We moved here, to the Detroit area the summer of 2001. I cam without a computer and felt no burden to own one. We bought our first home on American soil since 1980. The home we moved into sits on a gorgeous acre of land with big trees and just 3 homes from Lake St. Clair. It is a private circular Archway entered haven. I was warned though, early on that the one thing I should think through before buying was what many called, “The neighbor from Hell”.

It wasn’t long into our settling in that I didn’t see “Hell” written on his forehead; but I caught a glimpse of the rumors I had committed to distruction. As time went on it was if the effort to destory planted ideas about a man I had never met, started to reassemble into something many would have described as the work of Dr. Frankenstein!

After two years of his riding lawn mower taken my lawn to the dirt as he did some strange figure eight ritual that all of my pleading was actually fueling bigger 8’s! Finally I planted a 150 foot row of $4,000 dollars of shrubs between our homes, and in one winter he strangely decided for the first time to shovel snow of his back patio!

His brother lives in our “Desperate Housewive’s” picture book lane and the two brothers haven’t spoken in 28 years. His brother apologized and said, “I am so sorry you have to be his neighbor”.

After nearly 10 years of silence, today I went to the mailbox and passed “Sunshine’ shuffling out from our very inflated forcast. In that moment a still firm and small loving voice said, “Ask him how he is doing as a builder in the worst city in America.”

He answered.

I immediately was aware of Jesus promise, “Do not worry about what you are going to say for I will give you the words when you need them.” Before I knew it I was asking for his forgiveness for not asking him for his opinion on the row of shrubbery that he would have to look at and inconvienced him as the path way from front to back was now narrowed. Even though they were all legally on my property and a sufficient distant from his property line, I knew that there was something that I could do bo allow love to cover a multitude of sin. It didn’t matter whose list of “wrongs” was longer or shorter. It didn’t matter that I spoke nicely to him from the beginning and that never changed. It didn’t matter that he broke a Guiness Book of World Records for the most different foul words strung together to describe a neighbor.

Only one thing mattered in that moment. God loves and always has loved my neighbor. And He had placed us next door to make the message clear. I apologized for planting and not asking. I apologized for not mending our “world record” verbal bash. There were no buts. No diagragms of the increasing size of the “scalping figure 8’s”. Just, “Please forgive me and lets see what we can do to make it a relationship that will surprise us both.”

And then he started to talk, surpassing 10 years worth of words in 2 mintues as he described how wonderful it was to be a grandfather.(daughter had a high school son). He couldn’t contain the joy and I left that ordained moment knowing that I had experienced what Paul said in the New Testament, “From now on we no longer regard others from a human perspective…….We see people the way God does.”

I walked into the house wondering why it took me so long and then letting go of that thought and smiled.

Some are mentioning that RS is in decline. If we run RS like I did with my neighbor it is bound to lead to a decline. But when I think of my neighbor tonight, I can’t wait for our next conversation. I picture him in my own telling stories about grandchildren.

We will make it but you know and I know where it has to start. I have missed this place and my friends here. I have missed those that “left” and I miss having missed the opportunities to see no one on this site from a worldly point of view.

I’m getting older but still have a good 20-30 years to finish well as I journey home and that journey goes right through the RS and the many friends and dear people that I think I will be seeing from a different point of view.

You all are special people, who are of great value.

Thank you for patiently waiting for my return. My wife just came through serious lower back surgery and now we both are out of work; but couldn’t be in a more joyful state.

GB     No proofreading, so feel free to tell me!!

What would the outrage be if Dell sold a line of laptops stuffed with bloatware and loaded with a buggy Windows OS?  OK, so maybe that happens alot.  But what if they then told you, you were not allowed to access the C drive, you were not allowed to remove ANY of the bloatware, and you couldn’t run ANY other OS except the one they give you?  Then imagine they release a Dell blessed OS update.  When you install this update on your laptop (that you removed bloatware on) it bricked your device.  I am pretty sure that would be pretty big news, right?

So where is the outrage at Motorola?  I will back up a little.  I purchased my first “open source” Android phone a few weeks ago.  I have the Moto Droid X and it is spectacular.  As I taught myself about the phone by joining a few forums, I learned about things like rooting, renaming apps (to remove them) and custom ROMS.  Knowing the danger of rooting the phone I chose to go ahead and do it.  I am pretty handy with technology and have no real fear that I will brick my phone.  When a leaked 2.2 OS was released, I was one of the first to load it up.  It made a HUGE difference over the buggy 2.1 released at launch.  Over the next few weeks I was able to use a great phone to its full potential.  Those who chose NOT to root and update were stuck. 

Than came this morning.  The official OTA 2.2 was released.  Knowing the dangers of possibly losing root, I decided to wait this one out.  I am SO glad I did.  Many others were not as fortunate.  When those who rooted and removed a file or two from the main drive tried to update, the update failed.  No big deal right?  We can always flash back to factory settings (thanks to the SBF file leaked from Moto).  NOT SO FAST!!

If you try to SBF from the OTA update, your phone is bricked.  I mean REALLY bricked.  Who knows if we will ever be able to fix it.  Many top developers believe it will take a 2.2 leaked SBF file to fix these phones.  So what happened?  Motorola changed the signature on the bootloader during the final days before release.  I know because I have a leaked version of 2.3.15 (the final OTA version) without the updated bootloader.

The ONLY reason I can think to do this is simply to brick the phones of those who chose to root.  I do not mind if Motorola chooses NOT to support my phone if I root it, but don’t intentionally break it.  Why do you even care what I run on MY phone?

What happened to Android being open source?  Wait a minute…Motorola is cool with taking an open source software developed by Google and then locking it down for their customers?  Then breaking the phones of those who do not follow their rules?  I am sorry, but this is plain wrong.  If Dell did this, Micheal Dell would be in front of congress.  I still love my phone and have a lot of faith in the developer community, but Motorola are a bunch of D bags.  I hope they are sued.

I never thought Motorola would make Apple seem like the open source company.

I try and check sources, but that is becoming increasingly difficult to do. So let me go on record as saying this, “If Lou Pritchett didn’t write the follow open letter then what is written here does a fare job of expressing my very similar sentiments. I pray for our President as God says to pray for our leaders. As I pray forward I pray for a leader that has the wisdom of Solomon as he leads, firmly backed by a constitution he knows so well that he is capable of bringing back the life it breathed into a growing nation and we need him to come soon or in a few more years maybe the “Author” is right.

So regardless of who the author is- how does this message provoke you, not to reaction, but to a deeper thought about who are we, and where are we headed?

 

You Scare Me   AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA

 

Claim:   Lou Pritchett penned an “open letter” to President Obama.

CORRECTLY ATTRIBUTED

[May 2009]

Dear President Obama:

You are the thirteenth President under whom I have lived and unlike

any of the others, you truly scare me.

You scare me because after months of exposure, I know nothing about

you.

You scare me because I do not know how you paid for your expensive

Ivy League education and your upscale lifestyle and housing with no

visible signs of support.

You scare me because you did not spend the formative years of youth

growing up in America and culturally you are not an American.

You scare me because you have never run a company or met a payroll.

You scare me because you have never had military experience, thus

don’t understand it at its core..

You scare me because you lack humility and ‘class’, always blaming

others.

You scare me because for over half your life you have aligned

yourself with radical extremists who hate America and you refuse to

publicly denounce these radicals who wish to see America fail.

You scare me because you are a cheerleader for the ‘blame America’

crowd

and deliver this message abroad.

You scare me because you want to change America to a European stylecountry where the government

sector dominates instead of the private

sector.

You scare me because you want to replace our health care system with

a government controlled one.

You scare me because you prefer ‘wind mills’ to responsibly

capitalizing on our own vast oil, coal and shale reserves.

You scare me because you want to kill the American capitalist goose

that lays the golden egg which provides the highest standard of

living in the world.

You scare me because you have begun to use ‘extortion’ tactics

against certain banks and corporations.

You scare me because your own political party shrinks from

challenging you on your wild and irresponsible spending proposals.

You scare me because you will not openly listen to or even consider

opposing points of view from intelligent people.

You scare me because you falsely believe that you are both

omnipotent and omniscient.

You scare me because the media gives you a free pass on everything

you do.

You scare me because you demonize and want to silence the Limbaughs,

Hannitys, O’Relllys and Becks who offer opposing, conservative

points of view.

You scare me because you prefer controlling over governing.

Finally, you scare me because if you serve a second term I will

probably not feel safe in writing a similar letter in 8 years.

 

Lou Pritchett

Origins:   Lou Pritchett is a former vice president of Procter &

Gamble whose career at that company spanned 36 years before his

retirement in 1989, and he is the author of the 1995 business book,

Stop Paddling & Start Rocking the Boat.

Mr. Pritchett confirmed to us that he was indeed the author of the

much-circulated “open letter” quoted above:

I did write the ‘you scare me’ letter. I sent it to the NY Times but

they never acknowledged or published it. However, it hit the

Internet and according to the ‘experts’ has had over 500,000 hits.

Last updated:   31 May 2009

The URL for this page is

http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/youscareme.asp

 

 

 

First posting could be as early as tonight!  Guesses on the very first “Flog” topic? This could be our first step to world-wide recognition!! Laugh, but I would rather Flog than Twitter, “The lettuce just fell off my sandwich! I will never eat here again!”Do people really spend time ready that kind of posted information? It explains how we got a president elected; clueless people tend to vote for clueless people.

THAT THREAD IS CLOSED.

I will continue to post, and within a week or two, I will try and determine what is the Blog site and how does it relate to the Forum and Folding of RampantSpeculation.com.

Maybe we should be so bold as to come up with yet another name for all of the rampantspeculation that takes place every second of every day all around the globe; how about Rampanspeculation.com/FLOG?

We have Twitter; try and convince me that doesn’t sound foolish. Facebook?; seriously, statistically how many have their face and nothing more in the upper left hand corner. The way it is progressing (or degressing); soon we can call it ”Fleshbook”.

MySpace?; it is ironic what so many teens have done to themselves- they could have had the planet to wander but chose a non-existent digital “place” to lie about who they are. They all hate rules and “walls” imposed on them at school, so they box themselves in and try and show everyone (which actually means no one) something they aren’t and can’t be.

I will be the world’s first Flogger. Unless I get any concerns right away,and since there are not a great deal of forum members that visit here, I will have Rafa make the change for me. We then can be known for RampantSpeculation.Com/Forum/Folding/Flogging !

 

It is hard to believe that nearly four years has gone by since the amazing “DCF Forum Posting Record for One Topic”, which had its beginnings in the summer of 2006! Google this sentence-Dell to offer free motherboard upgrades to XPS 700 owners. And look at this link:  http://www.techspot.com/news/24599-dell-to-offer-free-motherboard-upgrades-to-xps-700-owners.html .

I continue to think about all of those people that I got to know and befriend. Those were exciting times for many people. As I reflect on why I would describe ”forum posting” as exciting, what comes to mind right away are two words: Unity and Purpose.

Many people came together and accomplished something important and something that each person involved had a pretty strong conviction about what he or she was doing.

There was also that momentum feeling that you get when a group of people pull together over something they all have in common and it grows and the conviction grows with it.  Without the kind of unity that produces growth both in quantity and also in quality, there is no way that a few people could have met the goal that this group of customers had achieved.

Each person that was being added to the group at a rapid rate, joined in because they shared a common purpose. Without a legitimate purpose the “Summer of 2006″ and beyond, would never have sustained a critical mass to eventually be taken seriously.

I miss many of those folks. It has been a long time since I have sent an email to the ones that were heavily involved in the effort.

What excited me the most about what was accomplished that really was a rare event in the world of Big American Corporations is that people were incredibly encouraging and grateful. The computers and/or parts for many of that group are long gone; given away, sold on Ebay, donated to a cause, or just ran out of energy and died. The computers were not the most exciting part of that time; it was the People.

People made it exciting and People helped Dell recognize a need and find a way to place a greater value on the “customers” that are the ultimate foundation of the Dell Corporation. Value placed on the right foundation is what often explains why One Corporation is gone today that was “invincible” four years ago.

Unfortunately time, which some people will argue heals, often is what buries an event that was moving a Corporation to greater heights and better relationships with the People that are called customers. The excitement fades. The plans are lost as new people replace old. And as is often the case the PEOPLE once again get lost in the pursuit of technology and profit; those kinds of things, that in four years will be gone, given away, sold on Ebay, or just died out.

But the people are still there: People outside the corporation and People inside the corporation. All the products and technology in the world are never going to be as cohesive as the relationships built with People on the Inside and People on the outside; CUSTOMER CONNECTION at its best. 

I still have to ask myself, why customer care in the USA, for one, isn’t improving more, especially in light of the latest great tumble in the stock market. What word comes to mind; People.

One of the most amazing words that Neil Hand made in this statement is “apologize”.  “On behalf of Dell, I want to apologize for that.” That is one of those rare characteristics that is only known amongst PEOPLE; to say, “I am sorry.”

The Wall Street Journal had printed an article about Dell and customer care that came out in September of 2006, and much of it was prompted by the “Summer of 2006”.  There was a comment made by the author of that article regarding a follow-up article if we were able to move a giant Corporation to our goal. It was said; anticipating little would come of this group’s effort, as noble as it was.

That follow-up article would have been praising Dell for doing what is unheard of in Corporate America; saying, “I am sorry, and I will fix it.” That is exactly what Dell did. Not only did they make it right but they sent technicians free of charge right out to people’s homes. Had that article been written, who knows what impact it would have had long range on stock values, customer impressions, and positioning in the PC industry?

We will never know because it was never written. Not enough people got to see that customers can do amazing things and Corporations like Dell can show the world that within “Giant Corporate Walls”, are People, that go home to families, care about others, and are just like you and me.

I was privileged to pass through those walls; which in itself tells you something positive about the people inside. I had the joy of meeting and getting to know many Dell leaders and employees. To this day I can honestly say that once “inside” I met all kinds of People who really did have a burden for what the groups of people outside were feeling. I discovered that the “CARE” component of “Customer Care” was there, but it wasn’t always finding its way outside the Walls.

I pushed for a longer run then the final outcome. I couldn’t get a newspaper to write about something incredibly positive for the Customer and the Corporation. I don’t blame the author at all. He was a wonderful man to work with. He wasn’t the decision maker though. “What Sells” carries such power that it is the dominant decision maker for many companies. The weakness of  “What Sells” carrying to much power is that the money and the products are being exchanged with ”Priceless People.” 

Let’s hope that the changes for “People Outside” and “People Inside” will come; that the Corporate World will hold on to the value of the individual person; People are priceless. I believe that it will always have to be customer driven because we are the ones that know what it feels like and can help those that are more removed from our experiences.

I’ve been to a couple of Dell Consortiums, where they have brought in customers to interact with them and learn from the people that they want to care for and make products for. That goes back to the summer of 2006. The “Customer Class of 2006″ on the DCF did an amazing thing! Tell your grandkids!!