I’m typing this post from my newly resuscitated iBook (2005 vintage). Over the holidays, someone accidentally stepped on the end of the AC adapter, crushing the metal shielding and bending the center pin beyond repair (I tried to bend it back slowly and it snapped off).

After the initial shock, I thought, oh well, I’ll just order a new adapter. More shock. The official G4 iBook AC adapter is $100 at the Apple Store. Read more »

A few weeks ago I read an article about a rather iconic maker of parkas that I’d never heard of before. The company is called Canada Goose. They’ve made a name for themselves outfitting polar explorers and now produce very durable, warm and fashionable parkas. Naturally, I thought “if these parkas are so great how come I’ve never seen them before???” Read more »

Starbucks is, by definition about creating remarkable experiences and going that extra mile. They’ve built their entire reputation on it. So why is it that the store experience doesn’t quite translate whenever I try to make that “perfect” cup of their coffee at home?

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You have been bitten by a vampire, so and so’s added some innocuous application that you really could care less about, add this application to spam and alienate the few friends that you have left. This is just a sample of the garbage that now populates the Facebook mini-feed (cynicism aside of course). What was a once a rather gratifying exercise in voyeurism has now turned into a something resembling a flea market escapade. Then there’s the wall which went from elegant simplicity to becoming the equivalent of an elementary school art project and the mini-feed, which is now full of mostly junk interspersed with the occasional treasure of friend related gossip. Read more »

On what was a pretty normal and sedate work day, a colleague from work brought in a bottle of old-style Pop Shoppe pop (soda to those of you south of the border) , which has recently been resurrected from the graveyard of the 80’s. What struck me as interesting was the excitement that the return of this product inspired in my colleagues. It was almost as if they regressed to childhood in front of my eyes, swaddled in oversized adult clothing as they marvelled at the bottle. You would almost think it was the Coke bottle from The Gods Must be Crazy. Read more »

ian writes:

“I recently tried to add an additional bank account to my ING Direct Savings account, by sending them a cheque for decently sized chunk of money. After confirming that the cheque had been cashed, I call them to find that they cannot deposit the cheque into my savings account because my bank told them it was tied to a line of credit account.”"Line of credit? I don’t have one of those. It’s a regular everyday chequing account.”

“I would suggest calling your bank and sorting this out, and then calling us back.”

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Indigo/Chapters, Canada’s largest retail book chain gets “it”. They understand the relevance of the blog as a means by which they can converse with their customers. In a recent post to my personal blog I recounted my experience at a local Chapters while trying to find a copy of Don Tapscott and Anthony D Williams’ book, Wikinomics. What follows is a brief summary of the experience, how Chapters/Indigo responded to my experience, and how I came away from the experience with a renewed appreciation for the company.

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