Michael T. Halligan, the story of a wayward Infrastructure Architect

Translation of an exciting voicemail I received from @wojcyclery today, or how to make your customers love you.

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I received the best voicemail today from a bike shop I only discovered because of a Google Offer. The deal was fantastic, $75 off a $150 gift certificate, limit of 2 per customer. Of course I bought two. The first gift certificate bought me my first set of SPD pedals and some misc parts. The second got me a Brooks Flyer S satellite which arrived this morning. They left me a fantastic voicemail  to let me know it arrived: 

"Hello Good Morning Michael Halligan! This is Chris at wheels of Justice likely calling with some good news to let you know that the Brooks saddle, has showed up in the shop. It looks really awesome and I know you're stoked. You have any questions give US A call AT (510) 339-6091 Otherwise, we'll see you and we're open when you pick it up. Have a great day. Bye bye."

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Wheels Of Justice is awesome, go check these guys out, they're worth the ride up the hill!

[RANT] Bank Of America is defrauding customers who switched to credit unions this month. #occupyoakland

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Like several hundred thousand of my fellow Americans who are fed up with big banks, I closed out my account with Bank Of America at the beginning of the month and switched to a credit union with home I had opened up an account a few weeks prior .. I walked into a branch only to be told that they could not close an out of state account and that it would have to be done over the phone. It felt like an interference attempt,  but whatever, I shrugged it off and closed my accounts out effective immediately and requested that they send me a cashier's check for the small balance I had left.

 

I was assured that this was it, our business dealings were over. A few days go by and some vendor charges the check card. Any sane human being would expect that charge to get declined, and that the vendor would then call them up and say, "Hey, your card was invalid, WTF?". Instead BOFA saw an opportunity to kick me in the ass as I walked out of the door, and they did so with gusto. 

BOFA re-opened my closed account so that they could pay the charge off of an empty, closed account and extort me with an overdraft fee. Today I found out about this because I received a friendly alert threatening to extort me with an extended overdraft-fee. This was sort of a surprise, seeing as I've never tried to impose fees to any of my own former customers after we have officially ended our business relationships.That sounds a lot like theft and fraud to me.

Big banks must want to punish former customers for switching to credit unions this month. Bank Of America is the roach motel of banking. You check in, but you can never check out.  Last week  my girlfriend and I were walking home from Dia De Los Muertos, and hadn't yet heard about the destruction from OccupyOakland's general strike. As we walked down the street a windoow at a large BOFA shattered a few meters behind us. 

At first I thought it was just a broken window from some random Occupy-related vandalism, but then we saw a shadow running away as another couple yelled at him "There are people walking by, be safe!". I shrugged it off because I had already expressed my opinion to BOFA when they asked me why I was closing my account. 

At the time I was annoyed at both the sheer senselessness of it as well as the danger to passersby. While I still don't condone this vandalism after an hour and a half of getting the run-around by BOFA, let me tell you, I understand. 

Oakland Police Department Almost Killed a Systems Administrator Last Night.

Last night Scott Olsen, a veteran of the Marines who served Iraq war veteran, and a Systems Administrator is in critical condition at Highlands Hospital in Oakland after suffering a skull-fracture during last night's Occupy Oakland protest. He was shot at point blank range with a shotgun equipped to launch tear-gas canisters by either a member of Oakland Police Department or San Francisco County Sheriff's department. 

Watch this video and pay close attention. At around 0:37 a group of protesters run to Scott's aid. At 0:39 you see a black object lobbed by the police into the middle of this crowd where Scott was laying unconscious. A second later the object, a flash-bang grenade explodes in the middle of the aid group. These are our friends and our colleagues. These aren't just hippie kids in drum circles, this is a man who risked his life for our country, building a career for himself as a systems administrator.

As if it isn't hard enough being a systems administrator, now we have the police trying to kill us for exercising our first amendment rights.  :(

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