WTF 2

So I'm getting things ready to do a Sauce demo ( sartainsmenu.com ) and I find I am out of gallon Baggies that I use to marinate the meat, chicken thighs and pork steaks, so I scoot on down to the grocery store and get another box. So far so good.

I put the chicken in one of the bags and pour in THE MARINADE, that's when I find out that the baggie will not close. It seems that when it was made the "zip-lock" parts didn't line up so they would not zip! So now I have this gallon baggie FULL of boneless skinless chicken thighs and MARINADE that I  can't close. Because the baggie has a pointed bottom it can't stand up so I fumble around in the drawers for a bowl big enough to handle gallon of parts.

This is when I find out that ALL OF THE BAGGIES ARE THE SAME! None of them will close. Well it's back to the grocery store, though this time it is a different one, for more baggies.

Now that I have all of my parts in their baggies and ready for the big show at Oliver's Market, who are now carrying THE SAUCE and THE MARINADE, I can get on the net and see what GLAD has to say about my problem.

I sent them a note about the 'one gallon zip-lock storage bags' that would not close and their reply was a clue that this would not bode well...


October 7, 2010

Reference Number: 6333422

Dear Mr. Sartain,

Thank you for contacting us about your Glad Freezer Bags. We always appreciate hearing from our customers. 

We're sorry to hear about your experience with our product. Please be assured that this is very unusual and we would not expect this to occur. We are happy to send a coupon and you should receive it within 7-10 business days. We certainly hope you will continue to use and have confidence in our products. 

Again, thank you for contacting us. 

Sincerely,
Amelia Miller

Consumer Response Representative

Consumer Services

OK they're talking 'freezer bags' and I'm talking 'storage bags' I can live with that, so low and behold a week or so later I received a letter from The Clorox Sales Company repeating their sorrow over my dilemma and please find the coupon for "1 box GLAD Twist-Tie Food Storage Bags 1gal up to 100 ct". This was less than I was expecting as, if I wanted twist tie storage bags I would go over to the produce section and get as many as I wanted! 

Well I sent them a response to the coupon...

This is kinda funny. I sent an email about a box of 1 gal zip-lock storage bags that wouldn't close, the zip strips didn't line up. I then received an e-mail about the Freezer bag problem, no big deal, I then received a coupon for a box of "Twist-Tie Food Storage Bags". That's great except I don't use them I use the zip-lock kind! Can you fix this?

Thank-you for your time, Jim 

A couple of days later I got another email from Amelia:


Reference Number: 6333422

Dear Mr. Sartain,

Thank you for contacting us about your Glad Freezer Bags. We always appreciate hearing from our consumers.

I apologize.  I can and I will!  You can expect to receive the right coupon in the next 7-10 business days.  I accept total blame as I enclosed the wrong coupon.  I am sorry that you had to email me back. Have a great Thanksgiving! 

Again, thank you for contacting us.

Sincerely,

Amelia Miller

Consumer Response Representative

Consumer Services

Still hung up on those Freezer bags But I feel good that this game is almost over.

Well today I got another letter from the Clorox Sales Co.

November 18,2010

Reference Number: 6333422

Dear Mr. Sartain,

Thank you for contacting us about your Glad Freezer Bags. We always appreciate

hearing from our customers.

We're sorry to hear about the zipper not lining up correctly. Please be assured that this is

very unusual and we would not expect this to occur. We are happy to enclose a coupon

for reimbursement. We certainly hope you will continue to use and have confidence in 

our products.

Again, thank you for contacting us.

Sincerely,

Amelia Miller

Consumer Response Representative

Consumer Services

Enclosure: Coupon

Inside there was a coupon for:
1 box GLAD Zipper Freezer Bags any size up to 50ct


Should I tell them the original box was 100?

WTF

In a weak moment of nostalgia I bought two Swanson Hungry-Man turkey dinners, one for me and one for the Darling Rebecca. As a kid I thought they we're pretty good, sliced turkey, moist dressing with ample gravy and for desert a cranberry apple thing with a chewy crust. Doesn't that sound good?

Well I'm not a kid anymore and this ain't the same dinner!

When I opened the box I found a new dining experience was waiting for me. The turkey is now 'flaked and formed' the gravy didn't cover the most of the turkey and very little of the stuffing and the cranberry apple thing had no crust. Well I had gone this far so I cooked it up.

Because the gravy didn't cover the dressing it turned into kind of a dried up kibble and the turkey was not enough for a decent sandwich though it did look like it came from the the deli section of the grocery store, the cranberry stuff was so thin I couldn't get it out of the little section it was in, the fruit was easy to get out because there was so little of it.

Well I went to their web site and posted a complaint about the dinner. I told them in detail what I found wrong with the dinner and asked them where I could send the second dinner I had bought as I had no intention of eating it. The reply was not quite what I expected...

Reference #: 9131779

Dear Valued Consumer,

Thank you for taking the time to contact Consumer Relations regarding your recent purchase of Hungry Man Turkey Dinner. Please be assured that the experience you shared with us does not meet the high quality standards we have for all of our products.

I am sending replacement coupons in the mail that you should be receiving in seven to ten business days to replace those meals.

We take great pride in the quality of our products and ensuring consumer satisfaction is our greatest concern. We have taken the liberty of sharing your insight with our Quality Assurance management team so they can incorporate your experience into their ongoing improvement processes. We are always grateful when loyal consumers such as you take the time to communicate their experience so that we have the opportunity to investigate.

Sincerely,

Sara Allen
Consumer Relations Representative

A few days later I got a nice letter and two coupons for new Hungry-Man dinners ($3.99 maximum value) I still have the "dinner" in the freezer in the garage and there it will stay.

In their defence I will say the corn was great!

chapter one

“Oh shit, I’m late!” I have said this to myself and aloud a hundred times before. My folks had a standing rule that I was be home before the street lights come on, and once again I had failed. This time as with most of the others, wasn’t my fault.

I had been “out and about” with my incorrigible friends doing things best left undone. Of course we didn’t see it that way.

I should start by telling you who and what we were.  My name is Jim, not as wondrous as Ishmael in the Moby Dick novel but that too was not my fault. I was thirteen and like all thirteen year old boys was indestructible and knew everything. My friends were Bill, a sixteen year old Italian from the city, and Rick, another thirteen year old suburban from the upper middle class.

While me and Rick had been raised in the “lap of luxury’, Bill had been learned in the streets of San Francisco. Our folks had told us many times that we didn’t know how good we had it. Little did they know just how good we did have it. We would go out on our own with the help of “forbidden fruit” and found just how good life could be in suburbia.

Seems life in the northern suburbs of San Francisco, though boring to most folks our age, could be quite adventurous if you saw it in the right light, and that’s where Bill came in. Seems on the streets of San Francisco in the late sixties the world had found a new path, and Bill was our conduit to that new path and I shall always owe him for that. We would always be wandering the creek that ran through our town, jumping over the pools and throwing rocks at the turkeys that would roost in the trees. From time to time there would be a view into the windows of the folks who lived along the creek, giving us all something to fantasize about in later hours. Life was good. Sometimes life on the creek was, well, dull and we would venture off into other things more adventurous.

Our town had a population of around nine thousand and a police force of around fifty. Seems that those fifty were always fighting over who would get the use of our six prowl cars and this made the usually bored cops rather testy when they finally got out on the streets looking for some crime wave or another to break up that night. That usually meant us. We saw this as a bit of a challenge, to entertain ourselves while not being caught by the cops. Bill, bless him, seemed to always to have a plan. Rick and I could never seem to come up with the proper argument against his plans, so off we would go. It is a wonder we lived through some of them.

And these are our stories…