Today I received the following e-mail from World Gym in response to my rant about yet another number to have to remember and use. The e-mail has been edited somewhat to protect privacy of the sender and other information:

Dear Mr. Smith,

Thank you so much for your letter today explaining your frustrations with
the World Gym check in procedure. On June 1, 2002 all World Gym locations
in the Colorado Springs area were acquired by Excel Fitness Colorado, LLC
and now operate under new ownership. All your records and membership
information has been transfered from the previous ownership into the Excel
Fitness Colorado database. Unfortunately one of the drawbacks to our system
is that if you try to utilize a location other than the one that you joined
at, your membership info cannot be found without utilizing the membership
number. (Each membership number is coded to be club specific) We know that
change is difficult, so we have been gradually changing the check in
procedure over the last 8 months and posted those changes at each location.
I apologize for any inconvienance the new program causes you, I assure you
that was never our intent. We appreciate your business and thank you for
your continued support. To show my appreciation, I have lowered your
monthly dues to $(deleted) per month, which will be reflected on your March
statement. Excel Fitness Colorado LLC has been a leader in the fitness
industry for over 15 years, operating the largest World Gym franchise in the
nation. We have many exciting things planned for the Colorado Springs area
and hope that you will stick with us during some of these difficult changes.
Thank you again for your comments. Should any additional issues arise in
the future that you would like to comment on, please don’t hesitate to
contact me directly. I will do what ever I can to rectify the situation.

Thanks Again,

(name deleted)

VP / Operations

My Response:

Dear (Name Deleted):

Thanks for your response and particularly the change in dues! I really don’t have a huge problem with using a membership number, but hopefully you understood the real intent of the letter….

In my day job I’m the responsible for Information Technology for a large semiconductor manufacturer. One of the major problems we have in business is the overwhelming number of ways that our employees and customers (the politically correct phrase these days is “business partners” rather than customers) are identified. It seems that literally every computer system requires it’s own unique method of identifying and authenticating the system user. Getting that under control has been a major project at my company. The rule has become: Use a method of identification that the system user already knows or has. About a year ago we instituted a policy that we will not deploy any computer system that does not make use of our standard, already-in-place identification and authentication process. We have standardized on either the user’s name or an ID of their own choosing. We do have system users with the same name, but the identification system is required to handle that issue through the authentication process.

While this is probably more detail than you’re interested in, the point is to make it "falling off a log" easy for people to do business with us and interface with our computer systems, kind of like Amazon.com’s 1-click buying process.

Please feel free to pass this along to those who are responsible for your computer systems. With only a little effort, they can do the same thing for Excel Fitness Colorado LLC!

Meanwhile, thanks again for your response. Many companies either ignore letters like the one I sent to you, or don’t have the sense to put in place a process to promptly respond. I’m impressed. I’ve also put your response (with some editing to protect pricing and your privacy) on the web at https://www.rnsmith.com/

Thanks!

Roland Smith

Yesterday morning when I went to the World Gym for the daily ritual, the guy at the front desk (a less-than-2%-Body-Fat kind of a guy) looked me up on their computer and then gave me a card with a membership number. I’m now supposed to give them the number when I come in each morning rather than my name!

Yet another number to identify me. I’ve got a social security number, a drivers license number, several bank account numbers, pin numbers, user ids and passwords for computer programs, license plate numbers, frequent flier numbers, Safeway Savings Card number, Avis Wizard Number…. In fact, there are so many of these numbers that I have most of them entered into my PalmPilot PDA that I carry with me almost everywhere so that I can remember the number I’m supposed to use for each situation.

I asked the guy at the desk why I now needed a number. I’ve been going to this gym for more than three years and until Thursday, my name was sufficient. He told me it was so they could "be more efficient."

Now that’s a not-so-novel concept: Inconvenience the paying customer so that the goods and services provider is slightly less inconvenienced! I’m sure this makes the Dale Carnagie How to Win Friends and Influence People top ten list. But even more intriguing is why World Gym needs to have a different identifier for me than my name. I’m certainly not the only Roland K. Smith in the world. In fact, there are probably a couple hundred other people in the U.S. who use the name Roland K. Smith. Despite that situation, however, the Post Office manages every day to deliver the mail destined for me to my house and has never yet in my almost-sixty-years of living, sent some other Roland K. Smith’s mail to me. There aren’t any other Roland K. Smiths in Colorado Springs. In fact, there aren’t any other Roland Smiths in the city, either. So uniqueness in a somewhat common name can’t be the driving issue for the gym.

Sometimes I think that computers assign numbers as primary identification just because it’s so much easier for the person writing the computer program. Programmers like numbers. They work better in the computer than letters. Comparing two numbers, for instance, is much easier than comparing two names. The computer can easily determine that 140 is different than 2500. But the computer just as easily decides that "Smith" is different than " Smith" unless the programmer goes to a bunch of extra effort to write a comparison routine that accommodates spaces in names as well as the length of names.

Although my name is fairly common — particularly when using just the first initial and last name — I do like it and would prefer to be identified by my name. I suspect that the computer didn’t agonize over my number like my mother did over my name. It probably took the computer a few nanoseconds to assign the number unlike me coming home from the hospital unnamed because just exactly the right name hadn’t been decided, yet (compounded by the fact that I was supposed to be a girl and just the right girl’s name had already been picked, but surprise, I was not a girl and so a new, more gender appropriate name, had to be chosen).

United Airlines knows me by my name, even though one of the numbers I have assigned to me is a United Airlines Frequent Flier Number, which I’m supposed to hold confidential and only use in appropriate places. When I call United Airlines and say something like, "Hello, my name is Roland Smith and I’m flying from Colorado Springs to San Jose next Thursday…." The nice person at United Airlines invariably answers, "I’ve got your record, Mr. Smith. How can I help you today?" Even though the record that the reservation agent is looking at is filed in the computer under a record locator number, and my travel agent sends me the flight itinerary in e-mail with the record locator number as the prominent information on the page, United Airlines never asks for that number. It’s almost like the locator number is an inconvenience for them. All they want is my name and any flight information I may have. They’ve even found the necessary data by just using my name. Now that’s a system where the programmer did the complete job. On the other hand, United Airlines is currently having lots of trouble with numbers, in particular the revenue versus expense numbers. Perhaps that’s why they prefer using names instead than numbers?

The guy behind the counter at World Gym said this morning when I came in, "Good Morning, Mr. Smith. Have a good workout." I told him I was now supposed to give him my membership number and not my name, even though I hadn’t said anything to him yet. He allowed as how he was supposed to ask for the membership number, but that since he knew who I was he didn’t need for me to give him my number, as long as his lady boss wasn’t there!She’s apparently the enforcer!

"Well," I told him, "I’ll still just use my name. It’s too early in the morning to try and remember yet another number." As I started my forty-minute-treadmill jaunt, I was watching CNN and the latest news from Iraq and the impending war and thought about how we’re living in a place that we fairly reverently call the home of the free where people have names and convicts have numbers. I think that I’m much more than a number and I plan to somehow forget my new World Gym Membership Number.

By the way, I took several hundred digital pictures in Maui. Slowly but surely the best of the crop (but close to a couple hundred pictures) are being posted on the web. Click on the pictures link to left, select Maui, and enjoy the pictures.

Turns out that someone (or maybe someones) are actually reading this journal from time to time. So, I need to become much more diligent about actually clicking on this link, logging in, and writing. The previous post came while we were still in Maui, several weeks ago.

We’ve finally had some snow. Not much, just about four inches, but enough to be called snow. The weather has also turned quite cold as well. The front walk needs to be shoveled — even though it’s a south-facing sidewalk, the sun hasn’t become warm enough to melt the snow. City ordinance says we have twenty-four hours after the end of the storm to shovel the walks. I’m in violation!

Maui was a great experience. I’d highly recommend a week or two on the island for anyone. Don’t plan on it being a relaxing vacation, however. There’s so much to do that one week isn’t enough. Next trip we’ll put Sunday in the middle of the trip so we can have an automatically slower day to rest up from the previous few days. I’ve thought about what I liked most about Maui. The sights were beautiful, the weather was lovely, the ocean was pleasant. But, overall I think it was that Maui was much different than I had expected. I was thinking we’d be in a jungle, kind of like the Philippines, that it’d be hot, and that the mosquitos and bugs would be out in abundance. None of those preconceptions were valid. I don’t think the weather got about 85 degrees while we were there, and there was always a breeze to keep things cool. The air was not very humid. The western side of the island, where we spent most of our time, was actually quite arid — no jungle here! And finally, we had a great time. We’ll definitely return. I’d be quite happy to spend a fair amount of time on Maui.

In the meantime, after returning from Maui, I made a quick trip to California on business. I convened all of my managers as well as their managers and supervisors in California for a planning / goal setting / motivational meeting. The economic climate is not improving with any speed, so the next six to twelve months will continue to be very tight. Helping them to understand how tight things really are was an important part of the offsite. To emphasize that, we didn’t even go offsite for the offsite meeting! It was held in a conference room at the facility in Milpitas, California. We had a good time, however, and the time together seemed to be very well spent. Best part of that trip, however, is that I’m staying home for all of February! No travelling anywhere in February. While that doesn’t help rack up frequent flier miles or flight segments, I’m quite happy to spend a month at home.

We decided today was a no alarm clock day. I slept into the glorious hour of 7:11. Nina was, of course, already up. Perry was up about ten minutes later. Chris hopefully will be able to do what all the rest of us could not do … sleep.

Snorkeling in Molokini was quite fun. The boat left at 8 a.m. and cruised past a couple of whale pods on the way out. We were there about an hour. The water was cool and a bit rough, but we had a lot of fun. I think that the snorkeling in the Caribbean is better, however (and the water is warmer!). We then cruised back towards Maui south of where we are staying in Kihei where we went back into the water to swim with the turtles. I saw several and Nina had one swim alongside for a few minutes. They were pretty, large, and more plentiful than I had expected.

Then we came back to the apartment, packed things up, and went to the beach for the rest of the afternoon. The water was still pretty rough — there’s weather coming in sometime — but we still had a great time. Chris literally lived in the water the entire afternoon. We watched the sunset (and took lots of pictures) and then came back to the apartment to shower and clean up. Dinner at Tony Roma’s consumed the rest of the night.

Whale watching may be on the agenda today…. We’ll see!

We’ve now been here in Kihei, Maui, for three full days and are exhausted. This is a beautiful place and far different than I had imagined. We’ve shopped, driven to the top of a volcano for sunrise, and survived the Hana Road. But, other than to stand and look, we’ve not been to a beach. I’m certain that’s on the agenda for tomorrow!

The flight here was very long. We left Houston on time at about 11 a.m. and flew for over eight hours westward to Maui, landing in Kahului. We were dang glad to get off the airplane even though our seats were actually pretty good. We were able to make some changes so that we had the two aisle seats on the last row in the airplane with an empty middle seat between us. There appeared to be two open seats on the airplane and we had one of them next to us! We then waited a couple of hours for my brother Perry and his wife Chris to arrive from Los Angeles. Our daughter Jaelene and her husband Scott are also vacationing here at the same time in a different place, so they met us at the airport as well. We planned the week and headed for bed!

Tuesday was a shopping day. We spent the entire day in Lahaina. We met Jaelene and Scott, bought tickets to a Luau and snorkeling, and then walked Front street. Lots of T-Shirt places, lots of trinket shops. Not nearly as commercialized as St. Thomas or Ocho Rios, but very much for tourists. We had dinner on Tuesday evening with some friends that my folks made while they were here on a mission about twenty years ago, Virgil and Bonnie. He’s also a cousin. They were a lot of fun and we had a great dinner.

Wednesday was volcano day. We got up at 4 a.m., left at 4:50 a.m., and drove to the summit of Haleakala some 10,000 feet above sea level. We arrived about 45 minutes before sunrise and were quite cold by the time the sun peaked over the clouds below us. We were there with about 200 other hardy souls and drove back down shortly after sunrise. We stopped at Paia on the drive back and watched the surfers. The waves were pretty big and there were a lot of foolhardy surfers out in the ocean catching waves. It was quite a sight! We then drove the coast along western Maui past Lahaina, Kaanapali, up to Hanolua Bay. We were at the Hyatt Regency at 4:30 p.m. for a Luau where we met up with Jaelene and Scott. The seats were directly in front of the stage. The food was reasonably good and plentiful. The show was excellent. We’ve now done that and don’t need to go again.

Today was the drive to Hana — clockwise around the Haleakala volcano. The total trip is about 110 miles but it took us a good eleven hours. We stopped at several waterfalls, some of which were lovely, many of which were very sparse. They haven’t had much rain this winter and consequently, the area is very much in a drought. Hana itself is a very quaint, lovely town and it’d be fun to spend a few days there (if we didn’t have to do the very long drive again). Just before Hana we stopped at Nahiku where George Harrison once had a house. Spectacular drive, stunning coastline, great place to have lunch. Past Hana we stopped at the Seven Sacred Pools — which were down to a couple of almost dry pools due to the drought and then stopped at the Charles Lindbergh grave. The drive from there back to Kahului was over some pretty rough road which was also quite spectacular in places. We ordered delivery Chinese food and I spent a few minutes in the hot tub. Sure did feel good on the feet!

So, is Maui almost paradise? It sure is a wonderful place. It’s expensive. Everything is expensive. The lady at the rental car counter said that everyone has to work two jobs to make ends meet. I asked her what here second job was and she said, “A boyfriend.” The traffic is lousy. Life runs at a little slower pace along with pretty poor service. Parts of the island are stunningly beautiful. The Humpback Whales are here…. So, Maui definitely isn’t a parking lot nor dashboard lights — and could be considered to be almost paradise.

It’s a few minutes before midnight on December 31, 2002. This year has only a few minutes life left before entering the history books. My doesn’t that sound profound? Air Force Academy is playing Virginia Tech in a bowl game — they’re losing by 7 points but are more or less driving down the field. Tomorrow will have several football games and we’ll be staying home all day to get our fill of football.

Some new neighbors down the street had an open house this evening so that they could meet the neighborhood. We went over about 7 and stayed until about 8:15. They are very nice people and will fit well into the neighborhood. There’s about 30 seconds left in the ballgame and Air Force has a first and goal. Perhaps they can make this happen??

I enjoy Sunday evenings like this one. We’re home, it’s dark, no one is coming over, I’ve no place I need to be, there are no obligations or other things I need to be doing. It’s also the last day of the Christmas Holidays. Tomorrow is a working day and most everyone will be back at work.

We had Monday, December 23rd, Tuesday the 24th, and Wednesday the 25th off from work. We were also encouraged to take Thursday the 26th and Friday the 27th off as well. Most of my staff did take these days off. I decided not to burn the two vacation days since we’ll be spending some in January. The two days were great days to be at work. I got most all the administrivia taken care of and can now let it pile up for several more weeks.

Christmas was very nice. Nina and I went to see The Lord of the Rings part two, The Two Towers on Christmas eve morning. We went to the first show at 10:00 a.m. meaning we were able to get into the theater for $3.75 apiece. The theater was filled — with a smattering of single seats left here and there. We were near the front of the line and had choice seats. Only problem is, the movie is more than three hours long with previews and such. Well before the movie was finished, both of our bladders were demanding serious attention. That’s too long that early in the morning to be too far away from a bathroom. Still, I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the movie a second time. I’ll definitely go see it at least once more in the theater.

Christmas eve night we were invited to a Mark and Karvin’s home along with another couple, Bob and Rosemary. Mark and Karvin had put together an sumptuous feast, including Swedish mush! I like cereal and found this to be very good as well. The mush includes one almond which ends up in someone’s bowl. The finder of the almond is supposedly blessed with good fortune in the coming year — in such ways as being the next one married, or having the next child. None of us were interested in any such “luck.” However, the Bishop drew the bowl with the almond. We’ll have to monitor his coming year to see what “luck” comes his way!

We were planning to sleep in on Christmas morning! At 4:45 a.m. the phone rang and it was our friends from Townsville, Australia: Ray and Mary. We had a lovely long chat. It’s mid-summer in Australia, so their day included a BBQ, swimming, and a water-balloon war. Meanwhile, we were enjoying 30 degree weather. Fortunately, Ray and Mary called us second. Duane and Bobby got the 4:00 a.m. call! After the chat with Ray and Mary, sleep was out of the question. We both lazed around until around 8 when we opened presents and then made a huge Christmas breakfast. Most if the breakfast waffles made it outside for the birds. All the bacon, however, was consumed! Later that afternoon we went over to Bobby and Duane’s to join them for their traditional family Christmas dinner. In preparation for the dinner, Duane decided to get a couple of tables and some chairs from the church building. He called me to make sure the room where the tables are located would be unlocked. I offered help, but he assured me all would be well. A little while later, I got a call from his cell phone. He was at the church and had locked his keys inside the building! So I drove down and rescued him. He had brought out two tables, with one holding the door open. He loaded the other one into the pickup truck along with sixteen chairs. He then loaded the other table- and the door closed, locking his jacket inside the building on the couch along with all his keys. Luckily, the cell phone was on the seat of the truck. He took a lot of ribbing about that incident!

While at Duane’s house, I took a couple hundred digital pictures of the family (there must have been about thirty people there). I then loaded the best of them, about a hundred pictures, onto a CD and put together a slide show of the pictures. That was a lot of fun and I learned a lot putting the CD together for him. One of their children lives in Maryland, so I made up two CD’s so that they could send one out east for that family to see pictures of the cousins and siblings.

Friday morning we finally finished revising our will. Both Nina and I now have a will, powers of attorney, medical powers of attorney, living wills, and all the associated paperwork for trusts and specific bequeathments. It’s good to have that done. The work is expensive…. Definitely not as expensive as not having all this paperwork completed! We can now demise and not have to worry about what will happen.

The Christmas season and the year 2002 draws to an end. It has been a good year for us. We’re still gainfully employed. We’ve been able to take two cruises. All of our children are doing well and everyone seems to be in good health and vigor. Mom and dad are getting much more frail, but they are still enjoying life and able to take good care of themselves. Dad has recovered very well from the fall resulting in a hip replacement. Mother has a congestive heart condition but it hasn’t gotten much worse over the past year. We’re active in the Church and thoroughly enjoy our work at the Denver Temple each week. Life is good!