Tutti Barese

All the fun is taking place in the Macaroni Dish. Best to direct one's attention there. We seem to be on the verge of creating the Encyclopedia Mastandrea. We'll be defining terms (such as Orange Soup and lupini beans), identifying people (such as Shoes Pompadour and his sidekick Tony the Toothpick), and offering non-standard uses for ordinary household products (such as Q-Tips, hot dog carts, night-shirts and golf-balls).

Confused? Just wait until we start cataloging the Vito Disputations -- a modern day Socratic dialogue packed with uncommon wisdom and insight.

Some low-level functionary has responded (not substantively, but not quite a form letter either):

Thank you for your recent message about the activation of your Discover Card Account. I wish to express my sincere apology for any difficulties or inconvenience you may have experienced with your Discover Card Account. Our goal is to provide excellent customer service, and as a valued Cardmember, you should expect to receive the best service possible, at all times. We regret our failure to deliver that service in this situation.

Thank you for taking the time to bring this to our attention, as it is comments such as yours, that allow us the opportunity to better serve our Cardmembers. I look forward to assisting you in the future.

Please allow us the opportunity to regain your trust in Discover Card; as I stated before, excellent customer service is our number one priority.

If I can be of any further assistance to you, please don't hesitate to contact me again. Thank you for choosing to use Discover Card.

Of course, much of the above is indeed a form letter. Otherwise, "[t]hank you for chossing to use Discover" would have to read "thank you for choosing to never use Discover again."

Oh well, to them it's all a trade-off: they figure they can make a few pennies by cross-selling their customers, even if the blather causes them to lose a handful of customers in the process.

Pricks.

And speaking of pricks, Steve, the blog hiatus is over: when you gonna regale us with the saga of GMAC?

Here's a little note I sent to the annoying folks at Discover Card today. I doubt they'll care, but hey, I like to vote with my wallet:

I tried to use my new card this morning, but it was declined. Therefore, as soon as one refund credit posts, I'll pay the balance and close the account.

You see, I did call to activate the new cards. I gave all the pertinent info, then asked the rep to please not make me endure a telephone sales pitch. Rudely, she pitched me anyway, so I hung up.

And apparently she also left me with a dead card -- causing me embarrassment and inconvenience at the supermarket this morning.

When I called today to report the above, I was told I'd have to go through the activation process again -- and while I was on the line, I was treated to another sales pitch! Amazing!

I'm through with Discover.

It's a shame too -- Discover was the first card I got, way back in 1987 when I was still in college. They even have pretty good online access. But really, when a customer asks you to not read the sales pitch, DON'T READ IT. Pissing off your customer is just bad policy. Don't use Discover, or if you do, be sure to complain loudly about the aggressive cross-selling.

If the fookers reply, I'll be sure to post their answer. Fair is fair.

Well, the president is coming to town today. I usually know this without having to watch the news -- the Sheraton across the street is, for some reason, a popular venue for political events. Even the Clintons used it... a lot. And every time they were here they tied up the streets and made for an infuriating walk home. Secret service people can be nasty -- and the process of keeping the prez in his protective bubble operates without regard to the disruption it creates. Any regard.

Mostly that's the libertarian in me, doing all that complaining. The inconvenience that Buch causes will probably bother me less than the inconvenience Clinton caused -- mostly because I greatly disliked Clinton, and less so because Bush doesn't come around much. I can only remember one other time he was in the neighborhood. Clinton seemed to be here every other week (maybe he was looking for the peep shows in Times Square, but no one had told him that Giuliani had shut them all down).

So now I'm looking out my window, 20 floors above 53rd Street and Seventh Avenue, watching them erect the limousine tent at the hotel's side entrance. If this event goes like the last one, a motorcade will literally circle the block, they'll drive the limo right into the tent, close the flaps, and the prez will make his entrance/exit without being seen. All under the watchful eyes of well-fed agents (Secret Service? Marshalls?) stationed on nearby rooftops.

It's mildly interesting to watch. Still, I gotta make sure I get my work wrapped up as soon as I can so I can get outta here before they tie up the streets. I'm all for state security, but getting barked at by cops as I try to cross the street tends to inspire adolescent feelings of contempt for the establishment.

If you have to get stuck in PA for any reason, stop in Loch Haven. It's near State College. Be sure to have dinner at the Chinese restaraunt on the main street through town. I had to stop there because of fog a number of years ago and the food was great. It was family-run: the mother cooked but understood no English. The son took the order.

Isn't technology amazing? They can extrude pretzels surrounding a flavored center. Remarkable.

Driving past the area of the Buckhorn exit we ran through a truly ridiculous downpour of rain. Hope we don't hit more of that.

We seem to have driven into a raging monsoon (which shouldn't be surprising, given the weather we've ben having for weeks). Or perhaps it always rains upon Buckhorn?

There are a handful of Combos now left at the bottom of the bag. Seeing them makes me queasy.

BTW, my laptop is online via a Sprint wireless Internet card -- and I'm shocked to even have a signal out here in the forgotten hills near Harrisburg. I'll ride it as long as it works.

It's almost noon and we're out on Interstate 80 on our way to Ohio. We left sometime around 9:30 this morning, and there's still most of Pennsylvania to yawn our way through.

At the Exxon just now I suddenly found myself jonesing for junk food -- got a big bag of Combos, and even opened a bag of chips we'd brought. Maybe puking will make the Pennsylvania experience... less boring, at least.

The boys have been quiet so far. Even took a brief nap as we crossed the Delaware Water Gap. But they're up now, seeking snacks and juiceboxes.

Yeck. Already ate too many Combos.

More later.

Vito used odd names for us as well. However, we never noticed a pattern: he'd call out: "Hey Clyde," "Klondike!," "Harry, get over here...," etc., and it would never be clear who he was addressing. We could usually rely on non-verbal cues to figure out that part. It never struck me as in any way extraordinary -- just another of those Mastandrea-isms that you take for granted

And I do, somewhat vaguely, recall a brief Vito-Vin colloquy on the subject (an exchange that may have predated, or in fact inspired, Vin's present-day naming conventions):

Vin: When you call them, you use everything but their real names.

Vito: When I use their names they don't answer.

Vin: Oh.

Can someone please get Jenia signed up on this thing? The poor man needs to blog in his own defense!

I finished lunch about two hours ago, and I still haven't eaten a banana!

This is mortifying. I must learn to abide by mealtime protocols.