Chat. However, I need some more
information from you first before I can further investigate your issue.

Please provide the following if you haven't already:

- Exact Yahoo! ID that you are reporting

- Your Yahoo! ID

- Name of the Chat room involved

If possible (and if you haven't already), please provide us a copy of
the harassment. You can do this by sending us a copy of the chat log
file. To do this you must turn on Chat Archiving in your Messenger
software.

While in Messenger:

1. Click on "Messenger" at the top of the client.

2. Click on "Preferences."

3. Click on "Archive."

4. Select "Yes, save all of my messages."

5. Click the "Apply" button.

6. Click the "OK" button.

If the abuse occurs again, please copy and paste the contents of the
archive with that particular user into your email to us.

To view your archived chat:

While in Messenger:

1. Click on "Messenger" at the top of the client.

2. Click on "Preferences."

3. Click on "Archive."

4. Click on the "View Archive" button.

5. Select the user you are reporting from the list in the left window.

6. Copy and Paste the offending text into an email to us.

Once we have received the necessary information, we can continue to
investigate this issue.

Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care.

Regards,

Jay Tyler

Yahoo! Chat Abuse

69004043

http://www.yahoo.com/

Original Message Excluded:
--------------------------

Okay. I can do that. I reply, keeping everything intact -- including the reference number in the subject line [which I've excluded here]. I find it a bit odd that I'm supposed to reply to this one, but not the other one, because they're the same email addresses. I figure it has something to do with the reference number...in the subject line.

But, whatever. It's Yahoo. There's probably some sort of method by which emails are sorted, right?

Subject: Re: Other Abuse (Not Listed)
Date: 03-Mar-10 11:13

Exact Yahoo ID: leprinced_de_deutschland
My Yahoo ID: Hunter.the_CrazyChick
Name of Chatroom Involved: Religion:1 [and possibly Islam:2]

The bots leprinced_de_deutschland used followed a naming pattern. s##s_gizmo_# [where # represents a numerical digit]. 'gizmo' was sometimes 'gizmodo' or 'gizmosaurus'. I think there were also instances of broken_gizmo. I can't be sure, as they don't show up in my logs.
Portions of the archive:

leprinced_de_deutschland: [15] we not play
dancingwithmisty: GO BACK TO IT, IF IT'S SO WONDERFUL
leprinced_de_deutschland: [16] LOCK
dancingwithmisty: R1 will NEVER be Islam2
demonrald: Mic ain't workin'
leprinced_de_deutschland: [17] unrstand?
demonrald: Audiho is lying.
leprinced_de_deutschland: [18] r1 b close
leprinced_de_deutschland: [19] LOK
audiho: dem, fuck you.
demonrald: She studies aberrant psychology.
audiho: :-?
demonrald: Especially guys who have bunny fixations.
dancingwithmisty: Get OUT
leprinced_de_deutschland: [20] thank lava
leprinced_de_deutschland: [21] ur name get lok now
demonrald: damn it
dancingwithmisty: Lava isn't even in here. GET OUT
audiho: oh, julio. :(
audiho: dem, your mic sucks, your life sucks, just kill yourself
leprinced_de_deutschland: [22] end of talk

leprinced_de_deutschland: [60] thank 2 lava
leprinced_de_deutschland: [61] n u r homo
leprinced_de_deutschland: [62] all ur name lok

leprinced_de_deutschland: [64] tel lave revove bot in islam chat and this bots leave

leprinced_de_deutschland: [84] when wickd pull bot from 2 I pill bot here
leprinced_de_deutschland: [85] this is deal no exce3ption

leprinced_de_deutschland: [89] gump name get loked now

leprinced_de_deutschland: [90] rel 1 closing down 2day
leprinced_de_deutschland: [91] find new rom
leprinced_de_deutschland: [92] hunter no talk
leprinced_de_deutschland: [93] name lok

Rough translation: he intended to shut down Religion:1 by filling it with bots. He also repeatedly threatened to lock other user names. He wasn't able to, but this doesn't change the threats or his intention to do so.

Apparently, he was back during the night, while I was asleep. It's likely that he'll also return today, but I probably won't have any record of that as I've ignored him.
Thank you for not sending me an auto-response asking me to ignore the individual.

So, there you have it -- my reply. Everything they asked for, right?

Subject: Re: Other Abuse (Not Listed)
From: reportabuse@cc.yahoo-inc.com
Date: 03-Mar-10 19:35

Hello,

Thank you for writing to Yahoo! Customer Care.

The Yahoo! Customer Care team that supports Chat issues is primarily
English-speaking.

Please forward a translation of the information and we will review the
situation further and take appropriate action.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care.

Regards,

Yahoo! Chat Abuse

69004043

http://www.yahoo.com/

Did you catch that?

If you're beating your head on your desk right now, or executing the world's largest and most emphatic facepalm, you're reacting exactly how I reacted. Except...I don't have a desk, so I couldn't really 'headdesk'. And I honestly couldn't decide which was more...warranted. I think both. Or at least some image of something else doing it -- a cute kitten with its face buried in its paws on the floor, or Puppet Angel, or, y'know, something less used than Picard. Maybe Jon Stewart.

Anyway, I replied:

Subject: Re: Other Abuse (Not Listed)
Date: 03-Mar-10 21:12

What I sent you *was* in English.

Which should've been the end of it.

Subject: Re: Other Abuse (Not Listed)
From: Yahoo! Chat chat-advocacy@cc.yahoo-inc.com
Date: 04-Mar-10 16:27

Hello,

Thank you for writing to Yahoo! Chat.

We appreciate your report of abuse in Yahoo! Chat. I understand that you
would like to report abuse in Yahoo! Chat. However, I need some more
information from you first before I can further investigate your issue.

Please provide the following if you haven't already:

- Exact Yahoo! ID that you are reporting

- Your Yahoo! ID

- Name of the Chat room involved

If possible (and if you haven't already), please provide us a copy of
the harassment. You can do this by sending us a copy of the chat log
file. To do this you must turn on Chat Archiving in your Messenger
software.

While in Messenger:

1. Click on "Messenger" at the top of the client.

2. Click on "Preferences."

3. Click on "Archive."

4. Select "Yes, save all of my messages."

5. Click the "Apply" button.

6. Click the "OK" button.

If the abuse occurs again, please copy and paste the contents of the
archive with that particular user into your email to us.

To view your archived chat:

While in Messenger:

1. Click on "Messenger" at the top of the client.

2. Click on "Preferences."

3. Click on "Archive."

4. Click on the "View Archive" button.

5. Select the user you are reporting from the list in the left window.

6. Copy and Paste the offending text into an email to us.

Once we have received the necessary information, we can continue to
investigate this issue.

Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! Chat.

Regards,

Jay Tyler

Yahoo! Chat Abuse

69004043

http://www.yahoo.com/

Original Message Excluded:
--------------------------

Yeah. That feeling you have? You have read this before. It's pretty much the same, except for, y'know, the chat part.

So I sent them the same email as before, but with this line on the end:

That's all in English. I can't do much of anything to translate it into anything else, because 'can't type' isn't another language. This is pretty much what I've already sent to you before.

Their response? Scroll up to the last email they sent me. That was their response.

All I've learned from this is that the system that sorts their emails involves a beach pail of d100s on an uneven table and the Lemarchand Configuration.

I've been happy with the 510, but, after playing around with Gremlin's Blu for a couple of days, I wanted something like it. Research led me to the M401, and LiteCigUSA.net. I heard good things about the 401, and great things about the customer service at LiteCigUSA.

I wanted to try the Dragon, which is advertised over at the blucigforum, but I never got a reply to the email I sent. The guy over at LiteCigUSA responded very, very quickly. Also, his kits were a better value -- cheaper, with more stuff in it. I went for the hybrid kit.

One M401 battery, one M402 battery, two atomisers [one with a silver band, and one with a gold -- not sure if that's significant].

And it's in stainless steel. Which I thought was pretty. And much easier to find among all my black.

It's all very nicely packaged in this spiffy little box with a magnetic latchy thing. I'm using it to keep everything together now.

The charger is USB, and it comes with a little adapter for plugging it into a regular electrical outlet. It's funny -- I've been wanting one of those USB to wall adapters forever, and now I've got three in the house from various things.

...and I thought this was funny. If you can't see it, here's what it says:

No pollution • no flame • nonflammable • no electromagnetic radiation • no carbon monoxide • no ignition

Nice to know. Y'know, about the electromagnetic radiation.

And, if you're wondering, the manual is very, very funny.

Then there was this. This was kinda...disappointing. The reason I didn't want to order until I heard back from someone was because I wanted to see if it was possible to get blank cartridges instead of Marlboro, since I'm really not fond of even the smell of real Marlboro cigarettes. Shawn at LiteCig said it was [much like the guy at MidwestVapor], so that [along with the price and contents of the kit] kinda swayed me to purchasing from there.

It was fine, though. I emailed him again, thanking him for the fast shipping, and letting him know that everything was working out okay, and asking if there'd been a problem after all with switching the Marlboro for blanks. He replied [again, promptly] saying that he must've forgotten, and immediately sent me a tracking number. Because he was sending me blank cartridges.

They arrived yesterday. There are ten of them. Ten.

And, yes, I know that they're probably the cheapest possible item in the store -- anyone running one of these businesses probably orders them in bulk, getting them for, at most, fifty cents each. But it was just...nice. Very nice.

That's the website in the background. I figured, since it'd probably be a crappy picture anyway, I might as well make it an interestingly crappy picture.

So, LiteCigUSA. Great customer service. Good [probably great] prices. I'd shop there again -- I probably will, when the chargers come back in stock. If they had 36mg liquid, I'd really be into them, since e-smokeytreats just discontinued 36mg....

As for the 401, it's nice. I'm using it more than the 510. The batteries seem to last a bit longer, and I may be imagining it, but the flavours seem to come through a bit more. I actually like it as much as I liked the Blu.

I'm not sure what else there is to say about it, so I'll stop here.

I'll explain why later. First, it seems I need to apply another update....

Yeah, I know. You're probably all familiar with my history of experiences with customer service, and how bad it usually is, so any good customer service could be considered to be 'unexpected'. But I do know the difference between 'appropriate levels of customer service' and 'above and beyond'.

I just had one of those experiences that, while maybe not 'above and beyond', is at least living across the street from it.

Last week, after ordering and trying some 'tasters' from NuVape, I decided that the only flavour I really liked enough to order a bunch of was Cola. Because I like e-smokeytreats' Vanilla more. And I can't fault them for that -- vanilla's hard. And neither of them quite got the chocolate I was looking for [JohnsonCreek did that]. I did like their Grape, but I don't think I could stand much of it. So: cola. Because it tastes like a coke icee from Hills.

There was a problem, though. They ran out of PG Cola, and only had non-PG. They offered a substitution, which I accepted, but not without expressing a concern that it might not taste as good.

And, to me, it doesn't. But that's not the only problem.

The bottle leaked during shipping. There was an oily, Cola-smelling residue all over the inside of the packaging. Which sucked. So, I emailed Nuvape to tell them about it.

They got back to me today. With a tracking number. They're sending me the PG Cola I originally ordered. All they asked was that I send a picture of the bottle, if I could. Not necessary, really. It'd just be a good way to encourage the people filling the bottles to seal them properly.

So, I took a picture of it, showing the oddly faded, kinda messy Nuvape/Cola branding label, and the smeary, almost-unreadable nicotine level sticker [which, oddly enough, becomes almost readable when the flash goes off]. And I thanked them.

Because I never actually expected anything out of them. Because, for me, normal customer service really does border on being ignored....

Good on you, NuVape. You've earned yourself a repeat customer. And maybe some referrals.

I told them to redeliver it Tuesday [online, while making sure I could do that over the phone].

I wait up on Tuesday to make sure I get it.

It's Wednesday now. Guess what....

Yeah. Still don't have it. Because the mailman didn't have it on Tuesday, and he said maybe today. So, when I didn't get it today, I called the stupid 800 number again. And they gave me the number of the main post office here.

And they said they'd have the supervisor call me back. But I'm kinda thinking I won't get that callback.

So, maybe I should be rude and call again.

...and I'm glad I did. Although, it's possible I may've gotten a wrong number, because I got a polite, reasonably intelligent, very helpful woman who actually tracked down the package and said she'd make sure it got out to me tomorrow, and that she'd make sure the mailman waited for me to get to the door.

But I'm still not buying any stamps. Because, really, anyone that helpful isn't going to last long.

Yeah, it's weird. But it suited me.

I may've covered all this before, thinking about it, but...what the hell. I'll say it all again, because I'd rather not talk about anything else right now.

...so I got this watch. And about a month after I got it -- the night I got the monitor back from Acer, and was reformatting Gremlin's tower -- that funny little scratch appeared...that turned into a crack. Today, it was a good quarter inch nasty thing right across the face.

Today, in spite of all my craptastic 'luck', we made it to Kohls to see if we could swap it out, because Nike said I should try that first. Something about Kohls having a very fair return policy.

Boy do they ever....

I was intending to exchange it, but they only had one that was metallic pink, and the numbers weren't even inverted. So, no.

But they took it back. More than a month after I purchased it, with obvious damage [which wasn't my fault]. Full refund.

So...that was good. Kinda sad, because I'd gotten really used to having that watch, but...I'll get over it.

But, yay Kohls.

Exciting, huh?

I think that was Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. That was when I discovered that my new watch was broken.

You can probably guess when that happened. I had to set the timezone and check the clock during that stage of the reformat, and suddenly...what the hell? There's a line across the face of my watch.

Must be a hair, right? Nope. It doesn't go away when I brush at it.

Must be a scratch. How annoying. But...I don't remember doing anything to scratch it.

...except...it's slowly getting worse.

Today, it's very obviously a large crack. A large, spontaneously forming crack. In the face of my nice, new sports watch.

So I email Nike.

Nike understands that I am disappointed. Nike is sorry that my watch did this. Nike says I should try to exchange the watch at the store I purchased it from, because they understand that this store has a very fair return policy.

If that doesn't work, Nike would like me to send the watch off to some place I've never heard of, and that, if they find that this random, spontaneous crack is actually my fault [what are the odds?], I'll have to pay for the repair. And if it's not my fault, I'll still have to pay for certain things.

Which sucks. A lot. I really liked the watch. It had two timezone settings, and it was comfy, and I haven't lost it yet.

I think I'm going to save the rest of the 'long couple of days' for another post, though.

And today, I get a call from someone -- I never got her name, or, rather I never understood it because she must've been talking to me through a slab of styrofoam wrapped cheese, or something -- telling me to call her back at her direct line.

Why? Because they have a monitor that doesn't match any of their records.

Lucky me.

So I go looking for the email I got from the guy that set everything up for the repair...and for my phone charger. And I give her a call.

Unfortunately, she has not replaced her phone in the twenty or so minutes since she called me. Joy.

"We have a monitor here that doesn't match anything in our system. It is not registered."

"Except it is registered, and it is in your system for a repair."

"Well, what's the name on the account."

I tell her, and she proceeds to do that annoying thing where she decides my name has all these vowels in it that it doesn't.

...and then she discovers that it's 'my fault' that it's not in the system, because there was supposed to be a B instead of an 8. Except it was very clearly an 8. But they couldn't clear that up because they didn't know my name....

Except, how in the fuck did she get my phone number if she didn't know my name?

Except...no.

See, as it turns out, there's no website for that. And I should've guessed, really, since all of Acer's websites seem to go from URL to URL in this shoddy, horrible sort of way.

And I really, really shouldn't have called today, when my head hurts, because obviously the stars have aligned in such a way as to force me to actually talk to a person named Shaniqua. Or whatever the hell the name was...it sounded like Shaniqua, it really did.

Maybe it was Shanaquina, or something equally stupid. Whatever it was, the instant I heard it, I knew I was in for some badness....

This isn't a racist thing, either. If some white mother named her kid that, I'd know that the kid was likely to be stupid, too. Because it's genetic, and no ammount of good genes from the father is going to make up for the supermassive black hole that is the 'Shaniqua' gene.

I start by saying, "I sent in a monitor to have it repaired, because it broke after maybe nine months of use, and I've got this reference number here...I'd like to know if there's a website where I can use it to track the status of the repair."

"Repair? Can you confirm your serial number?"

"I just want to know if there's a website...."

...but, apparently, she needs me to confirm my sereal number, so I dig out the photos of the monitor....

"Okay, ETL95...."

"No, your serial number is going to start with [two letters I didn't catch] or P[something]."

"...it didn't last time I called in...."

"What?"

"I said: This is what the serial number was when I called in on Thursday about the monitor being broken. The person who gave me the Reference Number was okay with the serial number I gave him at the time...."

"Well, do you have a Service [something something something]."

"I have a REFERENCE NUMBER."

"What is it?"

"13EDX...."

"13EIX?"

I correct her, read the rest of the number off to her, and she disappears for a while. I'm subjected to a strange, tinny combination of hip hop and country.

She returns, "When did you send this out? Friday?"

"I would have to check to be precise, but I'm fairly certain it was Thursday."

"Okay, well, it says here that...."

"It was delivered today. I know. I have the signature of the person who signed for it. All I want to know is if there's a website where I can use the REFERENCE NUMBER I got on THURSDAY to check on the STATUS of the REPAIR and/or REPLACEMENT of the MONITOR."

"Oh, a website? No, you have to call us and give us the number. And you need to give us some time."

"So, I should call back on Friday...."

"Yes. [Something about Friday, time, and possibly Spam.]"

"Okay, then. Bye."

"Have a nice day."

I hung up. And now I'm very concerned about what's going to happen next, because shit like this is never, ever a good sign.

I ordered a part for the [currently unlocated] Atari on the 18th, and the part arrived today.

I also had some problems ordering from them -- the paypal link would fail halfway through. When I sent a message mentioning it, I got a quick response.

Both of these things are fairly impressive, to me.

There's also Aurora Family Cycles, which is a small, family-owned bike store with very reasonable prices on parts [the seat I bought recently was cheaper there than online, which is rare].

The guy who runs the place remembered us from a visit that I barely remember, last year.

I figure they're both worth mentioning, even though one is extremely local. It's always nice when good customer service happens, and people should know that I don't just mention it when it's bad.