It is rare that I take 3 days off or even 2 in a row for that matter. But other than helping a member with a password problem and a couple of other mundane things I pretty much took Friday thru Sunday off.
It started off with going the track (Hollywood Park) on Friday night. It’s been a long time (years) since I attended horse races. One of the guys I went with has a friend who works there, so we had a free box and also got to be trackside for the final race. I lost $50 betting on horses. So no one should take my advice on horse race wagering.
We spent a couple of hours in the Hollywood Park casino afterward. As I’m not a poker player and don’t like California style gaming, I abstained from play. My pal did well at the poker table. He got his track losses back and ended up $150 ahead.
I went to the Bondage Ball on Saturday night. No I was not in bondage, but enjoyed the eye candy.
As many of you know, I typically throw a big pool party on the 4th of July. I didn’t do it this year though. I had some other plans that fell through at the last minute. So I had seven friends over for the day. I actually had a lot more fun than I usually do with my big parties as it was much less stressful.
Monday was back to work with a photoshoot and working on the site. I do love my job though.
Congratulations to the L.A. Lakers who are the 2010 NBA champions. The rivalry between the Celtics and Lakers is the best in major sports. No other pair of teams has met each other so many times for the championship of a major sport. We had some lean years between the 80′s and now, in which neither team was in the running. Now the rivalry is back in full swing. I’m liking it. I’m liking it more that the Lakers won this time.
Although I entered the U.S. Air Force 35 years after WWII ended, I still have an appreciation for the great aircraft of that era. B-25 anyone?
Here’s a few recent shots from some local Los Angeles area transgender clubs. The first pic is of Leslie the hostes of Club Goddess. Then next two are of Diane go-go dancing at Club Goddess. Next is Fawn who I just met that night at Hamburger Mary’s in Long Beach. Next is me with my pal Lani who go-go dances at Rage on Monday Nights. Then it’s back to Club Goddess this past Thursday. Gaby Garcia made a rare appearance which brightened up my evening.
Club Goddess at Cobra is on Thursday nights from 9PM – 2AM at 10937 Burbank Blvd. (at Vineland), North Hollywood, CA 91601
Monday Nights at Rage is hosted by Aubrey at 8911 Santa Monica Blvd, West Hollywood, CA
Hamburger Mary’s in Long Beach is on Tuesday nights and selected Saturdays (usually the 5th Saturday of a month) at 740 East Broadway, Long Beach, CA 90802-5134
Perhaps I’ll see you at one of these.
As I mentioned in the previous post, Bob’s Tgirls model Doll has been helpful around the house. Here she is washing my car. Maybe I should keep her.
Doll is visiting and staying at my place for a while. On Sunday we went house hunting in Beverly Hills and Bel Air. No, we’re not that rich that we’re actually shopping for houses there, but we like to see how the upper crust lives. Here’s a few shots we took at one of those open houses. She has also been a good houseguest and has helped me with some projects in the past week. One was we setup a new makeup station for the models and set up a lounge area as well. She also helped me put my new gazebo together out on the deck as I get ready for the Summer.
Bee is quite a unique person. One thing we have in common is that we both enjoy the fetish world. I ran into her at this month’s Fetish Nation. I took a couple of pics of her and of one of the shows that featured my dominatrix pals Goddess Soma and Mistress Melissa. By the way, Bee will make her Bob’s Tgirls debut very soon.
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- Bee and Me
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- Bee Armitage at Fetish Nation
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- Goddess Soma at Fetish Nation
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- The feature show at the April 2010 Fetish Nation
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- Mistress Melissa prepares the “bride”
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- Goddess Soma puts the final touches on the “bride”
It seems that the lengthy discussion I had with Apple customer support had a positive affect. The motherboard that would not be available for 2 – 4 weeks suddenly materialized. So, now I’m up and running. The lesson here is that when a company you do business with gives you an unacceptable answer to a problem, argue your point and elevate the issue as much as you can until you get the desired result. You may not always get that result, but it doesn’t hurt to try. If I had just taken what the first person I spoke to gave me, I’d probably still be without my computer.
Those who know me have heard me sing the praises of Apple both for their products and for the type of company they are. Today is not one of those days. I use a MacBook Pro laptop computer to run my business. Apple products are not cheap. But I’ve always been willing to pay more for better quality and better customer support. My macbook is only two years old, so I would not expect a total failure so soon.
On Thursday evening it died – before I could get any site updates set up for Friday or beyond. I brought it to my local Apple store the next day. The guy informed me that the logic board (motherboard) was bad and that they would have to send it in for repair. It would take 5 – 7 days to get it back. I told him that’s too long, that I have a business to run. He suggested I take it to an Apple authorized repair shop. The tech there confirmed the bad logic board. He said a new part would normally arrive overnight (Monday since it was Friday already.) When he put it on order, the status from Apple was that it was out of stock. I contacted Apple and after being on the phone for an hour was informed that it could take up to four weeks and that there was nothing they could do, but try to get it in two weeks.
That is just wrong. People like me make our living with our computers and can’t be without them for weeks. I don’t think my members would be too happy if they saw no updates for two weeks or more. I bet I’d lose a bunch of you too. I could understand if my laptop was several years old. But it is barely 2 years old and still under warranty (that I paid extra for.) I’m wondering if I’d get this kind of lackluster support from Dell or Toshiba.
Fortunately, I decided to remove my hard drive before leaving the repair shop. I now have it hooked up to my PC, which is able to access files on it thanks to a product called MacDrive8 from Mediafour corporation. So I can at least keep the site updated for my members although I can’t edit video at this time. If I had let the Apple store take my computer and ship it away (hard drive and all) and then keep it for weeks, I’d be out of business before I got it back. The fact that a $3000 computer barely lasted two years is bad enough, but the way Apple handles such a situation is not acceptable.
Apple is a very innovative company and puts out some great products but their concept of customer support leaves much to be desired. Apple just had the most profitable quarter in its entire history, yet they can’t have parts in stock to support their customers. Thanks for nothing Apple.
I had a great time this week and here’s a few photos featuring: Lani & Bob’s Tgirls shemale models Sasha and Morgan Bailey. Thanks Scott for the photos.
