Friday, August 19, 2005

Lapti Nek

A couple of years ago, my friend Jim (maybe yours, too) put together a three-disk set of mix CDs. The last song on the "Sea Life" disk was listed as only as a "surprise". I really liked the song, but never did know who or what it was.

That was also one of the songs that grew on my daughter from those disks. Recently, she even mentioned on a couple of occasions that it might be fun to use as a dance number.

During the Independance Day vacation that my family took at a wonderful "cabin" (really, pretty sweet digs) on the north edge of Georgia, my sister happened to hear the tune, and wondered aloud what language it was in.

It had never occured to me that it wasn't in English, really, but I've been listening much more closely since then, and just can't make out any of the lyrics.

So today, I IMed Jim, and asked him. Since it had been so long since he made the disks, he wasn't sure he could recall, so we had to do some back and forth before we were sure we were talking about the same song.

Well, wonder no more. The song is Lapti Nek, from Return of the Jedi. The language is, get this Huttese. Go figure. Mister meddle seems to have stricken it from existence as best he could; it isn't on the newer soundtrack.

Read more!

Wednesday, August 03, 2005

Mild Drama with Air Travel

Now I'm trying to get someone on the phone to help me get the credit applied.

My first call was to their automated customer service number.
I navigated the phone tree until I determined that
1) there was no way to get my credit in the menu system
2) there was no way to get to a human in the menu system

My next call was "to purchase a ticket within U.S. and Canada.
After plodding through a few menu steps, my cell phone dropped
the call and flashed "CALL NOT COMPLETED". wtf.

So I tried again. This time, I actually managed to get a human on the phone.
Oh. My. God. This wasn't broken English.
It was, like...I had walked into a restaurant in a non-English speaking country,
nowhere near a tourist area, and I had caught some poor waiter flat-footed,
who had knowledge of no more than 3 words of English. (I've done this.)
I'm not kidding. Eventually, Habib passed my call to someone else.
She spoke perfect English, understood what I asked, and said she would
transfer me to the right place.
Click-chirp-click "We are sorry, your call did not go through." Click.

That's when I figured I'd start to chronical this sequence, in case it gets any better.

What's my next move?
I think I'll see if their websight has a way to interrogate for this info.
Ya, ya, I shoulda done this first.

Place ticket number in form, select "check on refund" radio button...

"
We apologize for any inconvenience but in order for US Airways to provide
you with the most accurate information available the status database
is currently being updated.
Please try your request again during the hours listed below.

Refunds Inquiry:
*Sunday through Friday - 2:30 AM to 10:00 PM Eastern Standard Time
*Saturday - 2:30 AM to 5:00 PM Eastern Standard Time
"

Ok, now I'm going to call the refund toll free line.

Ok, after the part about begging you to go to their website, or use the automated options, I get:
"If you would like to speak to a representative about a refund,
please have your thirteen digit ticket number, beginning with oh one three, and press '2'"

beep.

"Our office is closed. Our hours are blah blah blah."

I'll try again tomorrow.

Read more!

This is worth the wait

The guy can play.

Read more!