Facebook Called Me Today. I Think They Are In Trouble.

Jane called me from Facebook today at work. [I’m changing her name, and you’ll see why. Her real name is also common and also has only four letters.] I assumed it was a cold call. She wanted to talk to me about advertising on Facebook and asked me if I had time to talk. Remember that.

It so happens I have a project that may involve Facebook advertising. I told her I wanted to talk, but I needed to schedule a time. She said she was west coast, so we agreed to talk 4pm eastern, my time. She said she would call me then. I scheduled: “Jane Facebook 4pm.”

Now I didn’t really think she was with Facebook. I get a lot of cold calls. I figured she was a contract sales person or with a company that does lead qualification. Our company actually sells such a service. I’m sympathetic to cold calls. Still, I wanted to talk to her about advertising on Facebook. I’ve done some work with Google sales, made some small purchases, and it is all fascinating.




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Staying Awake All Night

Several years ago we had 3 different laptops crash and lose all of their data in marketing. The “last straw” was Michael R’s. Using Retrospect backup software, Nancy’s old laptop, and a couple of large external hard drives, we set up a system that would back up the “My Documents” folder and “Desktop” of anyone who wanted backing up. Runs like clockwork. It is very addictive to get the “You’ve been backed up” message each day. Over the years it more than paid for itself by recovering Mark P, Russel, Mark H, and Anne’s data. This week, Michael R’s laptop crashed again (he who started all of this.) We were able to restore 20,000+ files to his new laptop.

The challenge was that I.T. sets our laptops to go to sleep after 20 minutes of being idle. We needed the laptop to stay awake all night as the files were restored. The video here shows the solution. An oscillating fan, two rubber bands, and two paperclips. Thanks to our legal council, Tori, for the rubber bands and paperclips!

New Office (Mac’s view)

I’ve moved out of the legendary “Sam’s office” and into an office around the corner. I needed to let Heather take the helm and oversee grand central station.

My MacBook has a built in camera. This is the “Mac’s view” of my office. I have my desk against a bare wall for now. As you can see… I could use some color. Kathy’s “401k” is the most I have so far.

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We won an award

My team creates a quarterly news magazine that goes out to 18,000 banks and credit unions. We won an award, so the group went outside for a photo shoot. Some of the fun people I work with…

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Descenders Below the Date Line

A digital sketch I worked up to send to our ANSI standards expert asking about the potential problem we could have when people write below the date line on a check. Has to do with check imaging. He says we’re ok. Nice handwriting, huh?

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Knife Garage

I carry a small pocket knife that includes scissors, a pen, and a small LED light. It is very useful, but I am unable to fly with it. I typically leave the knife at home or in my car at the airport.

Last Wednesday, I was off for a 4 day business trip, and as I walked into the airport I discovered I had brought my knife along. Inspired by Ted’s aquarium visit, I decided to look for a place to to hide the knife. I needed a space that was permanent and neglected, not likely to be discovered by some kid, security, or cleaning crew. There are a lot of plants in the airport, and I considered hiding it on the edge of a pot. Watering, though, might short the LED. Scanning as I walked, I looked at indentations in cement posts, phone booths (who uses them?), chairs, newspaper stands, and even a cardiac arrest emergency kit. I then spotted a self-service shipping station and walked in. Little more than a short hall with vending machines, a shipping scale, and a FedEx box, the station hid me well. There was a small space between the FedEx box and the back wall which seemed like a good spot. I slid the knife along the floor into the crack. It fit fine and was out of view. Off to the security gates.

Towards the end of the four day trip, I was eating lunch in Orlando with two company friends and told them I did not want to forget to retrieve my knife. I told them the story above. They were both alarmed that I had hidden a knife in the airport. It sounded illegal. Maybe a federal offense! I countered that the security gates cautioned that no knives were allowed past that point. This implies knives are allowed before this point. (Of course it also says no guns or bombs.) One of them said that when the same thing happened to him, he was worried about having a knife in the airport. So he went to the men’s room, scanned for security cameras, washed his hands, and then secretly slipped the knife into the paper towel as he dried his hands, throwing the knife away in the towel.

“I wanted to keep my knife,” I said. They both wished me luck on retrieving the knife and hoped I would not get arrested. Upon my return to Atlanta, I went to the shipping station and found my knife safely tucked in the shipping station’s knife garage. Good way to end a long trip.