On October 19, Senator Christopher Dodd (D, CT) of the Senate Banking Committee, proposed a bill to limit the amount and number of overdraft charges banks can charge customers. On Friday of last week, the Federal Reserve adopted a portion of that proposal regarding ATM and debit purchases, issuing it as a new rule while waiting for the rest of the bill to go through the legislative process.Today, the Fed has extended that rule,initially targeting ATM and debit card purchases, to include gift cards.
Dodd's bill is supposed to limit the charges a bank issues to customers due to using overdraft protection. Overdraft protection is a "courtesy" of the bank- When an item is presented for payment from a customer's account when the customer does not have funds to cover the item, the bank will pay the item plus a fee up to a predetermined limit, operating as an item-by-item short term loan. Fees are incurred per item paid and some banks have 'negative balance fees,' fees that are typically incurred daily for having a negative balance. The portion the Fed is adopting makes it illegal for banks to charge OD charges on ATM and debit card uses, two areas that are commonly used in kiting. Sure, it's stupid to get a $69 charge (from some banks) for a $.90 debit purchase, but overdraft charges are a significant part of a bank's income, regardless of the bank's size (though I have noticed smaller regional banks charge less than national banks).
In proposing this legislation, Senator Reed said that "most people never asked for overdraft protection and logically assume they can only spend the money they have," Reed said. "(This act gives) consumers more choices and (prohibits) banks from levying excessive, hidden fees on individuals and families who are struggling to keep their homes and jobs." When I worked the call center for my bank, 70% of the calls were about overdraft protection, to make sure they had it, and occasionally how to use it. As part of the Truth in Savings Act, banks are required to give customers a list of fees that could appear on their account, including Overdraft charges. Customers are required to sign a form stating they received the Truth in Savings Act. It is assumed by the bank that people want overdraft protection because no one wants to have a bill returned unpaid. If an account is opened WITHOUT Over Draft, the bank representative tells the customer. However, it has been agreed in my office that making an "opt-in" form at account opening detailing the rules of overdraft is a good idea and probably should have been enacted long ago.
The Senate bill limits the number of times a bank can charge for overdraft protection to 6 times per year, no more than once a month. This does NOT limit the times a customer can overdraw their account. As the Oklahoma Banking Association points out, "in some states – like Oklahoma – writing a check 'with the intent to cheat and defraud' a person, firm or entity and 'obtain . . . money, property or valuable thing' is a crime: a misdemeanor if the check is less than $500, and a felony if it exceeds that amount." The bill also limits the amount the bank can charge for overdrafts to "'proportional' to the cost of processing the overdraft," meaning that small banks will still charge smaller fees overall than big banks.
In my office, we are supposed to mitigate the losses of the bank and this bill is a big deal. For us, it means that we will probably no longer offer Overdraft protection because it will represent a loss to the bank (roughly 30% of revenue in some areas we cover). Alternatives have been proposed, such as a revolving loan, predetermined at the time of account opening, an "opt in," where a customer would choose how many or to what amount of check or ACH items they want paid if they do not have enough money to cover it in their account with a proportional fee charged either monthly or bimonthly, and simply not having overdraft at all. Returned check charges are in limbo- technically they aren't part of overdraft because they are a processing fee which is usually covered by a customer's account gaining the bank interest by simply having money with the bank, but the wording of the bill seems to include them. The OBA states, "Apparently they don't understand that there are at least two costs involved whenever a check "bounces" and is honored: one is for processing the item itself, and the other is for advancing the funds to cover the check." Return check charges are simply covering the processing cost.
As for debit and ATM cards, we've discussed some long needed changes and the Fed's new rule has made our discussions just in time.
Debit card transactions are likely to change drastically and not just from your bank: merchants are going to have to change the way they run cards too. Remember getting a $1 preauthorization from your gas pump? Preauthorizations will likely be for the maximum allowance for hotels, rental cars, and any purchase where the amount authorized could be different than the amount charged (like when you eat out and put a tip on your receipt) because authorizing banks will not be willing to authorize a charge that may overdraw your account because they will take the loss. Currently at my bank, a preauthorization shows up the day it is done and then falls off the account. After all, there is no guarantee that a preauthorization will lead to a real charge. This will likely change so that the preauthorization stays on the account unless and until the merchant puts through the "hard" charge or cancels the invoice.
ATM's...Well...The nation's ATM networks are a joke. The majority of ATM's seem to be based on a design from the 1970's or 80's, "stand alones" use a telephone line to dial their clearing house to do a simple verification, ie, "Will this charge clear this account?" and foreign ATM's (ATM's that are not owned by the same bank that you are transacting with) usually don't get any account information outside of verification (not even account balance unless a second transaction is initiated, which gets a second foreign ATM fee). We like the idea of having a pop up that tells customers that doing this transaction will overdraw their account, just like a real teller is supposed to do over the counter. Having ATM's use a secured internet connection is both cool and very risky. Installing alarms on ATM's so that they alert local authorities when they are "tampered" with will also help prevent further ATM losses due to skimmers and stolen debit/ATM cards.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Say Goodbye to Overdraft Protection
Friday, October 9, 2009
Response to Orson Scott Card
I recently reread an essay by Orson Scott Card titled “Are We the End of Science Fiction?" Just last week, I went to the movies and saw Surrogates, and haven’t been able to shut up about how happy I was with the science fiction involved. Sure, the plot was kinda predictable and the murder mystery was just an excuse to examine the human condition, but that’s what science fiction is supposed to do! Yes, Mr Card, we are not the end of science fiction, but the precipice of reevaluation.
I know, it’s irksome to go to the bookstore and hunger for a book that is truly sci-fi and have to dig through masses of sword and sorcery, books barely a step away from bewitching bodice rippers, and fifteen different types of media spin offs (Star Trek, Star Wars, World of Warcraft, World of Darkness, D&D and so many others). I picked up a hopeful by the name of Whitechapel Gods, which seemed to be a steam-punk book based on the summary, but quickly found myself in a fantasy involving human machines, not a shred of science to be found. There’s nothing wrong with that kind of story. It would definitely highlight the human condition. But I wasn’t able to get past the betrayal of expectations. The same thing happened with A Brief History of the Dead. A marvelous opportunity to examine our fears at the most basic level, with twists on science and socio-political theory…thwarted by the writer’s intent to write a survival tragedy with sci-fi trimming. And if you need to call that much attention to foreshadowing…but he must have done something right since his book was on the New York Time’s Best Sellers list for a while.
As much as it pains me, Card is right that fantasy is crowding out science fiction. Sci-fi is, as he puts it, too involved for most readers now. They need to observe and think about the world they are experiencing. I saw Surrogates with a friend from work. During the drive home, I started talking about the science- would the Surries correct color blindness and how would the human know since his/her brain had never experienced those colors before? Would the color I see finally be provable as the same the color you see since our optics are set to an industry standard or would we still have the theoretical misinterpretation of the brain? What about eating? If I had a food allergy, could I have my Surry eat something for me just so I could experience it? What if I have seizures? How come Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, the internet, and a life monitoring system aren’t included with Surries? My friend is a full time mom and part time gardener. She gave me a blank look and said, “I liked the story. I don’t know about the science. I don’t have time to think like that anymore!”
And it got me thinking. I had thought, the first time I read Card’s article, maybe a year or more ago, that the problem with writing science fiction now is that the science is always changing. I keep up with science magazines and the articles argue back and forth over so many topics that if I start writing about, say, a society that uses black holes as an energy source because they emit radio waves which can possibly do such and such (utopic/distopic sci fi), by the time I get to a finished draft in six months to a year, there will be an article about a brand new study that says that black holes DON’T emit radio waves, but cause vibrations in the dark matter field, thus debunking my “science.” And popular science hasn’t truly made it into scifi either. Why can’t my android secretary update her Twitter account while she’s being “murdered?” I mean, beyond the fact that she doesn’t know she’s an android and doing a constant upload of data?
Science has gotten to the point that magic is more believable. For some reason, our popular conscience (haha) finds that having witches and wizards building a conspiracy to keep Mundies like us from noticing how amazingly scary cool their world is even as it intersects our own is more reasonable. Maybe it has something to do with this “debate” about how “real” science is- after all evolution is only a theory that’s been proven with birds, peas, dogs, cats, fish, and other lower life forms that aren’t human. I mean, humans aren’t evolving are we? Oil of Olay has a commercial out that says that it protects my skin’s DNA and humans aren’t evolving. But I’ll totally believe in ghosts, angels, demons, and the power of my friend Will to overcome physical reality. Philosophically real reality.
But real science is changing every day.
If, as Card says, sci-fi is about exploring and preparing ourselves for the changes that science makes in our day to day lives, and I think it is, then science fiction is more important than ever. But it’s more than that. Science Fiction is supposed to help us stay human and recognize the humane in technology. There was an article on Wired.com around December of last year that talked about violence against Tickle Me Elmo. Does violence against a life like object desensitize us to violence against living creatures? If I kill an AI, does it count as murder? The first question was posed by the writer at Wired; I could draw correlations between “life like objects” being treated humanely and the studies being done with autistic persons via face recognition software that may answer that. The second question is purely theoretical right now but as we move toward a society that interacts with creations that mimic life to the point that we can’t tell the difference it will become important and be put to our lawmakers: Macintosh vs. Wade anyone? There’s already been a case where someone has “murdered” another by deleting their SecondLife character and followed up by murdering the real person.
There has never been a human time without human imagination. As long as we keep trying to understand our place in the world, the natural that exists without us and the social economic political network we have created, there will be something like science fiction. But we as science fiction writers need to do service to ourselves and imagine things that will be useful to our society. We aren’t going to get the science right- it is rare that we predict the future in that sense. But we have predicted human nature and we need to draw attention to that so we can get the minds of the world thinking again.
I know, it’s irksome to go to the bookstore and hunger for a book that is truly sci-fi and have to dig through masses of sword and sorcery, books barely a step away from bewitching bodice rippers, and fifteen different types of media spin offs (Star Trek, Star Wars, World of Warcraft, World of Darkness, D&D and so many others). I picked up a hopeful by the name of Whitechapel Gods, which seemed to be a steam-punk book based on the summary, but quickly found myself in a fantasy involving human machines, not a shred of science to be found. There’s nothing wrong with that kind of story. It would definitely highlight the human condition. But I wasn’t able to get past the betrayal of expectations. The same thing happened with A Brief History of the Dead. A marvelous opportunity to examine our fears at the most basic level, with twists on science and socio-political theory…thwarted by the writer’s intent to write a survival tragedy with sci-fi trimming. And if you need to call that much attention to foreshadowing…but he must have done something right since his book was on the New York Time’s Best Sellers list for a while.
As much as it pains me, Card is right that fantasy is crowding out science fiction. Sci-fi is, as he puts it, too involved for most readers now. They need to observe and think about the world they are experiencing. I saw Surrogates with a friend from work. During the drive home, I started talking about the science- would the Surries correct color blindness and how would the human know since his/her brain had never experienced those colors before? Would the color I see finally be provable as the same the color you see since our optics are set to an industry standard or would we still have the theoretical misinterpretation of the brain? What about eating? If I had a food allergy, could I have my Surry eat something for me just so I could experience it? What if I have seizures? How come Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, the internet, and a life monitoring system aren’t included with Surries? My friend is a full time mom and part time gardener. She gave me a blank look and said, “I liked the story. I don’t know about the science. I don’t have time to think like that anymore!”
And it got me thinking. I had thought, the first time I read Card’s article, maybe a year or more ago, that the problem with writing science fiction now is that the science is always changing. I keep up with science magazines and the articles argue back and forth over so many topics that if I start writing about, say, a society that uses black holes as an energy source because they emit radio waves which can possibly do such and such (utopic/distopic sci fi), by the time I get to a finished draft in six months to a year, there will be an article about a brand new study that says that black holes DON’T emit radio waves, but cause vibrations in the dark matter field, thus debunking my “science.” And popular science hasn’t truly made it into scifi either. Why can’t my android secretary update her Twitter account while she’s being “murdered?” I mean, beyond the fact that she doesn’t know she’s an android and doing a constant upload of data?
Science has gotten to the point that magic is more believable. For some reason, our popular conscience (haha) finds that having witches and wizards building a conspiracy to keep Mundies like us from noticing how amazingly scary cool their world is even as it intersects our own is more reasonable. Maybe it has something to do with this “debate” about how “real” science is- after all evolution is only a theory that’s been proven with birds, peas, dogs, cats, fish, and other lower life forms that aren’t human. I mean, humans aren’t evolving are we? Oil of Olay has a commercial out that says that it protects my skin’s DNA and humans aren’t evolving. But I’ll totally believe in ghosts, angels, demons, and the power of my friend Will to overcome physical reality. Philosophically real reality.
But real science is changing every day.
If, as Card says, sci-fi is about exploring and preparing ourselves for the changes that science makes in our day to day lives, and I think it is, then science fiction is more important than ever. But it’s more than that. Science Fiction is supposed to help us stay human and recognize the humane in technology. There was an article on Wired.com around December of last year that talked about violence against Tickle Me Elmo. Does violence against a life like object desensitize us to violence against living creatures? If I kill an AI, does it count as murder? The first question was posed by the writer at Wired; I could draw correlations between “life like objects” being treated humanely and the studies being done with autistic persons via face recognition software that may answer that. The second question is purely theoretical right now but as we move toward a society that interacts with creations that mimic life to the point that we can’t tell the difference it will become important and be put to our lawmakers: Macintosh vs. Wade anyone? There’s already been a case where someone has “murdered” another by deleting their SecondLife character and followed up by murdering the real person.
There has never been a human time without human imagination. As long as we keep trying to understand our place in the world, the natural that exists without us and the social economic political network we have created, there will be something like science fiction. But we as science fiction writers need to do service to ourselves and imagine things that will be useful to our society. We aren’t going to get the science right- it is rare that we predict the future in that sense. But we have predicted human nature and we need to draw attention to that so we can get the minds of the world thinking again.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
When Last...
When last I wrote, we had just found out that my grandmother had cancer on her kidney. I have been taking time off from writing so I could be with her. She had surgery a few days after my last post and was released from the hospital the day after. She's been at home recovering since. Two weeks ago, she got a small cold, otherwise I probably would have started writing again sooner.
Other big developments- Hoyt and I have decided to go a head and get the marriage liscence stuff taken care of next week rather than next year. September has been riddled with "heavy discussions" and anxiety for both of us and I think we will both be comforted in knowing that the other can hold us for legal ransom very soon.
Other big developments- Hoyt and I have decided to go a head and get the marriage liscence stuff taken care of next week rather than next year. September has been riddled with "heavy discussions" and anxiety for both of us and I think we will both be comforted in knowing that the other can hold us for legal ransom very soon.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Busy Week So Far
I've been pretty busy this week working on building up my Examiner.com profile. I got off track and did some unplanned work- a partial review of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency proposal (Senate version; haven't finished reading the House one) and finished a quick proposal on how to live on minimum wage, something most of us have done at least once.
Other projects to finish this week- SMS Phishing on the rise, and work on some short stories and other fiction, finish with the House version of CFPA (which so far has been friendlier to the financial industry than the Senate one, but still has vague definitions which could allow broad applications and drastic changes), and do some table top gaming! Hooray for L5R and Modern D20!
We did get to watch the new Harry Potter yesterday- Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It made me realize how long it's been since I've read the books. The movie was beautiful and followed enough of the ideas of the book that I didn't find anything too jarring. I've had some fun "at work" talks about the cannonized shipping; I thought that had finally died. I will admit that Ms Watson and Mr Radcliffe seem to have a better on screen chemistry than Ms Watson and Mr Grint, but that's just the way some things are.
Two of the coolest things this week were me accidently doing my post on CFPA the same day that Rachel Maddow had a segment on it and Thomas Zahler, writer and artist of Love and Capes, announcing that he has completed the final drafts for his wedding edition comic book cover, which fiance and I will be on. Mr Zahler said in his announcement email that, "The official reveal for te cover is....for the PopCandy blog on the USA Today site, scheduled for next Friday."
Other projects to finish this week- SMS Phishing on the rise, and work on some short stories and other fiction, finish with the House version of CFPA (which so far has been friendlier to the financial industry than the Senate one, but still has vague definitions which could allow broad applications and drastic changes), and do some table top gaming! Hooray for L5R and Modern D20!
We did get to watch the new Harry Potter yesterday- Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It made me realize how long it's been since I've read the books. The movie was beautiful and followed enough of the ideas of the book that I didn't find anything too jarring. I've had some fun "at work" talks about the cannonized shipping; I thought that had finally died. I will admit that Ms Watson and Mr Radcliffe seem to have a better on screen chemistry than Ms Watson and Mr Grint, but that's just the way some things are.
Two of the coolest things this week were me accidently doing my post on CFPA the same day that Rachel Maddow had a segment on it and Thomas Zahler, writer and artist of Love and Capes, announcing that he has completed the final drafts for his wedding edition comic book cover, which fiance and I will be on. Mr Zahler said in his announcement email that, "The official reveal for te cover is....for the PopCandy blog on the USA Today site, scheduled for next Friday."
Monday, July 13, 2009
Fusion Fall
Hoyt and I tried Cartoon Network's MMO over the weekend, Fusion Fall. Fusion Fall is a browser based MMO, so it doesn't require any disks or downloads, unlike most MMORPGS. Another great thing offered by the game is the "family" account- which has multiple (4) individual accounts tied to one billing and login account. The game currently offers
a free account type, which has limited leveling, item use, and item aquisation. The price for the game isn't that high either, with a normal account billing at $5.95 a month and a family account at $9.95 monthly.
The game brings back many of Cartoon Network's favorites- Dexter, The Kids Next Door, Samurai Jack, The Power Puff Girls, and more, for the Player to interact with. The voice actors are all present, which makes character dialouge simply a joy to hear. The animation
and graphic style is a generic and clean anime style, rather like the Digimon series.
While I like the game generally, with clear story expectations and mission tracking (it has a Quest Helper built in to the interface) I found myself frustrated with the primary method of movement, which is mouse based. Unlike most MMO's, this isn't optional and there is no "point and click" function of the mouse unless you move to the options screen, the same screen used for in game chatter. So for someone like me, who keeps a few programs going in the back ground, as well as text messenger, the only way to switch between programs is to hit enter, which brings up the game's options and automatically starts the chat window. This also means that the game is entirely auto-target, no selecting your target. If you want to target the monster on the right, you have to make sure it's centered in your screen and the auto-target system has selected the target and isn't stuck on a different monster. The good news is that the monsters don't appear to have an Aggro range; they only attack once engaged. To attack, you click the mouse and no auto-continue on attacks. I found, after some digging, that the game is built to be compatible with play on the XBox 360, for which these control issues wouldn't be a problem.
The game also doesn't appear to offer specailty classes; everyone can use everything and has the same fighting styles. I didn't see anything indicating a healing class (my favored class in just about everything I've ever played), but after the first hour or so, I wanted to move back into a more complicated world. Again, I like the world, and will probably continue playing, but I can't see myself quitting my WOW account or paying the otherwise reasonable fee for an unlimited account.
a free account type, which has limited leveling, item use, and item aquisation. The price for the game isn't that high either, with a normal account billing at $5.95 a month and a family account at $9.95 monthly.
The game brings back many of Cartoon Network's favorites- Dexter, The Kids Next Door, Samurai Jack, The Power Puff Girls, and more, for the Player to interact with. The voice actors are all present, which makes character dialouge simply a joy to hear. The animation
and graphic style is a generic and clean anime style, rather like the Digimon series.
While I like the game generally, with clear story expectations and mission tracking (it has a Quest Helper built in to the interface) I found myself frustrated with the primary method of movement, which is mouse based. Unlike most MMO's, this isn't optional and there is no "point and click" function of the mouse unless you move to the options screen, the same screen used for in game chatter. So for someone like me, who keeps a few programs going in the back ground, as well as text messenger, the only way to switch between programs is to hit enter, which brings up the game's options and automatically starts the chat window. This also means that the game is entirely auto-target, no selecting your target. If you want to target the monster on the right, you have to make sure it's centered in your screen and the auto-target system has selected the target and isn't stuck on a different monster. The good news is that the monsters don't appear to have an Aggro range; they only attack once engaged. To attack, you click the mouse and no auto-continue on attacks. I found, after some digging, that the game is built to be compatible with play on the XBox 360, for which these control issues wouldn't be a problem.
The game also doesn't appear to offer specailty classes; everyone can use everything and has the same fighting styles. I didn't see anything indicating a healing class (my favored class in just about everything I've ever played), but after the first hour or so, I wanted to move back into a more complicated world. Again, I like the world, and will probably continue playing, but I can't see myself quitting my WOW account or paying the otherwise reasonable fee for an unlimited account.
A Good Time to Save
Now that the heat of summer has is in full effect and dreams of Christmas in July have gone, many local stores are doing their best to remind patrons that Fall is just around the corner. Walmart hasn't quite put up their Christmas decorations yet...
What they really want to know is, "Have you started saving for Christmas?"
While it's true that banks are not offering the best interest rates right now (average of local banks in the Norman area is around 0.5%), now is a good time to start a savings account, or start seriously contributing to the one you have, and keep contributing throughout the year.
The third quarter earnings are going to be very high for a lot of regional banks, which have been benefiting from the record low mortgage rates and strong feelings of insecurity and distrust in national bank chains, which will push up interest rates on all deposit items (savings accounts, money markets, and CDs). These reports will be released internally by the end of October and externally in November, usually in time for Black Friday. August and September are also months when most banks offer specials on some deposit accounts, such as CD's and first time checking accounts for college students.
Many banks offer a "Christmas Club" Savings account, which will only allow deposits until November, when it will either send out a check for the balance of the account, transfer the funds to a pre assigned checking account, or send a out a prepaid Visa. These accounts are separate from normal savings accounts so emergency funds aren't confused with Christmas money. Christmas Savings accounts sometimes have differing interest rates from normal savings accounts, since they function as an 11 month rolling deposit CD.
What they really want to know is, "Have you started saving for Christmas?"
While it's true that banks are not offering the best interest rates right now (average of local banks in the Norman area is around 0.5%), now is a good time to start a savings account, or start seriously contributing to the one you have, and keep contributing throughout the year.
The third quarter earnings are going to be very high for a lot of regional banks, which have been benefiting from the record low mortgage rates and strong feelings of insecurity and distrust in national bank chains, which will push up interest rates on all deposit items (savings accounts, money markets, and CDs). These reports will be released internally by the end of October and externally in November, usually in time for Black Friday. August and September are also months when most banks offer specials on some deposit accounts, such as CD's and first time checking accounts for college students.
Many banks offer a "Christmas Club" Savings account, which will only allow deposits until November, when it will either send out a check for the balance of the account, transfer the funds to a pre assigned checking account, or send a out a prepaid Visa. These accounts are separate from normal savings accounts so emergency funds aren't confused with Christmas money. Christmas Savings accounts sometimes have differing interest rates from normal savings accounts, since they function as an 11 month rolling deposit CD.
Monday, July 6, 2009
False Choice in Public Option Debate
As I was watching the news this morning, the anchor and his interviewee kept saying how scared Americans are about their employers opting to support the “public option” rather than continue contracts with private health insurance providers and I thought to myself, “How is that different than any other year?”
Last year, my dad’s company changed insurance providers, as many companies do every year. My dad lost a significant portion of his vision coverage and his optometrist is no longer on the ‘in network’ provider list. And yet his premiums and deductible are higher. When he reviewed his health care package in January, there were no multiple choices for insurance providers, just different plans offered by the same provider.
Also last year, my insurance provider also raised their premiums and lowered coverage. The health insurance offered by my company doesn’t cover labs, x-rays, or medications for asthma. Now it’s little more than a discount plan. And I’m on the ‘optimum’ plan offered by my company. Again, when I went through my enrollment in December of 08, there is only one company listed, and the option to go to Afflac for a stopgap plan.
My grandma is the widow of a retiree of GM. She recently lost her dental coverage since GM’s collapse. She’s going in this week for a biopsy. She had cancer as a young adult and recently found a lesion that could be a recurrence, or so I expect the insurance company will claim. Her previous cancer was on her eye, which was removed when she was 26. The lesion is on her kidney some 52 years later.
So am I afraid that my company will opt for the public option? Not really. It couldn’t possibly be worse than what my company currently offers and I might even get vision coverage (not currently offered by my employer or my fiancé’s). And who knows, if it saves enough money, maybe they’ll be able offer all of us a miniscule raise to opt out. Is my dad afraid that his company will opt out? No. His company has enough employees in other countries that opting out wouldn’t make sense. As for my gran, she’s a conservative Republican who’s afraid that the public option won’t pass and she won’t be able to pay for long term care unless she sells her house.
The other major concern that has been raised by the opponents of the public option is that there will be ‘long lines’ to see our doctors.
For the last three months, I’ve been trying to get my doctor to call in a prescription and make an appointment. I have gotten the office several times, and finally succeeded in getting the appointment, but haven’t had any luck with the prescription she said was necessary when I was in her office. I finally went in to the office to try to get one of the nurse’s to write it out. I waited 20 minutes and was eventually told to call again and go home (Yes, I am getting a new doctor). The appointment I got? The first opening was in August. That’s a wait time of approximately 45 days from when I spoke with the office. That’s a wait of 70 to 80 days from the day that she asked me to make the appointment. The lines for treatment by specialists in Canadian hospitals are between 46 days for cancer patients and 18 weeks (126 days) for non-life threatening treatments. So my poor Dr is already acting like she’s operating in Canada.
To be fair, I also called my dentist last week with a concern and his office asked me, “Are you free right now?” I was in and back to playing WOW in less than thirty minutes. And the wait for my primary care physician is usually fairly low, so if I call thinking I have the flu, I can see him next week when I’m feeling better.
Last year, my dad’s company changed insurance providers, as many companies do every year. My dad lost a significant portion of his vision coverage and his optometrist is no longer on the ‘in network’ provider list. And yet his premiums and deductible are higher. When he reviewed his health care package in January, there were no multiple choices for insurance providers, just different plans offered by the same provider.
Also last year, my insurance provider also raised their premiums and lowered coverage. The health insurance offered by my company doesn’t cover labs, x-rays, or medications for asthma. Now it’s little more than a discount plan. And I’m on the ‘optimum’ plan offered by my company. Again, when I went through my enrollment in December of 08, there is only one company listed, and the option to go to Afflac for a stopgap plan.
My grandma is the widow of a retiree of GM. She recently lost her dental coverage since GM’s collapse. She’s going in this week for a biopsy. She had cancer as a young adult and recently found a lesion that could be a recurrence, or so I expect the insurance company will claim. Her previous cancer was on her eye, which was removed when she was 26. The lesion is on her kidney some 52 years later.
So am I afraid that my company will opt for the public option? Not really. It couldn’t possibly be worse than what my company currently offers and I might even get vision coverage (not currently offered by my employer or my fiancé’s). And who knows, if it saves enough money, maybe they’ll be able offer all of us a miniscule raise to opt out. Is my dad afraid that his company will opt out? No. His company has enough employees in other countries that opting out wouldn’t make sense. As for my gran, she’s a conservative Republican who’s afraid that the public option won’t pass and she won’t be able to pay for long term care unless she sells her house.
The other major concern that has been raised by the opponents of the public option is that there will be ‘long lines’ to see our doctors.
For the last three months, I’ve been trying to get my doctor to call in a prescription and make an appointment. I have gotten the office several times, and finally succeeded in getting the appointment, but haven’t had any luck with the prescription she said was necessary when I was in her office. I finally went in to the office to try to get one of the nurse’s to write it out. I waited 20 minutes and was eventually told to call again and go home (Yes, I am getting a new doctor). The appointment I got? The first opening was in August. That’s a wait time of approximately 45 days from when I spoke with the office. That’s a wait of 70 to 80 days from the day that she asked me to make the appointment. The lines for treatment by specialists in Canadian hospitals are between 46 days for cancer patients and 18 weeks (126 days) for non-life threatening treatments. So my poor Dr is already acting like she’s operating in Canada.
To be fair, I also called my dentist last week with a concern and his office asked me, “Are you free right now?” I was in and back to playing WOW in less than thirty minutes. And the wait for my primary care physician is usually fairly low, so if I call thinking I have the flu, I can see him next week when I’m feeling better.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Cash or Credit?
Let’s face it, carrying cash, while a good budgeting strategy, is dangerous and passé. But how much risk are you putting yourself in if you carry only cards?
I have CID written on the back of all my plastic, but I rarely get asked for my ID, even at stores I don’t frequent. A debit card may have a spending limit of around $1,500 for pinned purchases and $2,500 for signature based transactions. For people with Overdraft Protection, that could put an account negative thousands before Overdraft fees if a debit card is stolen. When I was a call center employee for a local bank, I would get calls from people who hadn’t seen their debit card in weeks and not know why they were over drawn, let alone where the card was used. “Who’s PCC anyway?” they’d ask. (Answer: Stripes gas station and deli)
While Visa will guarantee returning funds on credit and debit purchases made fraudulently, the process for funds being returned can take up to 90 days. Many banks will give immediate credit for disputed transactions, for differing definitions of “immediate,” and only if their dispute process is followed exactly, and occasionally involves additional information requests which customers can’t provide, such as, “Who was using your card? Do you know who might have used your card?” If it turns out fraudulent transactions were made by a friend or family member, banks will ask permission to prosecute or remove the credit given to the account.
Of course, if your wallet is stolen and you’re carrying cash, you can’t call your bank and ask that they put a stop on it. 1-800-VISA-911 may not be local, but they have the number to your local bank and can shut down missing cards immediately while contacting your bank.
I have CID written on the back of all my plastic, but I rarely get asked for my ID, even at stores I don’t frequent. A debit card may have a spending limit of around $1,500 for pinned purchases and $2,500 for signature based transactions. For people with Overdraft Protection, that could put an account negative thousands before Overdraft fees if a debit card is stolen. When I was a call center employee for a local bank, I would get calls from people who hadn’t seen their debit card in weeks and not know why they were over drawn, let alone where the card was used. “Who’s PCC anyway?” they’d ask. (Answer: Stripes gas station and deli)
While Visa will guarantee returning funds on credit and debit purchases made fraudulently, the process for funds being returned can take up to 90 days. Many banks will give immediate credit for disputed transactions, for differing definitions of “immediate,” and only if their dispute process is followed exactly, and occasionally involves additional information requests which customers can’t provide, such as, “Who was using your card? Do you know who might have used your card?” If it turns out fraudulent transactions were made by a friend or family member, banks will ask permission to prosecute or remove the credit given to the account.
Of course, if your wallet is stolen and you’re carrying cash, you can’t call your bank and ask that they put a stop on it. 1-800-VISA-911 may not be local, but they have the number to your local bank and can shut down missing cards immediately while contacting your bank.
A Query From This Banker
After talking with one of the bank associates today while depositing Fiance's paycheck, I got to thinking. Mostly about budgets but also about pay schedules.
When Fiance started his job, he was lead to believe he would be paid more than he has and when I made our budget, I used some slightly less optimistic numbers which turned out to be closer to reality and which don't leave us much wiggle room. I've talked to him before about the possibility of me getting a second job since my hours are friendlier for that sort of thing and he's against it on the basis that we only get to see eachother an hour a day (plus whatever we get when he comes home for lunch). This is true and I don't think that hour will likely change if I do get a second job. This is the summer months, when he expects to earn the bigger checks. I'm not looking forward to the winter checks.
About my hours- I have a specific task list which I am supposed to accomplish each day at my job. I was recently told by my boss that on Saturdays I'm supposed to be doing two different task lists...which lead me to wonder what the heck I'm supposed to be doing on Mondays, the day I've set aside to finish the second task list. If I don't finish my task list, I am supposed to explain why, and more often than not, my answer is, "If I'd finished that task, I would have been over hours and you have told us consistently that you haven't approaved any over time so I'd be explaining why I'm over hours." I am at a loss as to why our department is hourly rather than salary since all of us are in the same situation- we have our tasks and are expected to complete them "regaurdless of how long it takes" unless it puts us over hours.
When Fiance started his job, he was lead to believe he would be paid more than he has and when I made our budget, I used some slightly less optimistic numbers which turned out to be closer to reality and which don't leave us much wiggle room. I've talked to him before about the possibility of me getting a second job since my hours are friendlier for that sort of thing and he's against it on the basis that we only get to see eachother an hour a day (plus whatever we get when he comes home for lunch). This is true and I don't think that hour will likely change if I do get a second job. This is the summer months, when he expects to earn the bigger checks. I'm not looking forward to the winter checks.
About my hours- I have a specific task list which I am supposed to accomplish each day at my job. I was recently told by my boss that on Saturdays I'm supposed to be doing two different task lists...which lead me to wonder what the heck I'm supposed to be doing on Mondays, the day I've set aside to finish the second task list. If I don't finish my task list, I am supposed to explain why, and more often than not, my answer is, "If I'd finished that task, I would have been over hours and you have told us consistently that you haven't approaved any over time so I'd be explaining why I'm over hours." I am at a loss as to why our department is hourly rather than salary since all of us are in the same situation- we have our tasks and are expected to complete them "regaurdless of how long it takes" unless it puts us over hours.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
"Unwritten" comic
Picked up issue 1 of Vertigo's "Unwritten" by Mike Carey and Peter Gross. It's a very nice read, so good we went out and got the second issue this morning.
All Harry Potter fans over 12 will love this. Readers under 12 may also love it, but I would suggest parental approval first due voilence and the like. Not that the presence of such things is bad but I remember my mom happening accross my " Johnny" comics. Worst time to have a therapist parent. The premise is that fictional characters arecoming to the real world, which is a fairly popular idea now days (thank you Jasper Fforde).
Tommy Taylor, more popular than Harry Potter in this world and with a Real Life Tommy as the writer's son and supposed inspiration, finds himself in a rut. He's been living on his dissappeared father's coat tails doing conventions and the like for years. One day a lady appears and accuses him of being an identity thief. Now he's on a quest to find out who or what he really is.
The art style is old school: clear lines, tri color template, but with a mix of "the real," computer screenshots mostly. The writting is similar to CS Lewis in the "fiction" world and rather journalistic in the "real" world.
The concepts being dealt with are, to me any way, like those of Jasper Fforde's literary detectives. We have seen a bad guy who's power seems to be acting as a text sieve- he melts things down past their basic textual descrptions, leavingbehinda pool of letters. The characters are warping the world around them to fit their story.
All in all, a great read that I fully recommend and intend to keep reading.
No tips from a banker right now, I'm on vacation :)
All Harry Potter fans over 12 will love this. Readers under 12 may also love it, but I would suggest parental approval first due voilence and the like. Not that the presence of such things is bad but I remember my mom happening accross my " Johnny" comics. Worst time to have a therapist parent. The premise is that fictional characters arecoming to the real world, which is a fairly popular idea now days (thank you Jasper Fforde).
Tommy Taylor, more popular than Harry Potter in this world and with a Real Life Tommy as the writer's son and supposed inspiration, finds himself in a rut. He's been living on his dissappeared father's coat tails doing conventions and the like for years. One day a lady appears and accuses him of being an identity thief. Now he's on a quest to find out who or what he really is.
The art style is old school: clear lines, tri color template, but with a mix of "the real," computer screenshots mostly. The writting is similar to CS Lewis in the "fiction" world and rather journalistic in the "real" world.
The concepts being dealt with are, to me any way, like those of Jasper Fforde's literary detectives. We have seen a bad guy who's power seems to be acting as a text sieve- he melts things down past their basic textual descrptions, leavingbehinda pool of letters. The characters are warping the world around them to fit their story.
All in all, a great read that I fully recommend and intend to keep reading.
No tips from a banker right now, I'm on vacation :)
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Media Circus History
Several events making the rounds in the media circuit- Senator Sanford, the Iranian protests, and Oklahoma Rep. Sally Kern.
I'm amazed that Sanford is saying the things he's saying. He's treating this as some kind of weird Livejournal. I thought he'd been to couples counsiling and he's still saying the most damaging things to his marraige. Isn't it a no-brainer to praise your wife over the Other Woman if you're trying to get back into her good graces? To appologize and mean it? I suppose he might be appologizing in a sense of "I'm sorry this betrayal happs ened to you," but he hasn't made that clear. As a woman who's been lied to by people she's cared about, I have no sympathy for him. If he really has found his soul mate he should still respect the bounds of his marriage, as he's criticized others to do. It's a difficult thing to do...unless you just don't care about the person you've married. From Mrs. Sanford's remarks, I take it she's been hurt and had enough.
In Iran, a revolution facilitated by Twitter. How cool is that? Not nearly as cool as the rumors of Anonymous helping protestors (Note: no relation to Richard Brennan). While I'm sad that the Iranians didn't get the regime change they were wanting, I am amazed that it has been as well documented as we've seen.
Lastly, I would like to mention Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern. As a liberal in Oklahoma, and a humanist, I am appalled by her ignorance and assupmtion to place that ignorance into yet another harmful policy. Yes, laws are traditionally based upon the social mores that make up a society. Mores are not morals nor are they religions. Which is why some unpopular things which are useful to society are legal but not supported by mores (executions and integration at its inception for example). I think my friend Rodney Derrick had the best response in Facebook, "This is a bold and ignorant statement that indicates a growing intolerance for people's differences in the state of Oklahoma. I haven't come across any proof that homosexuals wrecked the economy, and I doubt that I ever will. It's a mean-spirited statement that commands people of all faiths to smack it down before this ignorance metastasizes across the state." Her statements, to me anyway, are too close to other statements that minorities have destroyed the economy...before World War II in Germany.
I'm amazed that Sanford is saying the things he's saying. He's treating this as some kind of weird Livejournal. I thought he'd been to couples counsiling and he's still saying the most damaging things to his marraige. Isn't it a no-brainer to praise your wife over the Other Woman if you're trying to get back into her good graces? To appologize and mean it? I suppose he might be appologizing in a sense of "I'm sorry this betrayal happs ened to you," but he hasn't made that clear. As a woman who's been lied to by people she's cared about, I have no sympathy for him. If he really has found his soul mate he should still respect the bounds of his marriage, as he's criticized others to do. It's a difficult thing to do...unless you just don't care about the person you've married. From Mrs. Sanford's remarks, I take it she's been hurt and had enough.
In Iran, a revolution facilitated by Twitter. How cool is that? Not nearly as cool as the rumors of Anonymous helping protestors (Note: no relation to Richard Brennan). While I'm sad that the Iranians didn't get the regime change they were wanting, I am amazed that it has been as well documented as we've seen.
Lastly, I would like to mention Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern. As a liberal in Oklahoma, and a humanist, I am appalled by her ignorance and assupmtion to place that ignorance into yet another harmful policy. Yes, laws are traditionally based upon the social mores that make up a society. Mores are not morals nor are they religions. Which is why some unpopular things which are useful to society are legal but not supported by mores (executions and integration at its inception for example). I think my friend Rodney Derrick had the best response in Facebook, "This is a bold and ignorant statement that indicates a growing intolerance for people's differences in the state of Oklahoma. I haven't come across any proof that homosexuals wrecked the economy, and I doubt that I ever will. It's a mean-spirited statement that commands people of all faiths to smack it down before this ignorance metastasizes across the state." Her statements, to me anyway, are too close to other statements that minorities have destroyed the economy...before World War II in Germany.
Dragon Masters World, iPhone App
I finally got an iPhone last week. It wasn't the phone I'd wanted, but it was consideribly cheaper, being the discontinued 3 G, and I can tease my fiance that I got the toy he wanted. Then I got some apps.
Since starting my new job at the bank in May, I haven't had the same time to look at the news and keep up with this blog. But now...there's a highly commercialized saying for that. I'm still not going to be able to glance at my phone very often the hours I'm in the office, but I can keep an RSS feed going and listen to the news at least. I can't read anything, but I can certainly listen to it.
Since moving jobs, I've found that Audble.com is now my best friend with the morning read of Wall Street Journal and books read by James Marsters and other people with calm voices. Which has lead to me listening to "Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies," by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith, a delightful listen, even if you do mind listening to someone saying "the killing arts" in an even Brittish accent every other sentance. Seriously, that is my only complaint about the retelling of the classic Austen story with zombies, and it's something that I don't think I'd mind if reading to myself.
One of the other neat things on my iPhone is the game Dragon Master World, from Aftershock. It's essentially the Facebook game Mafia, Lords and Ladies, and Warewolves only with dragons and a Paypal option to get neat but otherwise useless items or stat recharges. One thing on strategy- you'll make more money attacking other players than doing quests, so keep a high attack and a high defense. My usual complaint for games like this: I finally got enough gems set aside to buy one of the expensive dragons, got the cash out of the bank and while I was navigating to the page to buy the darn thing, I was attacked 5 times by the same guy and lost more than half my savings. There isn't an option to turn off PVP in the game, since that's it main point.
Another thing that mystifies me at the moment: Players collect other players into Tribes and Clans, but they are only as powerful as the player using them. For example:
Player A has a clan made up of {A, B, C, D, E, and F} and hasn't outfitted them, choosing to follow the RPG subset of the game, which still makes you collect a tribe, and has focused his/her skills on those relevent to RPG (Mana).
Player G has a clan made up of {B, F, G} but has focused on PVP, outfitting her/his clan with the latest and most expensive things, and focused her/his skills on Attack and Defense. As long as they are comparable in level, Player G would win most battles against Player A even though A has a bigger clan and regaurdless of how the individual players in that clan have outfitted themselves or what type of clans those players may have amassed (I assume this is because subset A has gone to Player A's 'house' and must use whatever Player A has available rather than what the subset might have at home).
But this is only true in comparative ratios. If Player A had more than double the clan members, Player G had better play a defensive game.
Hopefully I'll get back on the ball with updates. I have some stories I'd like to share, comics I'd still like to review (I'm looking at you "Oz/Wonderland Chronicals" and "Love and Capes." In case I don't find the time, both wonderful reads), video games I've watched my fiance play, and of course some thoughts on the silliness of the news media.
Last but not least, a tip from a banker.
If you are depositing a large check and will need funds available immediately, say for a car purchase or down payment on a house, there are three things you can do to make things easier:
1) Make the deposit in a guaranteed funds negotiable item. That means a cashiers check. Very few banks will place a hold on a cashier's check and usually only if they can't verify it. Banks that I know will not verify anything: Wachovia, JPMorgan Chase, Liberty Mutual. In general, Bank of America is pretty decent on offering ways to verify checks but they will not verify personal checks drawn on their credit lines.
2) Make the deposit on a Monday or Tuesday. All banks will be open to verify with those banks that do verify and if there is a hold placed, it will usually expire by the following Monday.
3) Ask the teller taking your deposit if s/he will A) Fax a copy of the check to their risk department and B) call the issuing bank to verify funds. The teller might not have time to do option B, but it is possible that someone in the risk depatment might have time to call the same day.
Other options: ask to speak with the teller supervisor and explain what you're doing. It isn't always up to the individuals in the bank location you're visiting whether or not a hold will be placed, but they have the option of alerting the risk department a head of time and requesting that no hold be placed. And the last option I would suggest: Try to deposit a cashier's check from the same bank you'll be depositing with. Yes, it is a kind of bizzare, but a bank looks at their own casheir's checks as less suspicous than someone depositing a random $10-100 k in cash.
Definately do NOT: write yourself a big check. Nothing is nearly as suspicous as CG Lastname hand writing a $100k check to him/herself, especailly if done in thick marker and your normal balance in the receiving bank is less than a third of the check you're depositing. The only way to avoid a hold on that is to know the bank manager very well and have him/her vouch for you, and for $100k, they may not.
Since starting my new job at the bank in May, I haven't had the same time to look at the news and keep up with this blog. But now...there's a highly commercialized saying for that. I'm still not going to be able to glance at my phone very often the hours I'm in the office, but I can keep an RSS feed going and listen to the news at least. I can't read anything, but I can certainly listen to it.
Since moving jobs, I've found that Audble.com is now my best friend with the morning read of Wall Street Journal and books read by James Marsters and other people with calm voices. Which has lead to me listening to "Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies," by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith, a delightful listen, even if you do mind listening to someone saying "the killing arts" in an even Brittish accent every other sentance. Seriously, that is my only complaint about the retelling of the classic Austen story with zombies, and it's something that I don't think I'd mind if reading to myself.
One of the other neat things on my iPhone is the game Dragon Master World, from Aftershock. It's essentially the Facebook game Mafia, Lords and Ladies, and Warewolves only with dragons and a Paypal option to get neat but otherwise useless items or stat recharges. One thing on strategy- you'll make more money attacking other players than doing quests, so keep a high attack and a high defense. My usual complaint for games like this: I finally got enough gems set aside to buy one of the expensive dragons, got the cash out of the bank and while I was navigating to the page to buy the darn thing, I was attacked 5 times by the same guy and lost more than half my savings. There isn't an option to turn off PVP in the game, since that's it main point.
Another thing that mystifies me at the moment: Players collect other players into Tribes and Clans, but they are only as powerful as the player using them. For example:
Player A has a clan made up of {A, B, C, D, E, and F} and hasn't outfitted them, choosing to follow the RPG subset of the game, which still makes you collect a tribe, and has focused his/her skills on those relevent to RPG (Mana).
Player G has a clan made up of {B, F, G} but has focused on PVP, outfitting her/his clan with the latest and most expensive things, and focused her/his skills on Attack and Defense. As long as they are comparable in level, Player G would win most battles against Player A even though A has a bigger clan and regaurdless of how the individual players in that clan have outfitted themselves or what type of clans those players may have amassed (I assume this is because subset A has gone to Player A's 'house' and must use whatever Player A has available rather than what the subset might have at home).
But this is only true in comparative ratios. If Player A had more than double the clan members, Player G had better play a defensive game.
Hopefully I'll get back on the ball with updates. I have some stories I'd like to share, comics I'd still like to review (I'm looking at you "Oz/Wonderland Chronicals" and "Love and Capes." In case I don't find the time, both wonderful reads), video games I've watched my fiance play, and of course some thoughts on the silliness of the news media.
Last but not least, a tip from a banker.
If you are depositing a large check and will need funds available immediately, say for a car purchase or down payment on a house, there are three things you can do to make things easier:
1) Make the deposit in a guaranteed funds negotiable item. That means a cashiers check. Very few banks will place a hold on a cashier's check and usually only if they can't verify it. Banks that I know will not verify anything: Wachovia, JPMorgan Chase, Liberty Mutual. In general, Bank of America is pretty decent on offering ways to verify checks but they will not verify personal checks drawn on their credit lines.
2) Make the deposit on a Monday or Tuesday. All banks will be open to verify with those banks that do verify and if there is a hold placed, it will usually expire by the following Monday.
3) Ask the teller taking your deposit if s/he will A) Fax a copy of the check to their risk department and B) call the issuing bank to verify funds. The teller might not have time to do option B, but it is possible that someone in the risk depatment might have time to call the same day.
Other options: ask to speak with the teller supervisor and explain what you're doing. It isn't always up to the individuals in the bank location you're visiting whether or not a hold will be placed, but they have the option of alerting the risk department a head of time and requesting that no hold be placed. And the last option I would suggest: Try to deposit a cashier's check from the same bank you'll be depositing with. Yes, it is a kind of bizzare, but a bank looks at their own casheir's checks as less suspicous than someone depositing a random $10-100 k in cash.
Definately do NOT: write yourself a big check. Nothing is nearly as suspicous as CG Lastname hand writing a $100k check to him/herself, especailly if done in thick marker and your normal balance in the receiving bank is less than a third of the check you're depositing. The only way to avoid a hold on that is to know the bank manager very well and have him/her vouch for you, and for $100k, they may not.
Monday, April 27, 2009
So it’s been a long time. And a lot has happened.
The weekend after I started this blog, Susan Boyle rose to international stardom. From the snippets I saw on the news, I didn’t think anything of it. But the news kept bringing her up and eventually one of my favorite authors linked a story with Boyle’s cover of “Cry me a River,” which is beautifully haunting. The Youtube video of Boyle is fantastic, if you haven’t seen it, and deserving of the commentary heaped upon it. It plays like a short movie. I would even go so far to say that it is the epitome of a short film.
This lead to some Youtube silliness over the week which uncovered three other note worthy clips- some AMV mashes of Avenue Q songs done by Disney characters and an AMV mash with Ariel and Hercules as an unlikely couple. The last is something we found on our Media TV set up called The Guild, with Felicia Day from Dr Horrible’s Sing Along Blog.
Earlier this week, Penny Arcade did a comic about Chronicles of Spellborn from Acclaim games. I spent the next day downloading it and tried it out. While the graphics are pretty, the character customization at start lacks much- similar to DND Online, and to some extent, World of Warcraft. Call me spoiled, but I liked being able to choose what the proportions of my character are, as in City of Heroes. CoS only had three body types for humans- malnourished, super buff, and Andre The Giant. The beginning “armor” is only for looks and so are the beginning weapons. It doesn’t really seem to matter what you choose. The news releases I’d read commented heavily about the combat system, and Acclaim calls it “innovative” and “user controlled.” From what I saw, it was non-responsively similar to the combat system used in Oblivion and other first person shooter games, the main difference being that CoS is close 3rd person, over the shoulder rather than first person. I didn’t make it past the tutorial. After spending fifteen minutes chasing glowing white dots to learn controls that match CoH hotkeys and being given make busy quests by a cabin boy I decided I’d rather do some chores.
We also picked up a mountain of comic books thanks to a sale at our local shop. I’m finally caught up on Courtney Crumrin, and grabbed a few sample copies of the Ender’s Game, Battlestar Galactica: The Cylon War, and Superhero Human Resources comics as well as the pre-comic for Ghostbusters, which has been out for a while.
The Ender’s Game series is seeing some strain on being adapted, as I would expect for something so…culturally rooted. I’m still sad that Orson Scott Card couldn’t find a way to work with Wolfgang Peterson. Perhaps someone like Del Torro will come in next and just blow us all away with geeky pipe dreams. The main problem I would find for adapting Card’s work is probably best illustrated illuminated by Ender’s Shadow. While I enjoyed the book, Card had gotten into a habit of telling rather than showing character motivations and thoughts. He tells us that three year old Bean feels threatened and reasons out various things. He tells us, in Ender’s Game, Valentine’s feelings and motivations. If, instead, he’d shown us Valentine grimacing when Peter tells her how to write for Demostenes, that would be easy to move to a visual form.
Not too long ago, Angry Video Game Nerd did a series about the Ghostbusters games and how unsatisfactory they were. I hope he’s ready for the new release. It looks like it will have some of his favorite peeves redone for the Wii and 360. The pre-comic was very well done, putting the story right where it belongs and with unexpected ending.
As for now, the news media remembered “acts of God” are just the remedy for a slow news day, and are whipping themselves (and the public) into a frenzy with the swine flu, Sylar is sure to kill someone on tonight’s “Heroes,” and I have some eggs to hunt down for Noble Garden.
Media Nerd Girl
Upcoming:
Actual reviews of the rest comics, some of the most common questions on personal accounts (including “How’d they get my debit card number?” and “Where’d my money go?”), a review of the new “No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” book, and probably more youtube videos.
The weekend after I started this blog, Susan Boyle rose to international stardom. From the snippets I saw on the news, I didn’t think anything of it. But the news kept bringing her up and eventually one of my favorite authors linked a story with Boyle’s cover of “Cry me a River,” which is beautifully haunting. The Youtube video of Boyle is fantastic, if you haven’t seen it, and deserving of the commentary heaped upon it. It plays like a short movie. I would even go so far to say that it is the epitome of a short film.
This lead to some Youtube silliness over the week which uncovered three other note worthy clips- some AMV mashes of Avenue Q songs done by Disney characters and an AMV mash with Ariel and Hercules as an unlikely couple. The last is something we found on our Media TV set up called The Guild, with Felicia Day from Dr Horrible’s Sing Along Blog.
Earlier this week, Penny Arcade did a comic about Chronicles of Spellborn from Acclaim games. I spent the next day downloading it and tried it out. While the graphics are pretty, the character customization at start lacks much- similar to DND Online, and to some extent, World of Warcraft. Call me spoiled, but I liked being able to choose what the proportions of my character are, as in City of Heroes. CoS only had three body types for humans- malnourished, super buff, and Andre The Giant. The beginning “armor” is only for looks and so are the beginning weapons. It doesn’t really seem to matter what you choose. The news releases I’d read commented heavily about the combat system, and Acclaim calls it “innovative” and “user controlled.” From what I saw, it was non-responsively similar to the combat system used in Oblivion and other first person shooter games, the main difference being that CoS is close 3rd person, over the shoulder rather than first person. I didn’t make it past the tutorial. After spending fifteen minutes chasing glowing white dots to learn controls that match CoH hotkeys and being given make busy quests by a cabin boy I decided I’d rather do some chores.
We also picked up a mountain of comic books thanks to a sale at our local shop. I’m finally caught up on Courtney Crumrin, and grabbed a few sample copies of the Ender’s Game, Battlestar Galactica: The Cylon War, and Superhero Human Resources comics as well as the pre-comic for Ghostbusters, which has been out for a while.
The Ender’s Game series is seeing some strain on being adapted, as I would expect for something so…culturally rooted. I’m still sad that Orson Scott Card couldn’t find a way to work with Wolfgang Peterson. Perhaps someone like Del Torro will come in next and just blow us all away with geeky pipe dreams. The main problem I would find for adapting Card’s work is probably best illustrated illuminated by Ender’s Shadow. While I enjoyed the book, Card had gotten into a habit of telling rather than showing character motivations and thoughts. He tells us that three year old Bean feels threatened and reasons out various things. He tells us, in Ender’s Game, Valentine’s feelings and motivations. If, instead, he’d shown us Valentine grimacing when Peter tells her how to write for Demostenes, that would be easy to move to a visual form.
Not too long ago, Angry Video Game Nerd did a series about the Ghostbusters games and how unsatisfactory they were. I hope he’s ready for the new release. It looks like it will have some of his favorite peeves redone for the Wii and 360. The pre-comic was very well done, putting the story right where it belongs and with unexpected ending.
As for now, the news media remembered “acts of God” are just the remedy for a slow news day, and are whipping themselves (and the public) into a frenzy with the swine flu, Sylar is sure to kill someone on tonight’s “Heroes,” and I have some eggs to hunt down for Noble Garden.
Media Nerd Girl
Upcoming:
Actual reviews of the rest comics, some of the most common questions on personal accounts (including “How’d they get my debit card number?” and “Where’d my money go?”), a review of the new “No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” book, and probably more youtube videos.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Final Fantasy: Echoes of Time Walking Review
We got Square Enix’s “Final Fantasy Echoes of Time” for the Wii over the weekend. I didn’t get a lot of time to play, what with preparing for boyfriend’s WWE anniversary to prepare for, but once his event was underway, and I’d made sure the boys were settled with snacks and soda, I got to go upstairs and be dismal and confused.
First, there’s an incredibly long load when selected from the main Wii screen. We first tried it downstairs to show boyfriend’s guests- I had time to set up and get dinner in the oven before it got to the main game screen. The User Interface…There’s a lot of double use of buttons and it makes things a bit slippery. For example, on the Wii nun chuck, the “C” button summons party members by holding it down. The “C” button also casts magic…by holding it down. You pick things up by hitting “Z.” You can then attack them (“A”) or put them down (“Z”) or throw them (“Z”) or lay down/do a crazy break dance move (“Z”) and drop whatever you are holding. The screen itself is set up to resemble a Nintendo DS split screen- the main action on the left and party list, status, and magic selector on the right ‘screen.’
The basic premise set up is that your character is from a small village in a forest and no one is allowed to leave the forest due to the Law, no one is allowed into the forest until their coming of age ceremony at sixteen, and the children of the village occasionally fall ill with ‘crystal sickness’ that makes the children stronger, faster, quicker to heal, and they never fall sick again. Your character was the first illness in a long time some years ago, and another child falls ill in the opening. Unlike your character, the child who falls ill is habitually ill and may die from the illness and is in need of a medicine. For some unexplained reason, your character is allowed to break that Law and leave the forest.
Only, no one tells you to do so. A lot of people hint at it, one person tells you where the big town is, but no one says “Hey, PC NAME, you can leave our village and have proven you can walk through the forest without being eaten by wolves (more on that below) and for some reason are except from the Law, why don’t you go and get this medicine from the town? We’re not sure they’ll have it, since it is an ancient illness and no one else has crystals…that we’ve heard of. I mean, we’re not allowed into the World At Large, so there’s no real way we can check.”
On the coming-of-age quest, you go into the woods and get asked if you know how to fight. The town Moogle then starts showing you how to beat things up. The AI takes over your toon and picks up a cute fox thing (Mus) and just starts hitting it against a tree. At that point in time, there has been no indication that the fox thing behind the Moogle was an enemy. You then go around being attacked by things until you come to a door which you open and then fight your first boss. Afterwards, you have a cut scene that doesn’t explain anything but hey, you passed. And you get a “short cut” back to the village on the opposite side of the map from where the animation for the short cut is shown. You go back, you find out about your sick friend, and, for me anyway, eventually get bored and try leaving. Hey, you’re out! There’s a big city a short distance away.
So you go to the big town. It is filled with ‘adventurers’ and tomb raiders and scholars…who get lost in the giant library and are all scared of the forest to the south and have no idea about the lost village. But there is an item customization shop, an item shop, an adventurer’s guild, an item storage place, a moogle who gives out quests, and the library.
The item stores lead to a problem- in order to customize an object, it has to be unequipped. There is no option to unequip items; your character must always be wearing and carrying something. So in order to customize an item that you like using, you must carry around an item you don’t intend to use to equip it before getting it customized and you must remember to change your equipment before leaving/entering battle.
While I’m talking about items, here’s another problem I have: items for healing and restoring magic are instant use. You can’t carry them around and use at your leisure. But the items do work on all the party, so that’s nice. And only the party leader can ‘use’ them, even if it’s sitting on another party member’s head.
The first time I came to town, I didn’t visit the moogle, upgrade weapons, or get additional party members from the adventurer’s guild. Why? Well, I didn’t know about the moggle and the dialogue about the Adventurer’s guild was primarily derogatory and made it sound like I could only party with people online. Later, when I was at the final boss for the first dungeon, I kept wondering why the heck I was having such a hard time killing him; I could get him within 30 hp of dying and he’d KO me. So I started over and took more time to explore. After going downstairs when I heard someone fell on the camera guy, watching a little wrestling to cool down from the so far frustrating game, and finding the manual to see what it said about equipping items. The manual mentions the quest giving Moogle, near the Adventurer’s Guild in town.
The second time I did it right- I went to the adventurer’s guild and found that they can add party members to your party; so regardless of what you chose for your main toon, you can now fill out your party with whatever else you might have wanted to play, because any member of a party can be the party leader and will be treated as if they were from the lost village. I tried to do some quests from the moogle before setting out. That was a mistake.
The quests are, in a word, dumb.
The first quest possible is a fire fighting quest. You (and only you, the rest of the party is on break) pick up barrels of water and throw them at some fires. Only, they don’t always do anything. Sometimes they explode and douse a small portion flames. Other times, they land, as a barrel, in the flames and sit there. You can pick the barrel back up and suffer knock-back flame damage…sometimes…and try throwing the barrel again. You can stack the barrels and try to throw them for a bigger watery dousing, but so far, all I’ve achieved is stacking a bunch of barrels and having them land in a fire.
The second quest you unlock by talking to a chef on the stairs to the library (North of the main gate, left up the stairs). He wants you to roast a bunch of Mus for his restaurant. Go back to the Moogle and take the quest. Again you’re on your own. The Mus are the little fox like things and they are in several areas. Once you enter those areas, they swarm you. Your two big problems- running out of magic and beating something to give you a magic restoring item occasionally runs into an area where the Mus are and you end up fighting all of them. I ran this quest several times and failed it each time. Once, I only used fire magic (the requirement for completing the quest). The only thing I can figure is that it needs a certain number of Mus, but it doesn’t tell you how many. The fail note says that “if you accidentally kill a Mus using something other than magic, don’t worry, more will appear.”
The quests appear to be on a time limit and have been very difficult and vague in what they need to be beaten. The manual says that they give money, but the quest menu doesn’t say how much. I think that, for my money, I will go out and beat the poor monsters against a wall.
One other thing about the city before we move to the first dungeon: North on the plaza with the water fountain is a mother, child, and magic user. The child is having a fit because it wants a sweet drink. The mother says no, and if you keep misbehaving, the witch of the forest will come take you away. The child is skeptical. The magic user jumps in and mentions a person from your village. You then have the option of then saying, “Yeah, and she still gets lost” or “Hey! I’m from that forest!” It doesn’t appear to matter what you choose at this time. Both options will cause the child to start crying and scare everyone.
To move forward, go to the Library and speak with the creepy guy from the opening scene to get his quest. Then go speak to the two guys near the water fountain.
The first dungeon is as straightforward as anything else I’ve seen in the game so far. You have simple puzzles to solve, monsters to beat, frivolous warnings, and a lot of doubling back through areas to unlock new areas. The dungeon- The Aqueducts. Having seen real aqueducts in person, as well as on TV and in photos, I would call this place poorly named. For one, it’s underground. Second, its purpose appears to be cleaning the water rather than moving the water. And housing monsters and treasure chests. The point of the quest is to find out why the water is turning brackish and report back to the maintenance people in the city. Posted on placards on the walls of the sewer are signs stating, “Monsters appear to be messing with things. They sure are cute though,” and “Don’t go into this room! It’s a big monster and it’s mean and dangerous!” So if the maintenance guys had just talked to the sewer workers, they’d know what was going on.
That’s all the major stuff I’ve done so far. I will continue to play as available between building up our WOW characters and upcoming holiday fun. If anyone has insight or comments, I’d love to hear them.
First, there’s an incredibly long load when selected from the main Wii screen. We first tried it downstairs to show boyfriend’s guests- I had time to set up and get dinner in the oven before it got to the main game screen. The User Interface…There’s a lot of double use of buttons and it makes things a bit slippery. For example, on the Wii nun chuck, the “C” button summons party members by holding it down. The “C” button also casts magic…by holding it down. You pick things up by hitting “Z.” You can then attack them (“A”) or put them down (“Z”) or throw them (“Z”) or lay down/do a crazy break dance move (“Z”) and drop whatever you are holding. The screen itself is set up to resemble a Nintendo DS split screen- the main action on the left and party list, status, and magic selector on the right ‘screen.’
The basic premise set up is that your character is from a small village in a forest and no one is allowed to leave the forest due to the Law, no one is allowed into the forest until their coming of age ceremony at sixteen, and the children of the village occasionally fall ill with ‘crystal sickness’ that makes the children stronger, faster, quicker to heal, and they never fall sick again. Your character was the first illness in a long time some years ago, and another child falls ill in the opening. Unlike your character, the child who falls ill is habitually ill and may die from the illness and is in need of a medicine. For some unexplained reason, your character is allowed to break that Law and leave the forest.
Only, no one tells you to do so. A lot of people hint at it, one person tells you where the big town is, but no one says “Hey, PC NAME, you can leave our village and have proven you can walk through the forest without being eaten by wolves (more on that below) and for some reason are except from the Law, why don’t you go and get this medicine from the town? We’re not sure they’ll have it, since it is an ancient illness and no one else has crystals…that we’ve heard of. I mean, we’re not allowed into the World At Large, so there’s no real way we can check.”
On the coming-of-age quest, you go into the woods and get asked if you know how to fight. The town Moogle then starts showing you how to beat things up. The AI takes over your toon and picks up a cute fox thing (Mus) and just starts hitting it against a tree. At that point in time, there has been no indication that the fox thing behind the Moogle was an enemy. You then go around being attacked by things until you come to a door which you open and then fight your first boss. Afterwards, you have a cut scene that doesn’t explain anything but hey, you passed. And you get a “short cut” back to the village on the opposite side of the map from where the animation for the short cut is shown. You go back, you find out about your sick friend, and, for me anyway, eventually get bored and try leaving. Hey, you’re out! There’s a big city a short distance away.
So you go to the big town. It is filled with ‘adventurers’ and tomb raiders and scholars…who get lost in the giant library and are all scared of the forest to the south and have no idea about the lost village. But there is an item customization shop, an item shop, an adventurer’s guild, an item storage place, a moogle who gives out quests, and the library.
The item stores lead to a problem- in order to customize an object, it has to be unequipped. There is no option to unequip items; your character must always be wearing and carrying something. So in order to customize an item that you like using, you must carry around an item you don’t intend to use to equip it before getting it customized and you must remember to change your equipment before leaving/entering battle.
While I’m talking about items, here’s another problem I have: items for healing and restoring magic are instant use. You can’t carry them around and use at your leisure. But the items do work on all the party, so that’s nice. And only the party leader can ‘use’ them, even if it’s sitting on another party member’s head.
The first time I came to town, I didn’t visit the moogle, upgrade weapons, or get additional party members from the adventurer’s guild. Why? Well, I didn’t know about the moggle and the dialogue about the Adventurer’s guild was primarily derogatory and made it sound like I could only party with people online. Later, when I was at the final boss for the first dungeon, I kept wondering why the heck I was having such a hard time killing him; I could get him within 30 hp of dying and he’d KO me. So I started over and took more time to explore. After going downstairs when I heard someone fell on the camera guy, watching a little wrestling to cool down from the so far frustrating game, and finding the manual to see what it said about equipping items. The manual mentions the quest giving Moogle, near the Adventurer’s Guild in town.
The second time I did it right- I went to the adventurer’s guild and found that they can add party members to your party; so regardless of what you chose for your main toon, you can now fill out your party with whatever else you might have wanted to play, because any member of a party can be the party leader and will be treated as if they were from the lost village. I tried to do some quests from the moogle before setting out. That was a mistake.
The quests are, in a word, dumb.
The first quest possible is a fire fighting quest. You (and only you, the rest of the party is on break) pick up barrels of water and throw them at some fires. Only, they don’t always do anything. Sometimes they explode and douse a small portion flames. Other times, they land, as a barrel, in the flames and sit there. You can pick the barrel back up and suffer knock-back flame damage…sometimes…and try throwing the barrel again. You can stack the barrels and try to throw them for a bigger watery dousing, but so far, all I’ve achieved is stacking a bunch of barrels and having them land in a fire.
The second quest you unlock by talking to a chef on the stairs to the library (North of the main gate, left up the stairs). He wants you to roast a bunch of Mus for his restaurant. Go back to the Moogle and take the quest. Again you’re on your own. The Mus are the little fox like things and they are in several areas. Once you enter those areas, they swarm you. Your two big problems- running out of magic and beating something to give you a magic restoring item occasionally runs into an area where the Mus are and you end up fighting all of them. I ran this quest several times and failed it each time. Once, I only used fire magic (the requirement for completing the quest). The only thing I can figure is that it needs a certain number of Mus, but it doesn’t tell you how many. The fail note says that “if you accidentally kill a Mus using something other than magic, don’t worry, more will appear.”
The quests appear to be on a time limit and have been very difficult and vague in what they need to be beaten. The manual says that they give money, but the quest menu doesn’t say how much. I think that, for my money, I will go out and beat the poor monsters against a wall.
One other thing about the city before we move to the first dungeon: North on the plaza with the water fountain is a mother, child, and magic user. The child is having a fit because it wants a sweet drink. The mother says no, and if you keep misbehaving, the witch of the forest will come take you away. The child is skeptical. The magic user jumps in and mentions a person from your village. You then have the option of then saying, “Yeah, and she still gets lost” or “Hey! I’m from that forest!” It doesn’t appear to matter what you choose at this time. Both options will cause the child to start crying and scare everyone.
To move forward, go to the Library and speak with the creepy guy from the opening scene to get his quest. Then go speak to the two guys near the water fountain.
The first dungeon is as straightforward as anything else I’ve seen in the game so far. You have simple puzzles to solve, monsters to beat, frivolous warnings, and a lot of doubling back through areas to unlock new areas. The dungeon- The Aqueducts. Having seen real aqueducts in person, as well as on TV and in photos, I would call this place poorly named. For one, it’s underground. Second, its purpose appears to be cleaning the water rather than moving the water. And housing monsters and treasure chests. The point of the quest is to find out why the water is turning brackish and report back to the maintenance people in the city. Posted on placards on the walls of the sewer are signs stating, “Monsters appear to be messing with things. They sure are cute though,” and “Don’t go into this room! It’s a big monster and it’s mean and dangerous!” So if the maintenance guys had just talked to the sewer workers, they’d know what was going on.
That’s all the major stuff I’ve done so far. I will continue to play as available between building up our WOW characters and upcoming holiday fun. If anyone has insight or comments, I’d love to hear them.
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