Chunking Things

Saturday, December 29, 2012

A Little Fused Glass

My BFF takes up hobbies.  She researches and perseverates over them until she has it all figured out, then she moves on to the next obsession.  I truly love her.

She called last week and said she found a fused glass class at a shop in Houston.  She wanted to drive down for the holiday early and attend the class.  I said, "do it, I'll go with you."

We drove to Tomball, Texas to Hot Glass Houston where we met the proprietor and course instructor, Bob.

Bob was a chatty guy, an excellent teacher and vastly patient with us both.  We asked endless questions and interrupted his prepared speech several times.  He was genuinely helpful and enthusiastic with a couple of beginners.

BFF has fused glass before.  She's taken several classes in Texas and North Carolina.  The phrase "enough knowledge to be dangerous" comes to mind.  I was mostly fascinated with making something out of 'recycled' glass.  I am always fascinated by making something from discards.

The glass we used was Tempered Glass (not laminated like car windshields) and once it is raised to temperature, it cannot be cut again.  So when they make window glass for commercial windows, they often make more than one pane for each opening, to cover the vagaries of construction.  These extra panels were what we used.

The fun part was breaking the glass.  We used one of these--you see them all the time in commercials for safe egress from wrecked cars.  The fun part was the 'laying on of hands'.  Bob invited us to come over and watch as he helped the first student wrap their glass panel up in a tarp.  Then we all laid our hands on the tarp wrapped glass and the student gently tapped the glass in a single place.  The glass shattered out from the point of impact.  You could feel it rippling through the pane under your palms.  The rest of the day, it continued to crackle and pop, like Rice Krispies.  Truly impressive.  We all wrapped our glass in the tarp and then shattered it with a single strike.  Then we started to layer up our broken glass on our kiln shelf.

We chose either a round or square shape and marked the paper.  Then we started moving the glass pieces around until we filled up the shape for the first two layers.  The top layer is more decorative.  That profile stays with the bowl during the two firings.  The first fuses the piece, the second slumps it into a bowl shape.  The glass is in the kiln for over a 100 hours!  I find that just amazing.

The finished product is very pretty.  I chose not to put any colored glass frit into my bowl.  The only color is the original tempered glass.  This picture is not great but you can see how the glass on the top layer kept its irregular shape and gives texture to the finished product.

I could fill this bowl with lemons and keep it on my kitchen table, but I chose to buy a stand and display it like an art piece.  I really enjoyed taking this class and learning how to do this fused glass bowl.  I'm thinking I might sign up for another class soon.  Hot Glass Houston has quite a few offerings that look really interesting to me.

--  Sandee Wagner


Thursday, December 13, 2012

The Downside to Outsourcing Customer Service

Full Disclosure, for four years I was that voice on the phone you got when your computer started smoking and you thought, "I gotta call Support!"  I've been in the trenches and I comprehend what a difficult job it is.  I also know that when companies make the decision to move call centers out of the US and into foreign countries, that sometimes, the quality of support received by the consumer is impacted.

Case in point.  Shutterfly.  I'm not sure that I'm emailing back and forth with someone in a foreign land, but the lack of understanding that I'm receiving leads me to believe that English is a second language for the many MANY folks I'm chatting with.

Shutterfly is a site where you can upload photos from your digital camera and create photo books and albums.  It's pretty easy  to use and the product you receive is very good quality.  My DIL does an annual book of her favorite photos of the kids and gifts us with one each Christmas.  As I was assembling my photo books, I realized that while I was living overseas, I didn't get the photo books.  It was SO costly to ship everything over there, it was no great surprise.

When I mentioned to my DIL that I was missing the past two years, she immediately 'shared' the photobooks with me so I could order a copy of each.  I was glad to do it!

Both books showed up on my projects page.  I ordered the first book with no problem.  When I tried to order the second book, there was no link to order it.  I can see it.  I can page through it from start to finish, but nowhere on the screen is there a place where a live link or order button will function.

So, I contacted support from the website's link.

It didn't seem really hard to me.  But apparently it was.

Me - "I'm trying to give you money, and your site won't let me order this photo book."
Support - "Which project are you referring to?"
Me - "Here's the link to the exact project (I pasted in a long URL link)"
Support - "We can't see that you have an account, so I created one for you.  Click this link to activate an account."
Me - "That's because my account is under an old email address I had years ago.  I'm logged in as this user (gave them my logon).  The project shows under My Projects as "shared"."
Support - "It appears that this project was created under the old (technical name here) stream.  The only way you can order this project is for it to be converted to the new format.  What is the name of the project?"
Me - "Here's the link to the project again (I pasted in a long URL link again)."
Support - "That project is not a new project."
Me - "Yes, I know.  My DIL did it a couple of years ago and just shared it with me."
Support - "That project will have to be converted for you to be able to order it."
Me - "Yes, you said that.  Will it be converted?  I'd like to order the book.  I'm trying to GIVE YOU MONEY here, it seems like you would want to enable that."
Support - "You'll have to give us the exact name of the project so we can have our technical group convert the project."
Me - "Here is the link again (I pased in a long URL for the third time).  It's under "My Projects" as the latest and the link under it says "shared photo..." before the link cuts off the words."
Support - "In order to convert this project, we will need the name of the project."

and it went on and on.  So far, I've sent them my login name three times.  I've sent the exact link to the project four times.  Today, I included a screen shot of the project page.  I did not put a big red arrow pointing to the ONLY project on the page, but it was hard to hold that back.

I'm trying not to be upset, but it does beg a question... if it is so hard to order something off their website, how much money in revenue are they losing from people who won't continue the inane email thread with folks who don't speak good English?

I get that this problem is 'off script' for what they are used to handling, but any website that has an issue which keeps a consumer from placing an order and giving them money, needs to be escalated.  At least, in my day, it did.

Shutterfly needs to up its game.  There are way too many competitors out there.  Next time, my DIL could use Mpix, Mixbook, LuLu, or Mypublisher.  No company can afford to tick off the folks who pay the bills.  Just sayin'.

--  Sandee Wagner

Monday, December 10, 2012

Pleasant Weekends

My #2 son and his family live outside of Minneapolis, MN in a suburb on the edge of farmland.  It's a lovely neighborhood and a great house in which to raise a family.  They love the area.  We've taken to referring to them as the SnoWagners because of the weather up there.

This weekend, my son texted me a message including a picture.  He said they were about halfway through their first blizzard of the season and the snow was almost a foot deep.

Great for sledding.  I'm sure.  But, brrr.  It just looks cold, doesn't it?

My DH and I were sitting on our back patio, enjoying the 80 degree weather.  So, I took a picture of my husband firing up the grill for dinner.

I emailed it to my son, telling him this is how the blizzard looked in Houston.  We were actually expecting some rain to push through and drop our temperature about 20 or 30 degrees.

It does get cold here, just not that often.

Well, my son has a great sense of humor.  He saw the picture of his shorts-clad  dad standing by the grill with a spatula in hand.  And he had his lovely wife take a picture of him in the same pose.

The contrast is pretty amazing.  I love the fact that he pulled a pair of khaki shorts over his long pants so he could have the 'shorts-clad by the grill holding a spatula' pose down perfectly.

I laughed until I cried.  These guys crack me up.

It's all about perspective, isn't it?  We all thought we were having a pleasant weekend.  My son and his family loved watching the snow dump onto their deck and couldn't wait to go sledding.  My husband and I loved sitting in the hot tub and grilling some burgers outside.  You know, we both enjoyed our weekends.

I will say that I am glad to be in the 50 degree temps instead of covered in snow.  I know you just have to have the right clothing, but really, I don't like to be cold.

Probably while they are enjoying a "White Christmas" I will feel a little misty and wish we could have cooler weather, but I'm sure I'll get over it.

--  Sandee Wagner

Thursday, December 6, 2012

A Delicate Flower of Nature

When I was a kid, my dad used to refer to himself as "a delicate flower of nature" whenever he got a sunburn or hurt himself in any way.  It was tongue in cheek, of course, because he was a big, tough Marine.  But I've adopted that phrase and said it for years.

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I proved it true to my family.  I cut myself on a marshmallow.

That's right.  Let that one settle in for a while.

I CUT myself on a marshmallow.  Opened up my skin and bled.

It takes a little setup, so, here's how this works.  First, my DIL made a wonderful holiday meal complete with sweet potatoes topped with marshmallows.  Now, full disclosure, I love a sweet potato but when you smear marshmallows on it, it kind of ruins it for me.  I like them a lot of ways, but not with the traditional marshmallow topping.  But everyone else loves that!  They were cleaned out.

And that's where the harm to my delicate nature came in.  I did the dishes.  I washed up since someone else was doing all the cooking (Yeah!).  When I reached my hand down into the soapy water the casserole dish was soaking it, I ran a sponge around the crusted on, melted sugar that is marshmallow topping and cut myself on a shard of glass-like leftovers.

When you explain that the marshmallows were melted into sheets of molten glass around the edges of the dish, it's not as impressive as when you say, "I cut myself on a marshmallow".

But that's the kind of delicate flower of nature I am.

--  Sandee Wagner