Boo ING Direct

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I’m working off some bad financial karma this week, I guess.

We’ve had a situation during our transition from Netbank to ING Direct where for the last week, we’ve had no checking account available to us to pay bills. The one that has the money (ING Direct) is locked because I forgot about a $18.00 check written to the Boy Scouts back in September that just got cashed on the old Netbank account right before a Netbank-ING Direct transfer went through for the last of the cash in the Netbank account.

The upshot of which is that it triggered some automated-fraud-detection thingy at ING Direct (even though it’s essentially an intra bank transfer since they ARE Netbank now), and they locked the only checking account we have available for an undetermined number of days, it’s been 5 so far. No, they can’t tell me when it will be available. No, there’s no way to get it unlocked so I can pay my mortgage. No, there’s no one I can talk to about this. No, they have no ideas about how to get the money in my savings account transferred out to pay the mortgage on time. No, they simply can not help me. They are awfully sorry, though. Don’t I have some other checking account at another bank I could use?

Not yet, no. But soon.

Luckily, I called the mortgage company, and they were able to do a wire transfer out of our ING Direct savings account to cover the payment today. Whew.

So, in summary, Boo, ING Direct, boo.

Book Log – Northern Lights (or) The Golden Compass

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The Golden Compass (or Northern Lights) By Philip Pullman

“I’d hire myself an armored bear.” – Sam Elliot

I saw the trailer for the upcoming The Golden Compass adaptation (opens Dec 7), and decided this looked like an interesting story. Reviews compared if favorably with the The Chronicles of Narnia and a small buzz has been created about this trilogy being an atheist’s answer to the 9-part Narnia series.

The original British title was Northern Lights, but for some reason was released as The Golden Compass in the U.S. Honestly, I think Compass is the more intriguing title.

The first book has a nice texture to it that should lend well to the film, a little bit fantasy and a little bit steampunk. The writing is engaging and the universe of the Compass is believable.

One of the fundamental premises is that the “souls” of people in this world are actually instantiated in a physical animal known as a daemon. The daemons travel with you and act as confidant and “soulmate”. A person’s character is reflected in the form the daemon takes. (Servants usually have dogs as their daemon). Children’s daemons shape shift constantly as their personalities are in development.

I was talking with terracinque about this first book, and we both agreed that if Mr. Pullman did anything well (and he did many things well) he communicated the relationship of person and daemon very clearly and made us care about it.

The only downside to this book is that is very clearly only part of a story. Whereas The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, for example, could comfortably stand on its own, we are not through with the story of Compass at the end and many things are left unexplained.

As for the reported anti-Christian rhetoric, the first book has little. There is a Science vs. The Church theme which will undoubtedly develop further in the coming books. My impression is this is less anti-religion and more anti-dogma.

Good read. I look forward to the film.

Modern Home Economics

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I was just reading a post in dooce.com, which I heartily recommend, and read a line that said “…blast on the stereo while unloading the dishwasher.”

Only I thought it said “…uploading the dishwasher.” And I decided from that point on, I would refer to it as uploading and downloading the dishes from or to the dishwasher.

Also, I can’t wait to get home and download a Coke from the fridge.

Literature Map

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I told myself I was just going to take a quick peek at LJ, just because I’ve been out of it for a while due to heavy workloads here and at home…

But then fierce_rabbit had to go and post a literature map link.

With only a few scant exceptions, I entered “Neal Stephenson” and it pretty much listed out my bookshelf.

Crazy.

Traffic… on Ice!

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The AJC is reporting that traffic will be bad around here this weekend, because of several events. One of the ones it lists is “Disney’s High School Musical: The Ice Tour”.

Really? That’s going to be a factor in traffic?

Maybe it has a really large cast that all drive separate oversized SUVs to get to the show.