AT&T Wireless FAIL - but not the way you might think

So everybody has been picking on AT&T about their spotty coverage in large metro areas where people are gobbling down bandwidth using their smart phones. That's not my issue. Though I'd like a smart phone, I'm not high enough up the ladder to score one at work, and I can't justify carrying two cell phones. So I suffer with my company-issued phone.

For years I could send short e-mail messages to my cell phone at [phone number]@mmode.com. I used it to receive voicemail notifications from Vonage. Airlines used it to send me flight status notifications. And in July it just stopped working without any warning.

When I spoke with our AT&T account representative today, I was told that she didn't know about mmode.com (it's pre-Cingular merger technology) and wasn't sure why the @txt.att.net address that newer phones use wouldn't work (Kate has an iPhone with a functioning @txt.att.net address). She also wasn't aware that they had pulled the plug on mmode.com e-mail. She was apologetic, but not helpful in solving the problem. Her proposed solution was to migrate me to a new device and a new SIM card.

I know that my phone is old. Actually, ancient in wireless technology terms. But it does support GSM, which seems to be the lowest common denominator these days. I'm finding that support of pre-merger "blue" plans and phones is non-existent. Basically. AT&T is providing an inferior experience in the hope that everybody moves to a more expensive "non-blue" plan that is properly supported.

What I find most appalling is that AT&T clearly states in their FAQ that "all [AT&T] wireless phones are set up to send and receive email messages by using the following address: yournumber@txt.att.net. You can exchange short emails with any email address worldwide." There's no caveats about phones on old blue plans. As I read this, all means all -- it doesn't mean some or most.

See for yourself at:
http://www.wireless.att.com/learn/messaging-internet/messaging/faq.jsp#email

The thread on the AT&T forum about this can be found at:
http://forums.wireless.att.com/t5/mMode/URGENT-mmode-down-again-Their-mta01-cdpd-airdata-com-mail-server/td-p/1939480

There are currently 12 pages worth of feedback on the AT&T community Web site about this, so clearly there are more than just a "handful" of people with older "blue" plans. Is anybody else out there reading my blog having the same problem?

First Tomato of the Season

After letting our garden plot lay fallow for two years, we decided to plant something in it this year. We were mainly encouraged by Kate's parents buying us a "grow your own vegetables" pack that included onions, potatoes, and garlic. We opted to not try the lettuce, carrots, and tomato seeds that came in the pack.

At the beginning of the season our neighbor, Dennis, was nice enough to till the land for us, which made it so much easier to plant. He also provided some corn seed, which has done amazingly well. We bought an assortment of tomato plants from Lowe's, which seem to have done very well.

Our first tomatoes were ready for picking this week. Here is a picture of one of the first tomatoes to come off the vine. We have not yet sliced one to taste the summery goodness.

Wailin Jennys come to Jim Thorpe

Kate and I headed to Jim Thorpe on Friday, July 30, 2010 to see the Wailin' Jennys at the Mauch Chunk Opera House. I had first heard the Jennys on a Prairie Home Companion broadcast a few years ago. I was attracted by their hauntingly beautiful three-part vocal harmonies. When we heard they were coming to Jim Thorpe and tickets were reasonably priced, it was a no-brainer.

The opening act was Mike and Ruthy, a folk-rock group from Woodstock, NY. They were talented musicians and a fitting act to share the stage with the Jennys.

After about four songs by Mike and Ruthy, the Jennys took the stage. The venue was small enough that the performance felt intimate. The Jennys were familiar with the Opera House from a concert they had recorded there in August 2008.

Towards the end of the concert, I was able to snap this picture of the Jennys. From left to right are Heather Masse, Nicky Mehta, Ruth Moody, and Jeremy Penner.

My Review of GE ADER65LN White Dehumidifier

Originally submitted at Abt Electronics

GE ADER65LN White Dehumidifier - ADER65/ 65 Dehumidification Pints Per Day/ R-410A Refrigerant/ Electronic Controls/ Low Temperature Operation/ Front Condensate Bucket With Water Level Indicator/ Automatic Shut-Off System When Bucket Fills/ Washable Air Filter/ Automatic Defrost Control/ White Fini...

GE ADER65LN White Dehumidifier

Strong performance, great price

By DoctorScott from Allentown, PA on 6/16/2010

 

4out of 5

Pros: Effective, Energy Efficient

Best Uses: Dank Basement

Describe Yourself: Homeowner

Primary use: Personal

One year ago my wife and I purchased a GE AHR65LM dehumidifier to tame the dampness in our finished basement. Due to the size of the basement (~1200 square feet), we knew just one dehumidifier probably wouldn't do the trick.

As of January 1, 2010, GE stopped making the AHR65LM and replaced it with the ADER65LN. From the outside, the two look identical. A call to GE's tech support desk revealed that the change between the models was the refrigerant used. The change was mandated by the US government and affects all air conditioners and dehumidifiers. The new one uses R-410A refrigerant. They apparently also lowered the MSRP during the model change.

So far the ADER65LN has been just as effective as the AHR65LM. The two units working in tandem have kept our basement humidity at a reasonable 45% even during a damp spring.

(legalese)

Airfare craziness...

I'd love to meet the people who come up with airfares. Of course, there may not actually be people who do this. A psychotic computer may have the job all to itself.

While recently traveling through Allentown's airport (ABE), I noticed a new banner by the escalators announcing the arrival of American Airlines at our airport. ABE is a surprisingly well-served airport that has almost all of the "major" legacy carriers (Delta/Northwest, United, USAirways, Continental) plus some smaller and newer discount airlines (Allegiant, Direct Air, AirTran) and one international carrier (Air Canada). The obvious legacy airline missing is American.

A quick search on the AA.com web site reveled three flights a day between Chicago O'Hare (ORD) and Allentown starting on June 10, 2010. Until now, United has had a lock on that route and it has been pricey. Thinking that competition may bring down the price of this route and allow Kate and me to visit her brother and sister-in-law in Chicago over the summer, I went in search of cheap airfares. No dice -- they are still high at around $400 even though nearly all of the seats are still available. Its seems that they want to fly empty planes for the first couple weeks.

But what if I want to fly through Chicago onto another airport relatively close to Chicago? On a whim I selected Milwaukee (MKE) to check fares. Actually, it was more than a whim since Kate and I would like to see the Kohler factory in Milwaukee some day, so maybe this would be a good opportunity. The fare for the same flights on American Airlines through Chicago and then connecting to Milwaukee is $239.

I'm trying to understand this... I can occupy an airplane seat for an additional 90 minutes during which time the airline will have to spend money on fuel and labor, and will contribute to CO2 emissions and ultimately global warming as they shuttle me from Chicago to Milwaukee, but I will save $160? Is there a secret organization subsidizing the flights to Milwaukee?

Living in a winter wonderland

We got a few inches of snow over the weekend -- the first appreciable snowfall this season. It looked nice and wasn't much of a bother. I didn't even have to bring out the snow blower since the driveway and sidewalk essentially melted themselves. Just a little bit of shoveling in the shadows was all I needed to do.

Lulu celebrates Halloween in stride

Lulu's alter ego made her annual appearance on Halloween. This year she posed as a "Lulu bug."



As in past years, she didn't tolerate anything on her head for very long. She seemed pleased once she was freed from the costume, but showed her angst on one of her stuffed toys later in the evening. "Ugly Monster," as this green beast had become known, met a horrible fate and was found in pieces behind the couch. Lulu doesn't know it, but we have a back-up Ugly Monster waiting in her toy box. Hopefully Ugly Monster II won't meet the same fate as its predecessor.

Resizing a Windows Virtual PC 2007 disk

I love challenges at work. Recently I had to import a large volume of laboratory data into a virtual testing environment. It went OK until I ran out of virtual disk space in my Virtual PC.

Unfortunately, there is no native way to expand the size of a virtual hard drive (vhd) file in Virtual PC 2007. After a few minutes of searching the Web, I stumbled across a Web site that showed the process.

The resizing tool download was free (after Web site registration) and worked flawlessly. I had difficulty getting gparted working under Virtual PC (no surprise there since it's a linux-based product forced to work under Windows). A few magical command line options during the gparted boot (vga=791 noreplace-paravirt) did the trick. The virtual PC now thinks it has a 25 GB disk and the data load can continue.

Fiction: End of the Line

I was recently on a flight on United Airlines through Chicago to Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. I thoroughly enjoyed this short piece of fiction in the Hemispheres magazine. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

Read the article on the Hemispheres Magazine Web site by clicking here: End of the Line

Beginning of the end of volunteer EMS in NJ

Sad as it is, another volunteer squad in NJ has closed its doors.

See the article here.

I could have predicted this when I was living in northern New Jersey earlier this decade. With the reduction of volunteerism comes the end of volunteer ambulance squads. Many squads in Bergen County and throughout New Jersey will face tough questions about consolidation in upcoming years. The idea of home rule that is rampant in NJ will be trumped by the reality that each little town, village, or borough doesn't need its own BLS ambulance squad running less than 1,000 calls per year. I predict that larger regional squads running a few thousand calls would be much more efficient. The counter-argument would say that a regional system might lack the down-home neighborly feel the current system provides, but I'd rather have a reliable and cost-effective ambulance service than an unreliable "home town" squad that might not get out the door when the pager tones sound.

My Review of GE JX2030 Deluxe 30 Inch Trim Kit For 2.0 or 1.8 Cu. Ft. Microwave Ovens

Rainbow Appliance

This deluxe trim kit allows for a GE countertop microwave oven to be Installed in a wall or cabinet alone or over a GE 30" single electric wall oven. It can also be Installed over a GE convection wall oven for a complete convection cooking center. This trim kit will enhance any ...

GE JX2030 Deluxe 30 Inch Trim Kit For 2.0 or 1.8 Cu. Ft. Microwave Ovens

Not much to this trm kit

Doctor Scott Allentown, PA 6/26/2009

3 5

Pros: Attractive Design

Cons: Poor packaging, Expensive for what it is

Describe Yourself: Casual Cook

If you have a GE microwave and need a wall-mount trim kit, the choices are limited. This trim kit looks nice, and matches the design of the microwave perfectly. It's expensive for a piece of powder coated steel, but I can't blame Rainbow Appliance for GE sticking it to the consumer for such a niche item.

This trim kit was delivered damaged. We bought our new appliances ahead of time and stored them in their original packaging in another room while the kitchen was being remodeled. The damage was not obvious until the package was opened 6 weeks later when the kitchen contractor went to install it. Customer service was not helpful, saying we should have contacted them sooner to report the issue. I suppose we could have fought with the credit card company and disputed the charge, but it wasn't worth the trouble. The bottom line is that we won't be buying from Rainbow Appliance again and I'm displaying my frustration at their lack of customer care in this review.

Annoying eFax Spam

I thought the days of getting spammed on a fax machine were over. I was wrong.

Twice over the last two days I have received eerily similar faxes on my free eFax number. I don't mind the fax spam so much since it doesn't really cost me anything. But if this keeps up, I will exceed my "free" incoming fax pages allotment and eFax will revoke my account.

Anybody looking for discounted health care plans?




For anybody else facing a similar issue, there is a way to report junk faxes to eFax:
http://www.efax.com/about-us?tab=reportSpam, but keep in mind that reporting a fax as spam doesn't reduce the number of pages counted against your free monthly allotment.

Kitchen Update - April 11

The kitchen is 99% complete. We're currently waiting for the pendant lamps that will be installed above the peninsula (two blue holes in the ceiling). The transformation has been amazing. We have been thrilled with our contractors including Kitchens By Design, Bender Electric, Joe Pietkiwicz Plumbing, and Eisenhard's Decorating Center.

You can see the pictures:

Before: very 80's salmon walls, light blue Formica counter tops, beige cabinets with oak trim, Pergo laminate flooring, and fluorescent lighting.




After: deep orange walls, cinnamon spice Zodiaq quartz counter tops, extra-deep maple cabinets to the ceiling, Armstrong laminate flooring, and recessed (dimmable) lighting with low-voltage under-cabinet accent lighting.




The pantry area has also been transformed.

Before: panel bi-fold doors (not seen here) with full-depth shelves and a divider down the front of the pantry.





After: dual custom pantry cabinets with five roll-out drawers each. The center area allows for staging of groceries and a handy place for the drop-down LCD TV.




Finally, the powder room that previously had the same beige cabinetry with the light blue counter top has been transformed to match the kitchen's decor.




After: glass vessel sink, oil rubbed bronze faucet, same cabinet and counter top materials as the kitchen. Not shown here are the new lamp, toilet, and floor, which will be featured on a future blog entry once the grout has been finished and the baseboard tile installed.

I wish I were...

A highlight of my recent business trip to Atlanta was a chance encounter with the Weinermobile. This isn't the first time I've seen this entertaining vehicle. The first rendezvous that I can remember was in 1995 when I was in Midlothian, Virginia on my way down to Clemson to find an apartment.

 

This time was near the Georgia Aquarium at the corner of Luckie Street and Ivan Allen Jr. Boulevard.

Remind me to avoid Columbus, Ohio

When money gets tight, people put their heads up their rear ends...

I just read an article from March 22, 2009 that Columbus, Ohio is considering taking paramedics off their ambulances and reverting to an all-basic (EMT) system.

"A committee charged with finding ways for Columbus to save money has recommended that the city return to a basic emergency medical system. The last time the Columbus Division of Fire provided only basic-level care was in 1968."

These days, there is a clear trend of upgrading ambulances from basic (BLS) to advanced life support (ALS). I'm not sure there are any BLS squads left in the county where I volunteer. All of them upgraded to ALS or disappeared within the last decade.

While they are at it, I think Columbus should replace their fleet of ambulances with hearses. Being built on a car chassis, a hearse probably gets better fuel economy than an ambulance, so the savings would be two-fold!

Kitchen Destruction: Accomplished

With the help of my parents and Kate's colleague, Rob, the kitchen was basically disassembled on Sunday afternoon. While the removal of the upper cabinets a couple weekends ago was relatively clean, the removal of the base cabinets and countertops was messy and noisy.



As you can see from the picture, the only cabinet in place is the sink base. The other cabinet in the center of the floor is acting as a temporary island since there's no place to put anything down. The dishwasher, stove, and refrigerator are still in place.

The next task will be pulling up the rest of the floor. While Kate and I had really wanted to keep the Pergo floor since it was in decent shape, its age (approximately 13 years) combined with the changing footprint of the cabinets necessitated its removal. As a result, we selected our flooring today. Though it was a tough debate between a lighter and darker finish, the darker one won out. We picked Armstrong's Origins Merbau, which has a rich color and interesting grain.

In other news... our vessel sink arrived today. It is beautiful and will look great against the Zodiaq countertop in the powder room.

Cool Geeky Software Tool

We're kicking it into high gear in preparation for the 2009 NCEMSF conference this coming weekend. As VP and Chief Technology Officer of the Foundation, I am responsible for the computing needs of the conference. Over the last year I've amassed a cache of hardware that should make this year's conference easier than ever to manage (we hope).

Two years ago we introduced the use of proximity RFID readers to keep track of attendance at the lectures. Each conference attendee was issued an RFID tag that uniquely identified them. Upon entering a lecture, the attendee "badged" in.

Last year we added LCD screens to the RFID readers to display the name of the current session. It also displayed the name of the person swiping in, but the updating of the LCD screens with the name was the slow step of the process. The process also relied upon a reliable connection back to the "mother ship" for verification of the name. As it turned out, the connection from some of the far workstations was not reliable. Additionally, the virtual serial port for the LCD screen in conjunction with the Visual Basic 6 code I wrote was just too slow.

This year we are using essentially the same RFID hardware, but each workstation will be standalone. No need to talk to the mother ship this year. Plus, instead of renting laptops and rushing to install the software the day of the conference, we have invested in a set of seven small form factor (SFF) PCs. These PCs will be solely dedicated to running the RFID stations, and will be operated without monitors.

So the challenge was setting up the seven SFF PCs identically. That's where the cool geeky software tool that I mentioned in the title of this article comes into place. I had initially evaluated Snap Deploy 3 from Acronis. It turned out to be a bit overkill for our situation even though the price was very reasonable at $19.99.

After scratching my head at the complexity of feature-rich Snap Deploy 3, I stumbled upon Clonezilla, which is free. It's produced by National Center for High-Performance Computing, which is located in Hsinchu, Taiwan. I opted for the "one at a time" copying method, but Clonezilla also offers a multicast mode that they claim can replicate a 5.6 GB disk image to 40 PCs simultaneously in about 10 minutes. My experience with the unicast version is similar: 4 GB disk image in about 7 minutes over a gigabit Ethernet switch.

Kitchen Update - February 15

The kitchen demolition continues. It was amazingly easy to remove the wall cabinets on the stove side of the kitchen. On Sunday night we tackled them, and are very pleased with the results. The most difficult part was hauling the cabinets to the basement for temporary storage.

Before upper cabinet removal:



After upper cabinet removal:

The Kitchen Demolition Has Begun

In preparation for our new kitchen early next month, Kate and I started demolishing the old kitchen tonight. We started small with the removal of some of the wall cabinets. You'll be happy to know that these cabinets will find a new home in our garage or my basement work room.

Before:


After:


We've picked out and purchased new cabinets and appliances. Our big debate now is what to do with the floor. We had hoped to save it since it's in good shape. Unfortunately, we're told that with the slight change in the footprint, we'll have to replace the entire floor since replacement boards for 13-year-old Pergo aren't easy to come by. Note to self: buy a few extra boxes of whatever new floor we go with.

Toronto from the Air

As you may have seen from my photo archive, I enjoy taking photos from the air. Here is a shot of the CN Tower taken while on final approach to Toronto's Pearson (YYZ) airport. While the plane window was dirty, I managed to get a decent picture.

Happy New Year!

Kate and I had dinner on New Year's Eve with our neighbors at Curious Goods at the Bake Oven Inn in Germansville, PA. It's about 20 minutes from our house, and it is Kate's favorite restaurant in the Lehigh Valley. It was originally recommended by our neighbors, so it seemed appropriate that we ended up there with them for New Year's Eve.

Kate enjoyed some lovely crab cakes and parmesan truffle french fries while I had a hearty and tasty lamb shank. All four of us at the table shared a yummy apple crisp for dessert. On our way out the door, the restaurant co-owner, Catherine, gave all of us party hats. Here is Kate showing off hers by the restaurant bar.

 

After coming home from dinner, the real party started when we decided to bathe the dog. She had been itchy recently, and we figured we some down time before Dick Clark came on the TV. Lulu doesn't like baths, but is timid enough to take them without much complaint. I'm pleased to report that Lulu is clean and soft for the start of the new year.

Kate has a new car!

Kate has a brand new car. Barney, her purple 1997 Toyota Rav4, was retired with 155,818 miles on it. While there was nothing mechanically wrong with Barney, we didn't want to push our luck. Driving a 12-year-old car with more than 150k miles on it is asking for trouble.

So, we thought we'd take advantage of a deal Toyota was offering for leftover 2008 Rav4s. Barney's replacement, a red 2008 Rav4, is appropriately named Clifford. Here you see Kate in the car the night we picked it up from the dealership.

 

About the dealer... I know people say that if you can't say something good about someone, you shouldn't say anything at all. But we feel the need to tell the world about our experience. It wasn't completely bad, but it wasn't what I would call "good." In this slowed economy, I would expect a new car dealer to be proactive and responsive when they have somebody walk into their showroom.

Our salesman was nice enough, but he lacked the follow-through that would have made us raving fans of Bennett Toyota in Allentown. We initially met with him on December 19 to look at used Rav4s. We test drove a gold 2007 with 12,000 miles. We were quoted a price, which was reasonable but not great considering the financing promotion that was being offered on the leftover new 2008s. We decided to sleep on it and come back the next day. We also decided to do some more research about prices for used 2007s. While looking online, we found the exact Rav4 (yes, the VINs matched) we drove advertised on Bennett's Web site for $2000 less than we were quoted earlier that evening. Kate was livid, as was I.

On December 20 we headed back to Bennett Toyota and asked about new 2008 Rav4s since our research indicated they would be a better overall value since Toyotas hold their resale so well. In other words, the high asking price due to the small depreciation for a 18-month-old 2007-model-year Rav4 wasn't enough to make us jump at it compared to a new 2008 Rav4. Plus, Kate didn't have her heart set on a gold car. She had been eying many of the other colors including red and blue. The dealer found us a red one with the equipment we wanted in upstate New York. We haggled over the price and eventually came to a mutually acceptable figure after the general manager intervened. The price was about $2000 under "MSRP," plus they offered a substantial amount for Barney in trade. We signed the paperwork and were told to expect the car early the following week or, at the latest, December 26.

After we signed the paperwork for the new car, Kate pulled out the print-out from the Bennett Toyota web site with the pricing for the used car we almost bought. "Oh yeah," said the sales guy. "The used car manager had left for the night when you were here yesterday, and he didn't tell anybody that he lowered the price on that car. We would have given it to you at the lower price. We're on the up-and-up here." Right... Why didn't he lead off the conversation when we walked in on December 20 with something like "I have great news for you guys... the price on the 2007 was lower than we thought last night?" It was more of a parting shot than anything else, so we left it alone.

December 23 and 24 came and went without any news about the whereabouts of Clifford. Many phone calls to the dealership later (and no proactive calls from them), we learned that the car would be ready for pickup on Monday, December 29. We went over after dinner that night to sign the paperwork and pick it up. While at the dealership, I approached the general manager (who we had met 9 days earlier when he approved the transaction) and expressed my concern about the poor service and lack of follow-through we had experienced. He (hollowly) promised me that customer service is his dealership's number one priority and that he ranks 4th in customer satisfaction in the region and first in the Lehigh Valley. He can tell me anything that he wants, but the proof it in his actions.

When we signed the paperwork on December 20, I specifically asked that the Bennett Toyota logo be omitted from the rear of the car. I don't mind a license plate frame, but anything on the paint is unacceptable. Guess what was on the back door when we picked it up? It was just one of many breakdowns in communication at the dealership. They were able to remove the logo the next day with a heat gun, but why did we have to go though the hassle?

The end of the story is happy one. Kate got a new car at a reasonable price. But the hassle of dealing with Bennett Toyota wasn't worth it. We are not raving fans.

The Cruise is Over - Back to Reality

Kate and I had a terrific time on our cruise. After 7 days at sea, we got back on December 6 and are already planning our next cruise.

This trip took us on Pricess Cruises' newest ship, Ruby Princess, from Fort Lauderdale, FL to Ocho Rios, Jamaica; Cozumel, Mexico; and Princess Cays, Bahamas. We were supposed to also stop at Grand Cayman, but the winds (45 knots) made it impossible.



As a first time cruiser, I wasn't sure what to expect. I am happy to report that I was thrilled with the overall cruising experience. It will be hard to top this cruise -- the food, the entertainment, the ship's amenities, and the service were all outstanding. We met some great folks including our dinner mates (one couple from Syracuse, another from Germany) and a nice couple from Winnipeg.

I'll be posting more photos and memories as time permits in the upcoming weeks. We're still plowing through 300+ photos from the trip. Speaking of plowing, we had our first measurable snow accumulation in Allentown last night. What a way to be welcomed back to reality.