400 Theater Opened Last Night

Kate and I went to see Public Enemies at the New 400 Theater (formerly the Village North) last night. Our experience was mostly positive, and we're definitely glad that the theater is back open again. I hope they're not quite done renovating; there's some disappointing, incomplete facade work on the outside around the doors, and the inside hallways and lobby looks like the grandest expense spent was put toward a coat of white paint. Also, the screen in auditorium #4 seems to have a hot spot in it, perhaps due to a bump on the wall or a shadow from some leaking light source.

I'm sure I've made the new owner very unhappy with those statements, but I have to call it like I see it.

That being said, it's great to see the theater here; it provides a valuable service to Rogers Park, and helps to keep our neighborhood alive and vibrant. I want the theater to succeed, and I hope the plans for success include putting a little more elbow grease into making the place shine.

Parking on Pratt and Sheridan?

We rented a car to go out of town last week, as we occasionally do. We returned to Chicago on Monday night, but weren't able to return the car until Tuesday morning, as Enterprise wasn't open in the evening. Yuck, a night of street parking. My least favorite thing about Rogers Park.

That got me thinking -- is it possible to get occasional temporary parking permits for the permit parking in the neighborhood? I don't actually own a car, so I wouldn't be buying a city sticker. If it's allowable to occasionally get a temporary permit, how does one go about doing that?

Beware: Woot Sent My Mom Dying Flowers, Doesn't Care

I just wrote the following email to Consumerist, CC'ing Woot. If you're considering buying something from Woot, you might want to read this first.

Dear Ben and Co. at Consumerist,

I'm wondering if you can help me out here, or if at least, you could help me by sharing my story with others.

On May 4, the "one deal per day" online store Woot had this neat little rose bush for sale for $29.99. They guaranteed that it would be shipped to my by Mother's Day. I had ordered about once per month from Woot and I thought this was a neat idea, and I was a big fan of Woot, so I ordered one for my mom. ( http://www.woot.com/Forums/ViewPost.aspx?PostID=3172889 )

They did indeed deliver it on May 8th. She thanked me for it and said she liked it. Problem is, I found out later that it arrived sick and dying. It died somewhere around a week after she received it. She didn't tell me at first, but I found out after that it was unwell the entire time, and that the roses never bloomed, and it ended up dying. My mom is a very savvy gardener, so she knows how to take care of a
rose bush.

She didn't tell me that it died until about May 17th or 18th. It took me a few days to follow up, because she left me a voice mail, and we live hundreds of miles apart. When she did tell me it was dead, I looked up and found that I wasn't the only one who received a dead or dying rose bush (see the last page of the discussion thread on this Woot item -- see
http://www.woot.com/Forums/ViewPost.aspx?PostID=3172889&PageIndex=11&ReplyCount=433#post3188368 ).

So, on May 20th, I followed up with Woot, asking them to refund my money. The wrote back telling me to call NuDell at 678-730-0701. I did and they said sorry, they can't help me, these plants only have a 7 day warranty. I thought to myself, hey, that's a bit odd, and we're not talking about closeout electronics, we're talking about a plant.

And it did indeed seem to die within about a week of being received. Since NuDell told me no, I went back to Woot. I explained the situation and asked if they could refund my money, or if I should file a credit card charge back. Riley from Woot responded with, "Unfortunately, we do not have the item on hand. If the item was dead upon receipt of it, why did it take you so long to contact us about it?"

At no point did I say the item was dead upon receipt, but I did politely reply and explain that my mom lives 300 miles away and it took me some time to understand what had happened and follow up. Jordan from Woot responded with a one line reply instructing me to call NuDell again.

I wrote back, again, and explained that NuDell told me no, and that I'm asking Woot to make it right for me, because Woot is who I bought the item from.

All the correspondence is below. (Not included in this blog post.)

I'm wondering if there's anything you can do to help, if Woot will notice this and help, or if I should just give up and file a credit card charge back. I'm not paying for a diseased plant, it's not right. As I explained in email to Woot, I realize that I'm a nobody, but I've spent an average for $50 per month with Woot for the past four months, which is when I first heard about Woot. That, plus the theory of me
continuing to buy more stuff from Woot in the future, makes me wonder if perhaps a little bit of support and customer service would be appropriate here. I like ordering from Woot. Wine.woot in particular is awesome. But, if I have to be worried about getting screwed over because somebody is going to ship me something other than what was promised, I guess I can't feel comfortable ordering from Woot in the
future.

I was a happy Woot'er until this happened. One of my friends turned me on to Woot, and I've turned on my friends to Woot. Yes, I know that iPods only come with white headphones. Yes, Woot did mention the "7
day warranty." I wondered what warranty there could be about a plant when I read that. Something's wrong when you get a plant and it dies within 7 days, or within 8 days, or within 9 days. And knowing that this happened to various other Wooters too is disappointing. I see multiple reports of dead and damaged plants, or plants arriving late, or not at all.

Like you often do, I'd welcome any public statement or response from Woot, if they'd care to make one. My communication with Woot hasn't gone so well. It looks like they're just copying and pasting the same info back at me and not reading what I'm writing.

Thanks for taking the time to listen to my story. If you decide to post this, please edit it as desired.

Best regards,
Al Iverson

5/29/2009 Edit: Yesterday (5/28), Woot sent me a one line reply to the long email above: "A complete refund has been issued." Thanks, Woot, though I'm still a little bummed that this is what it took to get that refund. Since Woot didn't CC Consumerist on their reply, I forwarded it on to Consumerist, in case they decide to publish my letter. (Woot also seemingly forgot to apologize for screwing this up, and not making it right, and not actually reading what I wrote. They also left out the bit about how they care about my business.)

Straight Dope Chicago: Is Rogers Park as bad as they say?

Cecil Adams answers the question, is Rogers Park unsafe? Short answer no, he says, followed by a ton of detailed analysis on crime statistics and comparison data between community areas. A very interesting read.

(H/T to Thomas Westgard)

It's Office Hunt Time

I'm considering moving my office out of the building where Sonny's is. The owners of that building have been nice, but I either want to move downtown or find something with more light and a more interesting space in the neighborhood.

As I embark upon my investigation, I note a couple of empty spaces nearby.

1. There's a little storefront next to Ennui that looks kind of neat, though I dunno about renting from them, since that's the building where they were questionably renting out a block of apartments to something rehab-related. A lot of that was detailed on Craig Gernhardt's blog, which makes me take it for a grain of salt, so I dunno. That little space has huge windows though and might be great for a one person office.

2. Tom Westgard moved out of his space across the street from Ennui. Anybody know what that would go for? That's a a pretty big space, perhaps more than I need. But it might be nice to be able to have conference space for when my employees come to visit.

I'm investigating some other options out of the neighborhood, and I probably will call about these places just to see if they're within my budget. In the mean time, I wanted to throw this out there to see if anybody in the 'hood has any thoughts. Anyone?

Wife in Chicago Tribune Today

Here's a link to the story online.

You'll have to stop in to your neighborhood 7-11 and pick up the print version to see the pictures. If you do, make sure you buy at least 150 copies, because the Trib needs money.

In the article, I'm referred to as an Internet marketing director, which is my Standard Answer to the "so, what do you do?" question, the one I give when I don't want to explain about email and spam fighting.