tfl: The Flatiron Life

Sporty Tomaw

Originally uploaded by flatiron32

Proof that Jacob has become a fitness fiend while I am sitting on my arse getting fatter by the day. Yesterday Jacob ran/walked the 3.5 mile JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge. Doesn’t he look sporty and sleek in his race shirt? Also, please implore Jacob to post something so that it does not appear that I have hijacked his site!

Today I was surfing the TV at lunch, when I spotted Gwen Shamblin on The Tyra Banks Show. I know, The Tyra Banks Show is the most ridiculous show on television, what was I thinking? But my mother was on Gwen’s diet a good 10 years ago and I couldn’t pass up a chance to re-explore a forgotten childhood memory. As a know-it-all teenager, I thought this diet was a totally wack, holy-roller plan. Gwen comes with a Southern accent, big hair, and a flamboyant worship style: all the trademarks of the televangelist that you’re not supposed to take seriously; but as I listened to Gwen today, I thought she was on to something. The plan is really no more than AA for overeating, urging people to pay attention to their bodies’ needs, eat small portions slowly, and rely on a healthy dose of faith to get them through times of temptation. The Weighdown Workshop is sort of French Women Don’t Get Fat, which I also like, plus Bible study.

On the slightly wack side, Gwen and some of the Workshop participants seemed to suggest that, when on the verge of succumbing to temptation, God would cause something to happen to the food they were about to eat: cakes falling to the floor, chips flying out of the bag when opened, etc. Since I believe that God allows temptation so that we might exercise our free will, I think you have to expect the outcome of prayer to be a change in perspective rather than circumstances.

I have the utmost respect for people who overcome eating disorders (and I use the term broadly). Most treatment programs for other addictions teach total abstinence, with food that is just not a possibility. I think, in many ways, it takes much more strength to deal with temptations in life through moderation rather than by eliminating them altogether.

Not so quick to the trigger this month, a few days ago I found myself forced to purchase new 41¢ Forever Stamps in order to mail my bills. Now, for at least the last three summers, I’ve had to listen to program after program talking of collusion, greed, and downright blood sucking from oil companies as the price of gasoline rises with summer demand only to find deafening silence and, what I hope to be feigned, ignorance from the media as gasoline prices again fall during the winter months. So with this new postage hike I wondered: When was the last time the price of postage dropped? July 1, 1919, apparently. To be fair, postage rates have pretty much kept pace with inflation. However, while I don’t exactly have hard data to prove it, I find it very hard to believe that average consumers are demanding even the same amount of standard first class postal services that they were in 1919. When is the last time you wrote a letter to Grandma? And who’s bilking you?

I have a few of ideas in mind as to why USPS decided to introduce the Forever Stamp, all stemming, naturally, from the desire to pump up revenues. We are, after all, supposed to jump on this arbitrage, right? Buying up Forever Stamps now in hopes to benefit in the event of future rate hikes? Maybe USPS is buying off the average consumer; a wink and a nod for subsidizing junk mail. (Notice that the bulk rate for first class letters is only 31 to 37¢ depending on the level of automation purchased.) Perhaps USPS hopes to economize on the cost of printing when it increases postage prices. Or, my most conspiratorial theory, maybe this is some endgame strategy that USPS thinks we haven’t figured out yet; one last-ditch effort to get a big demand for stamps before the service dwindles into Jimmy Carter-like irrelevancy.

But really, why would we rush to buy? If, as I mentioned, demand for standard first class postage is on the decline, then those of us left holding stamps that we value less than the price we paid for them will find ourselves unwitting competitors to the USPS in a saturated market, selling our stamps at a loss or trashing them altogether. If you already bought a gazillion Forever Stamps, I recommend short selling, now.

I am ordering today’s posts in terms of chronology and not importance, so number two today is my now public pregnancy.

As Jacob has mentioned, I am due shortly after Thanksgiving, which makes me three months pregnant this week. In two weeks I will proudly be able to say I am in my second trimester. I can already tell that the second trimester is much better than the first. I have recently outgrown most of my pants, but on the upside my nausea has subsided and I can now have a good workout at the gym without having to nap for three hours later in the afternoon.

We have seen pictures of the baby and we have heard its heart beat. I have always thought that women are overly sentimental about their babies’ vitals in early pregnancy, but now I realize how shockingly real the whole thing becomes. This is a person in my body that will, God willing, grow up and have a job and a family of its own.

As I consider the life I desire for my children, I find that my concerns run counter to those that I am told I should have. My biggest fears are not that my child will die in a car accident because his or her car seat is turned the wrong way, not that he or she will ingest hormone laced beef, not that TV and computers will tarnish his innocence or reduce her attention span. I am sincerely most worried that my child will face an homogenized, dumbed-down world that is uninteresting and unchallenging. I hope my fears are irrational.

Nothing sticks in my craw like bad customer service.

I recently completed a grueling internship experience that amounted to something of a finance boot camp. My supervisors for this internship had expectations that far exceeded those of any supervisor or professor I have ever encountered, and I certainly fell short many times. The bottom line is, I believe that when you have a job, you should care about doing it well, and when you mess up, you should apologize, learn from your mistakes and do the best you can to rectify the situation.

Domicile Furniture, on October 24th, 2006, promised us a custom upholstered sofa in 8 to 10 weeks. When our sofa arrived in the store five months later, they offered us, approximately, a 10% refund; I told them that I did not feel this was sufficient remuneration. After much arm-twisting, Domicile agreed to a 20% refund.

Oh, how I wish I had told you the last of it. The sofa was delivered to our home and did not fit through our downstairs hallway. Our only choice was to have it shipped back to Domicile. Was this an inconvenience to Domicile? Yes, I will admit that, for a matter of days, it was. I called Domicile to see if we could get a refund, and they told me that my options were to receive full store credit for another sofa or a refund of all but $250! $250 just for them to ship the sofa back to the store and re-sell it, I’m certain, at full mark-up. I explained to the store manager that, had the sofa been delivered in a timely manner, this $250 fee would apply, but we had been inconvenienced for six months and never received the 20% compensation. The manager replied to me that he understood and that’s why he offered the full store credit. Ha! As if he did not know that this was a zero value alternative for me? I told him that I have no intention of ever doing business with Domicile ever again and, like a snot-nosed little know-it-all, he replied, “Just a tip, ma’am, when you’re trying to work something out with someone, you shouldn’t tell them that you never want to do business with them again.” In shock at the nerve of this snake oil salesman, I told him that I was not trying to haggle for a deal, if I had been interested in that, I would have done so when I initially purchased the sofa. Rather, his store failed to deliver on the terms of its contract and for six months I lost the opportunity to either purchase a new sofa or, at the very least, collect interest on the money I had tied up in a sofa with Domicile. I seriously needed to explain to the man that I deserved compensation for the time I wasted trying to do business with his store!

So he sighed and said, “Fine, just pay the $95 delivery fee and we’ll wash our hands of it.” Now, I really think I should have told him to go ahead and deduct the $95 from the 20% refund that they were going to give me at first, but I was starting to feel like a cartoon version of myself, steam pouring out of my ears. I am a stubborn Swede; “letting things go” is really not my strong suit. I guess I paid a $95 “get Domicile off my back” fee. In the end, we got 90% of our money back and immediately ordered a new sofa and chair from another store, which was delivered in a matter of weeks.

Why do I consistently feel as though I need to explain customer service to people? Doesn’t anybody have standards anymore? Why should I ever feel as though I have made an unreasonable demand by asking a person to do his job? I can certainly sympathize with people when they make mistakes so long as they approach the problem with an air of humility and accountability. Just fess up and make it right, for crying out loud! It’s human decency!

I certainly would have been fired from my internship for the kind of attitude I experienced at Domicile.

I am a highly self-conscious communicator, so please be kind. However, there have been recent developments in the Tomaw family that seem to merit some comment from Wifey.

I am please to welcome the beautiful Joscelynn Gagnon Tomaw, also know as my wife, to tfl. Welcome her on board and be prepared for some excellent content.

I don’t want to elaborate on a discussion I had at work today that led to this exclamation. However, I want you all to think about it. What do you believe? Does it stand up to scrutiny? Is it so nuanced that it cannot be considered a principle, a central personal axiom, on which you base your life?

If you find yourself advocating any positions that cannot be dissolved into a concrete unwavering principle, stop advocating them.

For the record, ‘I want everyone to be better off’ is not a principle; It is part of being the social organizm called Human. Principles are the core beliefs on how this can be achieved.

This would have to be my first principle. ‘Believe in something unwavering. Challenge it everyday. Defend it everyday.’

Because of this principle, I find I have more respect for ardent communists and theocrats than I do for modern liberals and some conservatives. I disagree with communists and theocrats, but I cannot challenge that they have principles and that they base their policies on these principles.

What are your principles?

What do you believe in?

Baby2, originally uploaded by flatiron32.

A few weeks ago, Joscelynn came home and told me “I think I am pregnant”

I asked why she thought that. She went on to explain that two home test had told her so.

We are very excited to have this little bundle of joy growing inside of her. The baby may be coming earlier than we expected in out lives, but now we cannot imagine what life would be like if it were not.

Just after Thanksgiving is when the baby’s rent comes due. We are going to have a lot to be thankful for.

Thank you to all of you for the support I know you will give us and the love you show everyday.

I will keep you posted.

Bastille Circle, originally uploaded by flatiron32.

Above is a picture of Place de la Bastille, where angry little socialists have been showing how they value personal property rights for the last two nights. This demonstration comes on the heels of Nicolas Sarkozy being elected the 23rd President of the Republic of France (8th of the Fifth). Sarkozy want to unleash the economic power that France has displayed in the past by removing some of the social safety net and labor laws. You might call it Americanization.

I am sure I disagree with almost everything Socialist Party chief Francois Hollande wants politically, but he said something very important about our (France’s and that of these United States) form of government, i.e. the republic.

“We are in a republic, where universal suffrage is the only law we know. There can be disappointment, there can be anger, there can be frustration. But the only way to react is to take up your ballots, not other weapons.”

We among the few states where sovereign individuals have been able to choose their form of Government. Generally we are proud of the fact that power transfers peacfully in our republics, I think education is part of Sarkozy’s plan also.