Setting up a blog site for a friend

June 25, 2009 – 10:29 pm

In keeping with my policy of spending every evening goofing around with web sites, I have spent this evening setting up www.robertashurstconsulting.com. Bob is a great friend of mine who has helped my business tremendously, and while he is currently much more about the e-mail than the web site, I wanted to set up something which could help him update friends and put info up on the web without a lot of fuss and muss. Read the rest of this entry »

Jury Duty

June 23, 2009 – 10:49 pm

Monday I spent three hours at the Autauga County courthouse waiting to go onto a jury duty panel. Judge Sibley Reynolds told us that the jury selection process used to be “ten old men” who were selected to pick jury panels, and they placed names of potential jurors in a washing machine box.

Unfortunately, the slips of paper “were never fluffed up” or purged of old names, so they frequently had the same people in the panels.

Some surprises

  • the number of people who were called who either had excuses, were not qualified, or who were no-shows. If I recall correctly, 200 jurors were summoned and 89 were there  and qualified.
  • the number of lawyers milling around the courtroom that I knew.
  • the number of people in the jury pool I knew.

I guess I’ve lived in Prattville a long time. I was selected for a panel on Thursday, so on that morning I find out if I will be placed on a jury.

No great loss, I suppose…

June 11, 2009 – 10:50 pm

but I wonder why my Nigerian e-mail scam post broke my layout. Something in it made the main window go wide and kick the right column below the left column. Boo.

Well, that’s settled…

May 26, 2009 – 6:57 am

One more post about the accident from last January (not to be confused with the accident from last May, or the bumper-tap a couple of months ago). The settlement is finally done.

One of the first things that people say after you’ve been in an accident (aside from Are you okay? and Shouldn’t someone call an ambulance?) is something like Well, woo-hoo, boy, you gonna be rich now, ain’t you boy?!?  Unfortunately, being critically injured and receiving a settlement differ from winning the lottery.

 

Read the rest of this entry »

Settlement

May 3, 2009 – 8:04 am

I finally got the settlement done, more or less as I wanted it. More on this after the check is in my hot little hand.

My Father Asks for Nothing

March 8, 2009 – 4:45 pm

(hat-tip: www.sarahetc.com)

Read this and see if your eyes don’t leak a little:

http://sippicancottage.blogspot.com/2009/03/my-father-asks-for-nothing.html

Edjamacate northerners about the south

February 23, 2009 – 8:15 am

This from Ike Pigott, a fellow I know through Twitter. A thousand times THIS. I am thoroughly sick of people who have never been to the south enlightening me about what it’s like down here. It’s especially annoying since most of the people nowadays who don’t want to vote for education funding are retirees. From where? Oh, that’s right…

Pay-to-play – make the bad reviews go away

February 20, 2009 – 8:23 am

I’m a poet and don’t know it; the faster I try to write something the more likely it is to have an internal rhyme in it. Or maybe I’m a rapper in another life.

Anyway, Crystal King just mentioned an article in a tweet about how Yelp may be extorting customers with threats about bad reviews. I’ve got my own story to tell about the BBB, based on personal experience. Read the rest of this entry »

R.I.P, tuxedo pants…

February 17, 2009 – 8:34 am

What’s odd, and perhaps ironic, at least in the Alanis Morrisette sense of the word, is that my greatest fears leading up to a concert all revolve around getting there in one piece. I’m not a morbidly fearful kind of guy, despite nearly killing myself in a motorcycle accident early last year, despite nearly becoming a hood ornament for a drunk in a truck around the middle of last year, and yes, despite getting my rear bumper tagged just this past week IN MY BRAND NEW… (deep, calming breaths; deep, calming breaths; deep – calming — breaths).

Where was I? Not a fearful kind of guy. When I need to go somewhere, I usually just go, and assume I’m going to get there. But when I’m heading to a concert, I worry far more about getting there with all needed equipment than what I’m going to do once I get on stage and the funny man with the white pointy stick is waving it at me (once I get on stage, I do plenty of worrying about what the funny man is doing and whether I’m doing the right thing back, but that’s another blog post). Probably some psychological thing about worrying about the things you think you can control instead of the things you know you can’t, or something. Read the rest of this entry »

Tony Rubleski yesterday

February 13, 2009 – 10:07 am

Tony Rubleski spoke to about 20-30 people yesterday at the Prattville Chamber. I get to hear a number of gurus, and I was impressed with his approach. He compared himself to Forrest Gump a number of times (and no, he’s not a southerner; he’s from Michigan.).

My big takeaway from it is I’m still not doing enough in the business with lumpy direct-mail and leave-behinds at offices.

I ordered his book and CD set, so I hope to be even more enlightened soon!