This holiday season, buy your loved one something that shows you really care about her [or him].
In case anyone has trouble with PayPal, here’s a list of contact information for the company:
PayPal’s toll free number is (888) 221-1161
Another toll free number is (800) 836-1859
Yet another toll free number is (877)672-9725
Their NEW regular telephone number is: (650) 864-8000
Their regular phone number is: (650) 251-1100
Their fax number is: (650) 251-1101
Their mailing address is:
PayPal
P.O. Box 45950
Omaha, NE 68145
Their corporate offices are at:
1840 Embarcadero Rd.
Palo Alto, CA 94303
US
The Nebraska office is at:
Paypal
11128 John Galt Boulevard
Omaha, NE 68137
(402) 935-2000
(402) 935-7733
Luckily, I was able to give them only my credit card information, and did not give them any bank account info.
It’s hard to be an addict.
While on vacation a few weeks ago, I signed up for an AOL dialup account so that Laura and I could suckle from the Internet’s great digital teat. Since I no longer need the account, I decided to cancel it today. This should’ve been easy. Instead, it’s very similar to cancelling a membership to a nation-wide gym.
First, it is quite impossible to find any customer-service contact number via their external website, www.aol.com. I suppose they never planned on people having alternate connectivity. I actually had to ask someone who used AOL to locate the number for the Cancellation Hotline, which in turn was very well-hidden.
Second, AOL seems to hire ex-KGB interrogation experts to act as telephone reps for the Cancellation Hotline. Mine was ‘Mike’. I’m pretty sure ‘Mike’ is short for ‘Mikhail’.
Me: “I need to cancel this account.”
Mike: “Ok, I’ll need your name…”
I give him my name.
Mike: “May I call you Eric?”
Me: “Sure.”
Mike: “Ok, Eric, I’ll need to get some more information from you. What’s your current phone number? Your street address? Your date of birth? Your shoe-size? Date you lost your virginity? Vas it good? Do you ever have impure thoughts about your mother? Tell me. I have vays to make you talk.”
Me: “Just cancel the account, Mike.”
Mike: “Ok, why do you want to cancel the account?”
Me: “It didn’t meet my business needs.”
Mike: “What kind of business needs?”
Me: “I’d rather not say.”
Mike: “Of course you can tell me, comrade! We have to know how vee didn’t meet your needs, so vee can be gettink da betters!”
Me: “Ok, the main reason I’m cancelling AOL is that the cancellation process is extremely invasive and irritating!”
Mike: “Hmph! Capitalist pig! Your cancellation number is 0032671614. And don’t expect me to be helpink you when dey have you in de gulag, Yankee.”
One of my favorite [read: "only"] childhood Nintendo games was Capcom’s “Section Z“. Section Z was like the poor-man’s version of Metroid: guy in a space-suit killing things in order to kill a bigger ‘Brain’ thing.
The one important thing about this game was that it taught me how to non-linearly map things. I was used to pen-and-paper RPGs, so I was used to drawing areas that had rooms that lined up. After a few days of frustration trying to map Section Z, I realized that it didn’t matter where I put the rooms on my map. At the end of each room there were two teleporters. The key to mapping [and beating] the game was to note where the teleporters took your character. By the time I was done with the game, I had dispensed with graph paper, and just had a list of section names and where their ‘up’ or ‘down’ teleporters took me.
