I was very angry today. I had a reinsurer decline a piece of business that his company has been on for seventeen years because they've had a change of philosophy. You know, I do understand some of these "strategic" [short-sighted] decisions wherein it is determined that a company should come off of a hugely profitable account [grumble] with six business days to go [grrrr] after it has been sitting on the underwriter's desk for a month [snarl]. But the thing that really frosted my cake was that he let me know this in a three line e-mail, the last line of which was, "We regret any
inconvenience this may cause you."
[tazmanian devil scene occurs here]
It's not often I have the opportunity to chew out a fellow human being on the phone. An odd, somewhat surreal experience in a way. Bracketed by my apologies on either side because I "know that this is coming from senior management," I used the term "unconscionable" twice. Heh, heh, heh.
I managed to calm down, and presented the reinsurer and his boss with a [I thought] well-reasoned, logical argument for their continuation. I honestly don't think it will do much good, but at least I am trying to be productive and not just mad. But I was still mad.
We had our Employee Holiday Party - or whatever the current PC title of the aforementioned festivies may be - this evening. It was held at the Academy of Natural Sciences, in the Dinosaur Hall. I could comment on how apropos this is given some of the people in attendance, but I think not. As in the past, the dinosaurs clustered around the bar during the cocktail hour for fear that cocktails were only being served for one hour, because that's they way they did it in the bad old days. There was a Live Animal Handler who mingled around, thrusting odd critters in our faces from time to time. Keeps one on one's toes.
I put up a new link - Netflix. If you have a DVD player, Netflix is the coolest thing since sliced bread. For $20 a month, you can rent as many DVDs as you want, and (this part I love) keep them for as long as you want. You can't have more than four out at one time, but once you finish watching one you just put it in the postage paid envelope and send it back and they send you another one. This is great for me, the car-less wonder, for whom running out to the local Blockbuster requires much more time and energy than I usually have. Very nice on a rainy Thursday evening when I feel like curling up avec chat and watching a movie.
The other thing I love about Netflix is that you set up a Rental Queue from their list of 10,000 or so DVD titles, and you can put them in the order in which you'd like to see them. I can include movies that people have recommended to me or certain classics that I've never seen, the names of which always go right out of my head the nano-second I walk into a video store.
The thing is, certain classic movies strike me in a similar fashion to Woody Allen and some Classic Literature - I'd like to be able to know that I've seen them, but I don't really want to go through the process. I guess this is why "A Passage to India" (four stars) has been sitting on my DVD shelf since June. I haven't been in the mood for a "grand piece of film," with "gorgeous cinematography" and a "riveting story" yet.
Maybe one of these rainy Thursday evenings.
~ ~ ~
Quote du jour:
Never get angry. Never make a threat.
Reason with people.
Mario Puzo, The Godfather
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