Thank you Bill!

I’m horrible at Thank you notes.  It’s not my mother’s fault, just so we’re clear.  She taught me how and expected that I would write of my thankfulness in an appropriate manner.  I’m lazy and well, I just don’t make the time for them.  However, I’ve been meaning to send a thank you note in response to a blog posting where I was pretty whiny and unhappy.  It got quite a bit of response – I guess that was the point – and I have a few thank you’s to tender.

1)  First of all, I’d like to say a HUGE THANK YOU to Brian Seitz.  No, not that guy from Stray Cats (that’s Brian Setzer).  Brian Seitz (SR PR MGR-PHONE) read my blog on  “The RedmondNeighborhood Blog”.  He asked if he could contact me and arranged to meet me at the (now empty) Tully’s at Bella Bottega.

He gets a my award for “Best Customer Service in a Supporting Role” for taking the time to meet with some nutty housewife in Redmond and discuss her teeny-tiny problems with Windows Phone and Hotmail.  Okay, to clarify, he didn’t actually FIX anything, but he listened, took notes and offered lots of suggestions.  All this while he tried to figure out why MY Hotmail calendar didn’t look or do what HIS Hotmail calendar did.  Seriously, he spent AN HOUR with me on this issue.

We settled on the fix that I should create an outlook.com email account, link it to my Hotmail/Windows Live Mail calendar and start using my outlook email as my phone email/Windows live/Hotmail contact email.  That sounds easy, but it wasn’t (a different thank you to a different person for that exercise!).

He also took notes on my issues with “Map Chick” and Nebraska.  Read the original post and you’ll get it. 

And, it was like Christmas in August because as we concluded our meeting, he handed me TWO BRAND NEW IN THE BOX NOKIA LUMIA 900 phones.  I’ll admit that originally my husband was way more excited than I was about this; but after the shock of the whole “he gave me something for free” thing wore off and I got my phone all dialed in and set-up, I just look at it every day and do a little Happy Dance. 

Seriously though, he certainly didn’t have to give me anything.  I’m sure it’s good marketing practice and I very much appreciate it, but I was so impressed that he took time out of his schedule to attempt to work out my (insignificant in the scheme of things) issues.  The phones were just like the whip cream on top of the already-indulgent peppermint white chocolate mocha with sprinkles.  And, Brian?  If I’m not supposed to publicly tell everyone I meet that you gave me two new phones for complaining, I’ll stop telling everyone I meet.  But, it just rocked my world so I actually tell EVERYONE about my new phone and the awesome guy that gave it to me and how Microsoft worked hard to make one customer happy.

I figured out the podcast thing on my own (I think).  Regardless, I don’t really have time to listen to podcasts on my phone anymore because…

2)  APPS!  I’VE GOT APPS!  

This is a huge thank you to MICROSOFT (and Carlos Cruz who alerted me to the fact that it was now available).  I have Words With Friends (just since November)!  Originally, it was horribly slow and I couldn’t drag the tiles to actually play on my phone, but that was updated in about a week and now, yes Virginia, I can actually play WWF on my mobile device.   And, a friend introduced me to Wordament (It’s like “Boggle” on crack.  Seriously, if you aren’t addicted, well, then you’re stronger than I).

I’ve also got two email accounts (business and personal) and a fitness management app on my phone now, as well as a ton of other stupid stuff that I’m trying out. 

I still WISH that MS could play nicely in the sandbox and share their toys with Safeway, PayPal, BECU and a few others who have Android and iPhone apps but don’t offer them for the Windows 7/8 phones.  I suppose I don’t “need” mobile banking and deposits, updates on coupon specials or other junk on my phone, but I admit to still having a bit of “App” envy. 

3)  Windows Live/Mail/Hotmail

I am in the process of getting rid of my frontier.com email and switching everything to my new outlook.com account.  The process of doing this is painful and complicated – it’s just not a point and click procedure; and not all the contacts came over cleanly.  Thankfully, I have friends who have wine and knowledge. 

My friend Jennifer Moynihan gets a HUGE thanks for the hours and hours (and hours) of time she spent walking me through the remedial version (think Windows Live for Idiots, with Wine).  We set up an outlook.com email account, got it and all my junk email programs (Gmail, Yahoo, etc.) on the sidebar and made my old phone work in tip-top condition.  THEN, we upgraded it all to my new FREE NOKIA LUMIA 900 phone (Thanks again, Brian!).  And then all I had to do was call AT&T and get them to transfer my old SIM information to my new phone. 

The process that fit so nicely into one paragraph above took my husband four weeks of mumbling and groaning along with trips to AT&T store and calls to their customer service for his FREE NOKIA LUMIA 900 phone.  It took Jen and me about 8 hours, three bottles of wine, and some very funny conversations.  Yeah, my friends rock. 

I no longer daydream about my friends’ iPhones; especially after the map snafu that the new release produced.  Even on Map Chick’s worst day, Nebraska 97^th Street in no way gets me lost on the way to the Queen’s castle.  I’m hoping maybe next year I’ll upgrade to the new Windows 8 phone (this version of Nokia can only support 7.8 which I haven’t gotten yet, but I’ll wait patiently). 

Sincerely,

Paige Norman

paigenor@outlook.com

Windows 7 phone supporter

P.S.

I no longer care if my Bluetooth syncs, and I’m getting used to Hotmail/Windows Live system.  I really don’t use the “cloud” or Skydrive much, and there are tweaks that I’d love to see implemented that I’m sure other users would like too, but they’re miniscule and petty.  I’m not planning on making them an issue in a future blog post.  But, maybe, if someone is interested, they’ll ask me?