I just paid off a credit card I got since I partially financed my fiance’s pretty engagement ring. Except for the first statement and the credit card itself, I have never received a statement from them. Only because I started to worry did I switch to managing the card online, and luckily I did or I would’ve missed a payment. Since the card’s paid off and I don’t like being jerked around like that, I called today to cancel the account. Here’s what took place after I mentioned the lack of statements being a reason to close the account.
Credit Card Woman: “I see here that we’ve had mail returned that was sent to you, so maybe the address is wrong.”
Me: “Okay, well you got me the first statement and the credit card just fine, so I don’t see how the address was suddenly wrong.”
Woman: “Can you confirm the address with me?”
Me: “And besides, why didn’t you guys try to let me know when you started getting mail back instead of waiting for me to call?”
Woman: “We’ve tried several times to let you know.”
Me: “Nobody’s called me.”
Woman: “Oh no sir, you misunderstand; they wouldn’t have called, we’ve sent letters saying we need to update your address because there’s a problem.”
It may not be immediately obvious, but I’ve recently changed over my domains to a new host. It’s a rockier transition than I would’ve liked, namely thanks to the old host’s virtual inability to give me access to my own %$&#ing site as stored on their server. Fortunately, I figured out a workaround so I didn’t lose everything. There are some other things that need straightened out but hopefully that won’t take long.
I just got a refurbished Roomba 530. I’d been eyeballing them in general, and decided to snatch up the refurbished deal. One of the downsides is it can’t be scheduled. Not officially anyway. As it turns out the interface supplied by iRobot, the manufacturers, allows for the same low level commands to be sent to the 530 (and 510, and any other impossible-to-schedule 5xx model) as are used to schedule the other kinds.
This can be done manually, which makes for rough riding by a lot of Roomba owners, but I’ve automated it in a simple program. It requires:
- A serial port on your computer
- A cable to connect the Roomba to the serial port, I recommend the iRobot Create Cable.
- Windows with .NET 2.0 or better (standard on all computers that have been updated in something like the past 4 years)
A .zip with the program and a readme is available in the downloads section.
