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Saturday, February 9, 2013

Health, weight, shoulder, etc

The weight loss goal is going slow, with ups and downs.. and unfortunately, more ups than downs. I'm hovering at just below 230lbs. It's not bad, and it's been worse, but it's far from 199.

I know why.

I like beer.

My beer sampling weekends are definitely not helping me reach my goal. I don't think I want to stop beer sampling, so the only other options are to either stop eating altogether, or ramp up the work outs.

I think the answer is obvious.

I increased my Nike workouts to 4 times per week this week, and will continue with that plan. After I completed my work out today I felt pretty good so I threw in the old Your Shape Fitness Evolved disc and went through a couple of rounds of cardio boxing, that I used to do with this game.

I really enjoyed it. It's not super heavy on the full body cardio, which makes it fairly easy to keep up with. I decided that I'm going to continue to do it on the days that I'm not doing the Nike workout.

So my schedule is now as follows:

  • Sun - Nike Kinect
  • Mon - YSFE Cardio Boxing
  • Tue - Nike Kinect
  • Wed - YSFE Cardio Boxing
  • Thu - Nike Kinect
  • Fri - YSFE Cardio Boxing
  • Sat - Nike Kinect & optional YSFE Cardio Boxing
I used to do the cardio boxing with 3lb weights, but since I have shoulder issues I'll probably hold off on that for a while.

Today's Nike work out was actually a fitness evaluation since it has been 4 weeks since I started. I'm pleased with the results:


According to the Nike app, I'm ahead in every area of fitness than men 40-49. I'm pleased, and somewhat shocked. Are men my age really that out of shape? I'm hardly the model of fitness, and to be ahead in this age bracket makes me feel pretty good.

News on the shoulder... I went to see my doctor last week about my shoulder. He doesn't seem as keen as he did before to get me an MRI on my neck since it has been fairly good, for the most part. He said if it feels like it's consistently worse, then we'll take that next step. While I was there, I asked him for a written referral for massage therapy for my shoulder, as my physiotherapist recommended. Now I just need to find a registered massage therapist and begin that. I was originally thinking of getting it at Carleton University, where I go for my physio, but if I can find somewhere closer to home that may have weekend hours, I think it would be more convenient.

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Door repair completed

My wife dropped off the Escape Jim Keay on Monday evening for the door repair. We got a 2013 Ford Focus as a loaner. Not a bad car, but not very roomy. I've driven some of the older ones and they had more room. It was fairly comfortable, once I was able to squeeze in though. The heated seats were nice too.

Originally, the work was supposed to be completed by Wednesday. On Wednesday afternoon I received a call at work from a Jim Keay employee updating me on the repair. The door had been fixed, repainted, and the they were reassembling it. He said they wanted to let the paint dry over night and would wash the entire truck in the morning so we could pick it up on Thursday.

We drove there after work and arrived at around 5:30pm or so. We pulled up the the garage and an employee came out as we got out of the car and asked us if we were the Patersons. I handed him the Focus keys and he gave my wife the key to our Escape. He checked the gas in the Focus (we were to make sure it had a 1/4 tank), did a quick walk around to check for any damage and said that there wouldn't be any paperwork today because it hadn't been printed for him. Seems a little odd, but he said we could pick up on our next visit. I think it's pretty unlikely that we'll be going back. 15+ years as a loyal customer down the drain.

As I walked away, he apologized for the inconvenience. My usual instinct response to that is "No problem", but I held back and didn't say anything, because... well, it was a problem, and an inconvenience.

I did a quick check before we left and it seems like a good repair job. You'd never know the difference. However, the light wasn't the best as the sun was going down. I'll have to wait until there's more light (and it's not as cold) to have a better look.

Sunday, February 3, 2013

The repair process has begun

A rep from Jim Keay drove to my wife's work in the west end of Ottawa on Thursday morning and picked up our Escape to drive back to the east end so they could examine our door and determine if there's any additional damage.

It wasn't long before they called her back to give her an update. Apparently, the work required to fix it isn't as much as they thought it might be, so they did a temp fix and told her that we can drop it off on Monday for the repair. They will provide us with a loaner car and we can pick it back up on Wednesday.

She asked about any future problems, like rust, but they assured her it would be fine and said they were going to repaint the entire door.

So far, we're pretty happy with the responsiveness.

The temp fix. Basically flattening it out so there aren't any sharp edges.


Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Door Damage - taking responsibility

It looks like we won't have to fight for this after all.

I got a pleasant surprise yesterday when my wife called to say that the service manager called her and said that one of the employees who worked on our vehicle showed up for work early, with a guilty conscience, and admitted to accidentally damaging our door.

My wife said that the manager was the most pleasant he's ever been when talking to her too.

He said that they are still backlogged with repairs for the hail storm months ago, but he'd do his best to make sure we didn't have to wait long. He said they wanted to get our Escape in as soon as possible to make sure there was no structural damage and to prevent the damage from getting worse until they can repair it.

They're willing to drive from the east end, to the west end where my wife works, pick up our Escape, drive it back to the east end to do whatever they need to do, gas it up, and drive it back to her work when they're done.

While I'm really happy with the way this is going, the pessimist inside me is hesitant to heap praise on them. I'll give credit where credit is due once this is all over. But for now, this is a huge step in the right direction.

Monday, January 28, 2013

Body Damage Update 1

After I ranted a little on Twitter about the damage our Ford Escape received at Jim Keay Ford on Saturday, Ford Canada sent me a msg on Twitter apologizing and asked for our VIN, the dealer name, and our phone number.

Before I could send them the info, the service manager called my wife and asked her what he can do for her. She asked him if he was aware of what happened on Saturday and he asked her if she wanted to know what the message said that was left for him. She said sure. He read (going from my memory here):
Dear Mr. Carey, this customer wishes to speak with you regarding damage to her Ford Escape. She won't be calling you because she doesn't like you.
Now, my wife did mention to a couple of employees there that she didn't like him because of our past dealings with him. But to offer to read the message to her, instead of just confirming the details... that tells me he's trying to start a fire, rather than put one out.

She admitted to him that based on past dealings, she full expects that we'll have to go above him for satisfaction, but seeing as how they do have procedures to follow, we'll follow them.

He said the photos left for him were not that good and asked that we send him others. I sent him three via email this afternoon and included a link to more that are publicly available on Flickr. I also told him that Ford Canada had requested information, and that I sent it to them.

Saturday, January 26, 2013

Free body work, courtesy of Jim Keay Ford Lincoln

We have a bit of a history with Ford and Jim Keay Ford Lincoln. Click here to read if you're interested.

We've been dealing with them for about 15 years now. We've leased 4 vehicles and purchased one in that time. There's been good times, and there's been bad times. After today, regardless of the outcome, I think we'll be severing our ties with them.

My wife brought our 2008 Ford Escape in for an oil change, check-up and tire rotation. After the service and paying the bill, they mentioned to her that they "noted" there was some door damage. She didn't think too much of it. We have the odd minor door ding here and there, received from not-so-careful people who park beside us in mall parking lots. Who doesn't?

When she got to our Escape she saw this.






She walked back into the dealership and told them that this was not there before she brought it in.

The guy at the counter went to speak with the people who worked on our vehicle and, not so surprisingly, came back to say that nobody knows what happened.

They told her that the customer service manager would call her on Monday. She tried to get the name of someone higher because we've dealt with him before and he lacks customer service skills. She didn't get very far. Apparently, his boss is Jim Keay himself, and nobody there seems to have any contact information for him.

She also had to tell them to take photos of the damage for their own record. She had two photos taken with her cell phone, but they would have had none.

I'd like to think that they'll immediately own up to this and make good on it, but based on our history with them I fear this isn't going to be easy. Someone there already had the chance to come clean and chose to lie.

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Shoulder issues continue


I may have over-worked my left shoulder on Sunday. I think it was due to a combination of an unscheduled workout that I decided to do, and then installing shelves on our living room wall.

The burning sensation in my shoulder and bicep drove me crazy while I tried to sleep Sunday night, and most of the day on Monday. Monday was also my scheduled workout day. I was hesitant to do it, figuring I'd give my arm a rest, but in the end decided to go ahead and skip anything that seemed like it might be rough on my arm. Luckily for me that only meant skipping one set of knee push-ups. The rest of the workout went fairly well.

I slept a little better last night, but still not as good as I would have liked. I was sure that today I'd have a better day, but I think it was worse. On a few occasions today I had to get up and walk around. Sitting just seemed to make my arm worse. Strangely enough, this evening as I type this it's not too bad at all.

I may have figured out part of the cause at work. Although my chair is one of those ergonomic styles, I think the arm rests were a little too low, so my arm was doing more hanging than resting. The big test will be tomorrow. I can't put up with more discomfort.

On the plus side, it looks like the Nike Kinect Training game is syncing better with the Nike web site. My score is still a little off, but it's not giving a disconnect error anymore. Xbox support had also posted a msg in their forum that they were aware of issues and they took it down temporarily to fix it. That was before I tried it, so hopefully there's still some fixing to do so my scores are in sync properly.