Dishers.com – Page 18 – Disher Family Fodder

October 15, 2012October 24, 2012

Apple, your support is lacking.

It’s been a long time since I’ve gone on a RANT about poor customer service but here goes.

Last Thursday, the Cincinnati Reds were in a Do-Or-Die Playoff game, at 1pm. We recently moved into a new building, and don’t have any Cable TV installed yet. (TimeWarner, your RANT will be forthcoming).

Obviously we wanted to get this game which was on National TV on some of the TV’s in the building for folks who love the Reds could watch and keep up with the game.

We have a couple conference rooms equipped with AppleTV’s. So we thought, “Oh, this will be easy, we just need someone with an AppleTV/MLB subscription to log in.

LJ was already watching the game live on MLB.com using his MLB account. We tried his account with AppleTV but it wouldn’t work. So we did the next best thing. I purchased an MLB subscription, in an attempt to bring happiness to our beloved fans.

AppleTV/iTunes, did everything right. Showed me that the game was available then prompted me to buy the subscription. So I did. After the subscription was processed it let us know that “Oops, Sorry, this game is blacked out in your area”. Huh? It was on broadcast national television.

Thanks for that.

So today my iTunes statement comes in and looks like this:

See that link right there ‘Report a Problem”.

I decided I’d click it, cause, yeah, I have a problem. I don’t want a recurring MLB.TV subscription that I’ll never ever use again.

So I click it. What does it do? Opens itunes:

See that “Report a Problem’ text, that’s a link in iTunes.

So I click that.

What does that do?

Opens a browser, which is what my email invoice should have done in the first place.

Except, I’ll be damned if you can actually dispute an individual charge. It’s just the generic iTunes Support Page:

http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/

This is not helpful.

Apple is so good at so many things, but this is one area that’s been horrible forever. No wonder they are as profitable as they are. If we could force our customers through a maze that doesn’t ever let them fix their issue and we got to keep their money… We’ve all be millionaires.

After all it’s just a $0.99 app or in this case a $3.99 subscription. I’ve already wasted more than that is worth to me. No wonder. I bet most people just give up.

Now I get to make a phone call, which I can assure you will be super special.

Update: After jumping through the 87 hoops on apple.com and expresslane.apple.com, I was finally able to talk to Heather, who took care of this for me. But it just shouldn’t be this hard.

Update #2: I purchased a retina iPad as an update to the original iPad that I got pretty much on day one. I do love my iPad, I use it every day. Since IOS6 left iPad(1) in the dust, I was compelled to upgrade. Less than 3 weeks later they announce a new 4th generation iPad. Same retina display only 2x faster and better.

I read on the web where Apple usually allows people to swap if their purchase was made within 30 days. It appears this isn’t policy but it’s a good customer move. I mean my iPad looks like new and if someone bought it at ‘refurb’ pricing, they’d be happy. Anyway a few phone calls to my local Apple Store pretty much discouraged me. Apple Genius ‘DeAndre’ pretty much blew me off. Spouting out the 14 day return policy, though he admitted they do often stretch that to 30 days in some cases. At the end of the day, I was left without a confident feeling they’ll make it happen. I asked for a Genius appointment for launch day (Nov 2nd) and was denied. I’ll be damned if I’ll stand in line.

August 14, 2012August 14, 2012

Emma

OK, so Claudine has been Jonesing for another Golden Retriever since we had to put Comet down. He was a great dog.

Then all I heard about was, never again, never will we get a dog that:

a) Sheds and clogs up the vacuum cleaner
b) Is big enough to clear the coffee table with one swift wag of the tail
c) Makes us buy food by the 50lb bag

But enough time has passed that she forgot all that stuff.

On our way home from my rained out NASCAR Experience, she happened to glance on craigslist and there she was. 11 week old female golden.

We picked her up that evening. She’s HUGE, and she’s gonna be HUGE, Comet-like we hope.

We’ve had her a week now and for the most part she hasn’t eaten anything she’s not supposed to and the accidents have been minimal.

Meet, Emma:

She’s a doll.

July 14, 2012July 14, 2012

Saturday Steel First Annual Juniors Match

Today was the first annual Junior match at Saturday Steel.

Of course our kids rocked the house. Both Molly and Maria shot very, very well.

It was a good turn out, about 22 kids.

Dave Reichle explained the rules and how the match would go.

Then it was game on!.

A bunch of more photos at the link below:

Saturday Steel Jr. Match 07/14/2012

Vids below:

Molly smokin Rimfire

Molly smokin Stock Auto

Maria had a great Day! Here’s stage 1 Rimfire

Maria Stage 2 String 1

Maria Stage 2 String 2

Molly Stage 2

Molly swept her age group, and Maria came in 2nd in Rimfire for her age group.

Afterward the whole family shot the regular Saturday Steel Match.

IT was way to close to be comfortable in Rimfire…

Michael *almost* had Molly, *almost* Winking smile

June 15, 2012June 15, 2012

Sena BlueTooth vs. StarCom 1

OK, since 2007 I’ve had an intercom system in the bike. StarCom1 Advanced to be exact.

It allows me and a wired passenger to talk. The intercom part of the StarCom has always been a bit of an issue for me. Mostly tuning it. To get the VOX just right, so that we can talk clearly w/o wind noise holding the conversation open when not necessary.

Fortunately or unfortunately I haven’t had to use the intercom portion all that often since Claudine just doesn’t ride with me that much. When she does they are normally short trips and not worth messing with the intercom.

That being said, I use the StarCom every day on every ride.

It is my audio interface to my GPS (Zumo 550, then 665) and it’s my entertainment center (mp3’s from the Zumo and formerly XM via the Zumo) and when appropriate Radar detector audio.

At one point it also served as my interface to the phone. Both times, phones connected to the Zumo via Bluetooth and the Zumos hard-wired into the StarCom.

Previous to the StarCom I simply used a MixIT, to be a portable amplifier for iPod/XM and to Mix in the radar detector.

The Mix-IT worked well, but created a mess of wires going into the tank bag where I kept it. When I decided I wanted an intercom I passed it on to a friend and he still uses it today. My dad still uses one as far as I know. (Great product).

The Starcom has a number of advantages for me:

Central mounting location, on the bike. No longer in my tank bag.
One nice cable to my helmet, no mess.
Intercom capability
Above average volume and sound quality.

The disadvantages are:

It’s not cheap, it’s not super expensive but it’s not cheap.
Starcom cables don’t seem to last a long time. The Shielded cables for Radar and phone seem to break down. When you’re talking a $82.95 microphone/audio cable. This is a problem to have to replace it every year or so. (Two cables actually MIC-02 and MUS-04) if you want Stereo sound, which I do. And, no, you can’t use cheapo Radioshack cables. You can, but you won’t be happy.
Tuning the Intercom can be a pain.
Headsets aren’t cheap, now about $75 per helmet. Figure two helmets for me, one for the wife, one for the kids that equals 4 helmets/headsets. That is cheap compare to say a J&M system.
The headsets aren’t easy to shuffle around so you need to mount it in your helmet and leave it there.
Along with the cables I’ve found headsets if worn year-round tend to break down as well, usually the microphone is the first to go.

So what brings me to this review? Well about two years ago I lost the phone/microphone capability with my StarCom again. It actually works if the bike isn’t running, but if it is, well the noise or interference is so bad nobody can hear you.

I replaced the headset, and the cables (again), and re-routed them to get them away from as much stuff as I could to avoid the interference. It worked for a while but now it’s back to being fubar again.

All other audio functions work just fine. It’s the cable from the Zumo to the StarCom that is the issue.

So I decided to look at what else is out there.

Back in the day before I had the Mix-IT, I did play with one of the first CARDO BT systems for motorcycles and it was pretty good. At the time it was mono only and phone only.

After searching, the Sena Bluetooth SMH10 seems to be the most recommended at this time. Also the idea of my riding buddy having one and being able to talk to him was attractive. So I ordered up a pair.

I unboxed them, charged them, upgraded them to the new 4.0 firmware.

Paired up my Zumo and iPhone and went out of a test ride.

First thoughts:

1) Sound quality from this is HORRIBLE. Streaming MP3’s from the Zumo 665 is about AM quality at best. It’s certainly loud enough. I ride with earplugs so it needed to be loud enough to overcome. But even at lower volumes w/o earplugs, on a scale of 1-10 it was a 3 maybe a 4 at best. (Versus the StarCom which I would rate an 8.5-9)

(And yes, I am painfully aware of the need to make sure the speakers are centered in the ear).

2) Phone call testing.

For the first test I used what Sena calls Case 3:

I called my wife who was happy to play along, and she said no. This is unacceptable. I was barely legible if at all.

Now knowing that with my windshield down, it can be quite turbulent, I stopped an put the plastic microphone mask on the front side of the mic as suggested and included in the box.

No real change in quality.

I stopped again an switched up to what Sena calls Case 2:

For this the phone call quality was better. Wife said she’d call me and talk to me in an emergency, or take a call from me in an emergency, but no, she would not talk to me like this for 30 minutes to keep me awake.

It was not as good as the StarCom when the Starcom works.

In this configuration, MP3 streaming form the Zumo was still bad, though GPS prompts sounded pretty good.

At the end of the day I decided I listen to music 98% of the time and talk on the phone 2%. I’m not willing to give up the music audio quality in favor of what turns out also to be a lesser phone call quality.

The wireless features and Bike-To-Bike capabilities *could* have possibly swayed me. But even those scenarios are less than 10% of my total ride time and aren’t likely too.

So with some frustration, the Sena gets shipped back today.

I have ordered the StarCom1 BT-02 module. If that rectifies my cable issue, then I’ll be a happy camper. If not then we’ll figure out what to do next.

If you have a sure-fire bike to bike system that provides great audio (with ear plug) and uses or doesn’t use the StarCom system. Please let me know about it or how you have it set up.

May 28, 2012July 5, 2012

2012 Mason-Dixon 20-20 Rally Report

If you already know what a Motorcycle Endurance Rally is. Maybe because you read my report from last year (2011) or (2010) or (2009) you can skip this section and go straight to the Ride report. Otherwise, the basics are explained in the (2010) report.

This years rally them was the Mountain Doo Doo

Mason Dixon 20-20 2012

This was hinted at last year and advertised as the antithesis of last years nearly 100% highway riding rally. It was destined to be in the mountains and only in the mountains.

I was excited, I’d rather ride 1500 miles in the mountains than 800 on the super slab but that’s just me.

We anticipated that being in the mountains at night was gonna suck so last year after the MD2020 I added AUX lights to the bike. Nothing really sucks worse than two lane West Virginia roads in the dark and you can’t really understand just how dark unless you’ve been there.

OK so with much anticipation, the list of boni (which is plural for bonus) was released last Sunday (one week before the rally).

We get to prepare (read agonize over these for a week) while we try to figure out a good route.

The base boni looked something like this:

Now the first thing you might think is that’s a lot of boni, of which a good portion aint in the mountains. That’s exactly what I thought. Then the rules indicated that this was an efficiency rally. Which means the most points per miles wins, and not the most points. As you can see, the purple (highest value) boni are in the mountains as are most of the red (next highest in value). But all those green ones, the mediums, they are much closer to the rally HQ, which meant (to me) that an efficient ride was going to include a bunch of those and none of the red/purple which were “in the mountains”.

This didn’t sit well with me.

For one, the MD2020 always awards the most efficient rider with the Jim Young Trophy. This guy while efficient, usually is outside of the top 5, sometimes even outside the top 10.

So immediately I dismissed the whole efficiency idea. I played with a few routes but I (we) which includes my riding partner decided, we wanted a mountain rally and would ride the mountains and pick the best route out of those that we could find and ride it. We just wanted to ride well and score well. We became much less concerned about finishing well.

And so planning began and this is what we came up with:

The route included 1266 miles which would be enough to claim the points for exceeding 1250. It was tight. In fact it had us getting back at 2:40pm, which was 10 minutes after the Time-Bar time. Which meant we had to find 10 minutes, something we haven’t been able to do in the past.

But the route was such that at the end the last 8 or so stops, we could bail and jet over to 81 and make a run for it if we were running behind or “on time”.

The Route sheet from which we’d work from looked like this:

I can’t remember the last MD2020 that got started on time but we left the barn at 05:30, and beet feet north to Jim’s grave, a mandatory bonus every year, we arrived 07:02 which meant we were 30 minutes ahead of schedule from getting started 30 minutes early. This was awesome, now we just needed to maintain that over the next 33 hours.

Stop 2 was actually a bonus that’s not listed on the route but we were following a rider towards Jim’s grave and when he bailed off at the exit I checked to see what he might be going after, and (since we were ahead) we had time to grab it. It was right by the exit and we would need fuel at this time as well.

So we grabbed the 35 extra points for bagging the community center:

From this spot it was a bit of a ride to get to bonus 114 The population center sign.

At this point we were almost an hour ahead of schedule and starting to think maybe we’ve missed something…

4th stop would be Lost River Church Historical Marker

Followed by the Coots Store sign:

I should point out that the bandana was a new requirement for this rally. Not only did you have to have your rally flag but about 1/2 the boni required your ‘colorful’ bandana also had to be in the photo. Thanks Rick!

From the Coots sign we headed to cemetery in Franklin WV. By now it was north of 90 degrees and steamy hot.

After this bonus I noticed that my windshield wouldn’t go up or down and my turn signals were ‘funky’.

I pulled off the road at a gas station and Kyle mentioned I didn’t have any head lights to go with my other issues. *CRAP*. I have a 2006 FJR (Gen II) and no I have not had the wiring harness recall performed.

I have had 2 Brodie harnesses in my hands but gave them both up to guys who needed them for the Iron Butt Rally in 2009 and 2011 and never installed it.

I was fearful that my harness was melting and I’d be stranded in the middle of nowhere-WV.

In top of that starting was also problematic. It wouldn’t start in neutral, only in gear after ‘cycling’ the kickstand. I feared we were hosed at this point, and we were a full 1 hour ahead by now.

Kyle and I discussed and decided to carry on. If I was going to get ‘stuck’ in WV I guess it didn’t really matter where. (We’ll revisit that thought later).

The way the spider problem often works is you shut your bike off and it just won’t start back up. So I got it started and I’d just leave it running until the rest bonus. We knew then we’d be in a more major metropolitan area.

The next stop was in Seneca Rocks:

Then Rich mountain.

Followed by Pickens WV the highest point bonus of the rally at 777 points.

Now here’s the deal with this. Pickens is paved. But there are 3 ways into Pickens, and Garmin didn’t route us in or out on a paved road. No rather it was 20+ miles in and 20+ miles out on gravel, gravel that the FJR had no business being on. We were passed by dirt bikes, trucks and 4-wheelers.

It was a great fire road, and lucky for us it was graded recently. It wasn’t too rutted, buy still, we had no business there on 650lb street bikes.

Yea, there was a reason it was 777 points.

(Rick you suck)

From Pickens we headed to Hacker Valley.

Then on to the Walter Cool Historical Marker.

then an over look:

Of course you had to read the damn thing, cause they wanted the bend in the river and not the sign.

Then off to Zela

Extra special thanks to Bill Dunlop who was just leaving and pointed us to the sign, which was covered up…

From Zela to the Glen Ferris Inn near Gauley, WV

Then the Coal Marker

Then the Hatfield Cemetery

It’s starting to get dark and I don’t have any headlights. Sad smile

I do have aux lights which will help but people don’t really like those even though they are aimed away from oncoming traffic.

Next stop is Gilbert, WV to shoot Marilyn

Then Grundy, WV

Brilliant, Kyles headlight is out too. IT’s been fickle all day, he can usually get it started by wrapping on the relay with a screw driver…

This sucks…

(yes the FJR is running)

2 more stops before our rest bonus.

We found a reasonable gas station with good lighting, and an ATM.

We grabbed our rest start bonus at 00:16 and I tore into the FJR. I was hopeful that maybe just maybe the wiring for my aux lights was causing my issue. I disconnected the high beam relay (leaving the manual on feed) but that didn’t make a difference. That cost me about 40 mins rest.

We slept in the nearby Burger King parking lot away from the hustle and bustle of the gas station. The provided us with 2 good hours of sleep on our luxury thermo-rests.

The alarm went off at 02:50 and we saddled up and rode over to the gas station. I got a crappy cup of coffee and some pop-tarts.

We got our ending receipts at 03:18 and off we went into the night.

Smithfield WV.

Then Burkes Garden to snap the old post office. The road in and out of Burkes Garden was awesome. Only wish it hadn’t been in the middle of the night.

This was a daylight only bonus and daylight started at 05:30 regardless of the amount of light available, which was pretty much no light.

Then Peterstown, WV for a big Chicken

Then the Deer Restaurant

Then the Cow at the Paint Bank General store.

Which was perfect cause both of us were running on fumes and probably couldn’t have made it another 5 miles to the next gas station.

At this point we realize that getting back by 1pm is a possibility. The Garman is telling us we have a 10 minute cushion. (which is an hour and a half better than our planned arrival time of 02:38).

Just 3 more stops.

The hump back bridge

Then the lookout at Longdale Furnace. Another Rick Miller special. 10 miles of Gravel up the mountain in, and 10 miles out.

Just to get a picture of a pile of rocks.

Oh look, a Magical Coyote.

It’s right there under the bush, can you see it?

Lastly a quick photo of Foam Henge 🙂 I have always wanted to stop here.

We still had 180 miles to go and one fuel stop.

And we made it pulling in at 12:50pm

Total Rally miles 1264 (corrected)

Plus 450 miles to the rally and 450 miles home meant a wonderful 2164 for the weekend.

Good riding, good times.

We ended up with an 8.5 something points per mile. Good enough for 13th/14th place. But we didn’t really go for high points per mile so we’re really happy with that.

This was for us, the best rally we’ve ridden. We planned then rode our plan. We made time instead of losing it. Outside of some potential mechanical problems that didn’t really hurt us, we didn’t have any issues. We rode for a solid 30 hours and couldn’t have done any better.

We are happy with the ride and the results and are looking forward to next year.

The entire photo library is visible here:

https://picasaweb.google.com/105269375688822016029/2012_MD2020#

I don’t have a spot tracker and used Google Latitude on my iPhone so family and friends could track me. That data is available here:

http://www.dishers.com/FJR/2012_MD2020_Latitude_RallyData.kml

Best viewed in google earth, it’s not super accurate though. Apparently the Garmin can’t keep 3 days worth of Rally data so I lost all tracks prior to the rest bonus :/

Clarification: I wasn’t disappointed with the MD2020, it’s theme or the they way it was run. Bummed that it wasn’t a pure mountain rally, and bummed that it wasn’t traditional rally scoring yes, but I wouldn’t say I was disappointed. The rally was awesome, and well run as the MD2020 always is. It just turned out to be a different rally than we expected so in that aspect I guess you could say we were disappointed. Anyway, we made the best of it. We planned a rally route that we wanted to ride and executed it to the best of our abilities. It was probably my best ride to-date, in that we were able to execute our plan, added points and finished earlier than we expected. We were never rushed, it was a beautiful thing. Had this been a ‘regular’ rally we would have finished well, but we knew we wouldn’t from the get-go so we’re good with it.