Week Over
Well, another week with our Japan team and our KDDI customer is over. We had a good series of meetings; they seem to be warming up to us loud obnoxious Americans.
We were at Donovan's last night, one of the top 10 steakhouses in the country. We were utterly stuffed with food; I made all of the Japanese guys order a Stone Brewing Co Arrogant Bastard ale with dinner. Stone is local in San Marcos and an award-winning brewery. The ABs came in 20 ounce bottles. We had a good time and the wait staff were very cool and very helpful with the English (or lack thereof).
Today I went over the specification with them; it took about 2 hours. I am always intrigued as to what things get noticed or commented on in a review like that. Things I figured were no-brainers we wold discuss in depth, things I figured would be issues were breezed right over. I did find a few errors much to my chagrin; one or two are things that should not have been in there (but weren't caught by the internal team either so it's not like it is all my fault). We will do our best to get them to accept those deletions with the rev B next month. I was happy with my performance and that things went smoothly.
I left work early today and came home to relax. I expect to be asleep early tonight. Tomorrow I will visit my folks and try to figure out why their Mac is behaving sluggishly. I have a few ideas about what is causing it, probably the indexer that is included in Mac OS 10.4.
I need to update the rental agreement for the "Kumquat kids" and get that signed this weekend, too, hopefully.
Today I drive up t the parents' house to help them with their computer and see how they are doing.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
I Still Hate Cars
My dealer has two locations; I usually use the closer-to-me location as it is less busy BUT they couldn't do this work (alarms are dealer-added options and they have a guy who does them and the guy is at the other, big location). I got into a defensive conversation with the service manager idiot at the cloer-to-me location (I called over there first since, you now, they fucked the car up so I figure I'd give them first shot at fixing it) who told me "they do battery cable replacements all the time and they don't affect the alarm blah blah blah"
Oh. Shut. Up.
What a dick.
OF COURSE you guys fucked this up; it was PERFECTLY FINE when I gave it to you and when I got it back it was fucked up.
I took my car over to the dealer this morning because it has continued to "act up" with random beeps and burps and farts and the car alarm went off twice early Monday AM (1:15 and 1:45).
I wrote up a detailed explanation of what had happened and left the car with the (helpful and cheerful I must say) New Car Accessories Service Department manager.
I was impressed; an hour later they had called me and said they'd replaced the alarm "brain" and at no charge.
Turns out the car alarm was in fact interfering with the proper operation of the rest of the car because "Mode 2" was only 100% active after I drove off the lot today. In the past the doors would lock automatically as soon as I took it out of "P" (even in Mode 2) but today they were unlocked, I took it out of "P" and... they stayed unlocked.
"Ah ha!" I said to myself. "I am smarter than they are."
I feel like calling "Dave the Dickhead" at the closer-to-me location and informing him that now he can truthfully say that he has seen a car that was fucked up as a part of replacing a battery cable and he should shut up about it the next time someone has a complaint.
And this is why I hate people.
And cars. I hate cars, too.
Oh. Shut. Up.
What a dick.
OF COURSE you guys fucked this up; it was PERFECTLY FINE when I gave it to you and when I got it back it was fucked up.
I took my car over to the dealer this morning because it has continued to "act up" with random beeps and burps and farts and the car alarm went off twice early Monday AM (1:15 and 1:45).
I wrote up a detailed explanation of what had happened and left the car with the (helpful and cheerful I must say) New Car Accessories Service Department manager.
I was impressed; an hour later they had called me and said they'd replaced the alarm "brain" and at no charge.
Turns out the car alarm was in fact interfering with the proper operation of the rest of the car because "Mode 2" was only 100% active after I drove off the lot today. In the past the doors would lock automatically as soon as I took it out of "P" (even in Mode 2) but today they were unlocked, I took it out of "P" and... they stayed unlocked.
"Ah ha!" I said to myself. "I am smarter than they are."
I feel like calling "Dave the Dickhead" at the closer-to-me location and informing him that now he can truthfully say that he has seen a car that was fucked up as a part of replacing a battery cable and he should shut up about it the next time someone has a complaint.
And this is why I hate people.
And cars. I hate cars, too.
Saturday, February 3, 2007
I Hate Cars
Last weekend I took the car in for its 45000 mile service, which is an oil change and some other stuff. The guy told me I need to replace the rear brakes and the battery cable (it was all corroded).
"OK, fine, I'll bring it in next weekend," was my reply.
Now, after a few days I noticed something; whenever I went out to my car in the garage the doors were locked. For 18 months I've driven into the garage, turned off the ignition (doors automatically unlock), open the door, get out, close the door. The door stayed unlocked forever. 1 minute, 1 hour, 1 day 1 week, whatever, the door would be unlocked when I came back in the garage and opened the car door.
As of last weekend (but I only really noticed it mid-week), the door would be locked when I went out. I don't like this; I don't want the car doing things uncommanded. I figured the tech did some sort of firmware update or made a little change to the car's configuration file to work on it.
So, today, I took it back for the battery cable and the brakes. I told the service writer about this; the first thing he saw was that the alarm was in "valet" mode, which he knew because there was a glowing read LED down under the dash board. He set it to "normal" mode and that was that, I assumed. When I go the car back I noticed something as soon as I got home; pressing a remote control button makes the horn go "toot toot" along with the regular and familiar to both of us "beep beep." OK, that is really annoying and also the car was still locking it's doors automatically. So I call the guy up and tell him this, supposedly he was taking notes and will call the service department and the main dealer on Monday.
Yeah, sure he will.
Several hours ago I heard the car's horn go "toot toot" all by itself. I thought it was outside so I ignored it. Then I heard it again a while later; I went out to the garage and it did it again right as I opened the house garage door. "Crap, this thing is fucked up," I thought. I knew that removing the battery cable was a traumatic thing for computer-controlled cars like mine and I was right. So, I got out the Owner's Manual and learned a few things. First, I can supposedly change the beeps for when I hit the remote; I tried to change them but was unsuccessful, I think. I also learned that this car has 4 (yes, FOUR) different automatic door lock modes. I read them all but the differences between three of them are very very subtle, mostly to do with when they lock (car in P, doors closed, ignition on vs car in anything except P, doors closed, ignition on vs something else vs MODE 2!!!!!!). Mode 2 is "No automatic door locking at all. Ever. You have to lock them yourself!"
"AHA!" I said, "A-HA!!!!!!!!!!!!"
So, I read the instructions on how to get it into Mode 2. Here they are:
0. Get in the car and close the door.
1. Depress the door lock button to unlock all the doors.
2. Put key in ignition, turn to "ON."
3. Within 5 seconds of doing that, press and hold the door lock button in the "lock" position for around 5 seconds.
Are you with me still?
4. Watch the "Door Ajar" indicator light on the dashboard - it will flash the number of times equal to the mode it's in.
5. Repeat until you are in the mode you want.
It was in mode 3, so I had to do that sequence three times to get it into mode 2.
Eventually I saw 2 "Door Ajar" light flashes. Yea, I'm in mode 2!
Let's test it! Start the car, put it in R (carefully, the big roll up garage door is still closed).
CLUNK! The doors lock.
Goddammit!
OK, well, fine, fuck that; I'll try again tomorrow in the daylight.
Time to try something else; let's try to turn off the horn tooting. I see the little red LED under the dash (under the steering column, waaaay down there actually). I remember the service guy reached under there to do something so I figured he was flipping a switch (My MSEE comes in handy every once in a while). I reached down there and - Yes! - there is a push button behind the LED. I press and release. Nothing. I press and hold. And hold. A few seconds later the red LED comes on. Yay! No more horn tooting.
So, if I can get the car into Automatic Door Locking Mode 2 I will be happy and forget those clowns over at the dealership trying to "fix" this. I'll leave the alarm in "valet" mode (I have no idea if that means it is disabled or not but who cares? When was the last time anyone called the cops because they heard a car alarm go off?). I have an owner's manual for the alarm, I think, because it was a dealer-installed factory add-on. I get a break on my insurance because I have a car alarm so it is worth something.
I hate cars.
"OK, fine, I'll bring it in next weekend," was my reply.
Now, after a few days I noticed something; whenever I went out to my car in the garage the doors were locked. For 18 months I've driven into the garage, turned off the ignition (doors automatically unlock), open the door, get out, close the door. The door stayed unlocked forever. 1 minute, 1 hour, 1 day 1 week, whatever, the door would be unlocked when I came back in the garage and opened the car door.
As of last weekend (but I only really noticed it mid-week), the door would be locked when I went out. I don't like this; I don't want the car doing things uncommanded. I figured the tech did some sort of firmware update or made a little change to the car's configuration file to work on it.
So, today, I took it back for the battery cable and the brakes. I told the service writer about this; the first thing he saw was that the alarm was in "valet" mode, which he knew because there was a glowing read LED down under the dash board. He set it to "normal" mode and that was that, I assumed. When I go the car back I noticed something as soon as I got home; pressing a remote control button makes the horn go "toot toot" along with the regular and familiar to both of us "beep beep." OK, that is really annoying and also the car was still locking it's doors automatically. So I call the guy up and tell him this, supposedly he was taking notes and will call the service department and the main dealer on Monday.
Yeah, sure he will.
Several hours ago I heard the car's horn go "toot toot" all by itself. I thought it was outside so I ignored it. Then I heard it again a while later; I went out to the garage and it did it again right as I opened the house garage door. "Crap, this thing is fucked up," I thought. I knew that removing the battery cable was a traumatic thing for computer-controlled cars like mine and I was right. So, I got out the Owner's Manual and learned a few things. First, I can supposedly change the beeps for when I hit the remote; I tried to change them but was unsuccessful, I think. I also learned that this car has 4 (yes, FOUR) different automatic door lock modes. I read them all but the differences between three of them are very very subtle, mostly to do with when they lock (car in P, doors closed, ignition on vs car in anything except P, doors closed, ignition on vs something else vs MODE 2!!!!!!). Mode 2 is "No automatic door locking at all. Ever. You have to lock them yourself!"
"AHA!" I said, "A-HA!!!!!!!!!!!!"
So, I read the instructions on how to get it into Mode 2. Here they are:
0. Get in the car and close the door.
1. Depress the door lock button to unlock all the doors.
2. Put key in ignition, turn to "ON."
3. Within 5 seconds of doing that, press and hold the door lock button in the "lock" position for around 5 seconds.
Are you with me still?
4. Watch the "Door Ajar" indicator light on the dashboard - it will flash the number of times equal to the mode it's in.
5. Repeat until you are in the mode you want.
It was in mode 3, so I had to do that sequence three times to get it into mode 2.
Eventually I saw 2 "Door Ajar" light flashes. Yea, I'm in mode 2!
Let's test it! Start the car, put it in R (carefully, the big roll up garage door is still closed).
CLUNK! The doors lock.
Goddammit!
OK, well, fine, fuck that; I'll try again tomorrow in the daylight.
Time to try something else; let's try to turn off the horn tooting. I see the little red LED under the dash (under the steering column, waaaay down there actually). I remember the service guy reached under there to do something so I figured he was flipping a switch (My MSEE comes in handy every once in a while). I reached down there and - Yes! - there is a push button behind the LED. I press and release. Nothing. I press and hold. And hold. A few seconds later the red LED comes on. Yay! No more horn tooting.
So, if I can get the car into Automatic Door Locking Mode 2 I will be happy and forget those clowns over at the dealership trying to "fix" this. I'll leave the alarm in "valet" mode (I have no idea if that means it is disabled or not but who cares? When was the last time anyone called the cops because they heard a car alarm go off?). I have an owner's manual for the alarm, I think, because it was a dealer-installed factory add-on. I get a break on my insurance because I have a car alarm so it is worth something.
I hate cars.
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