Primerica Sucks

In 2000 I setup IRAs for the two children that I had at the time (I still have those two, and an additional three lol). I put token amounts in for them, the minimum possible to open an account. I use a Primerica agent, and never setup regular contributions.

My financial situation has changed a lot since then, and I'm trying to get everything accounted for in Quicken. With the financial upheaval, I'm making sure I have my ducks all in a row.

So today I go to the http://www.shareholder.primerica.com website to manage the account. But it's been eight years, so I need to call their customer service to establish login credentials. 1-800-544-5445. They pick up the phone fast enough; so far so good.

But the CSR quickly determines that she cannot help me, as my name is not on the account. Huh? The account is in the name of my eleven year old. Nice. He's off school today, so I interrupt his Mario Karts and get him on the phone. He correctly identifies himself. He states his date of birth. He gives our previous address, which is the one Primerica still has on record. He correctly gives our old phone number, and gives the phone back to me.

So I ask the CRS "can you help me now? Am I authorized to manage the account?" She explains no, since he is not the only name on the account. "So you want me to get my nine year old daughter and have her go through the same process?" The CSR says as long as she can get through the whole identification process without being prompted by me. Because she could hear me in the background helping my son. She wants me to call the agent who I setup the account with eight years ago. Whom I haven't spoken to since.

There has got to be a better way.

My sister got hosed by MS Antivirus

[Wow, I haven't blogged for awhile. Been enjoying retirement, I guess. This pic is now way out of date. My hair got much longer and is now way shorter than my blogger headshot :P.]

First, kind reader, be fully confident: Microsoft does *not* make an antivirus product. There is a malware program going around that calls itself MS Antivirus. I know, because I just installed it for my sister.

Her laptop was hosed, she told me. I thought she meant that the hard drive was shot, but then she continued and described all the problems her computer was having, and it was obviously infected with spyware.

So I took her laptop home, did a low level reformat, and installed Windows XP. Got all the patches loaded on, and of course gave her Firefox.

She sent me info on some antivirus software she had just purchased, including the activation code, and wanted me to make sure I loaded that on since it was bought and paid for. I'm a good brother, so I did.

D'Oh!

Spybot Search and Destroy cleaned the resulting mess up, except for MS Antivirus itself. To kill that, I Ctrl+Alt+Deleted and killed the program, then deleted the install directory.

So, a couple tips:
- Whenever I want to fix someones computer, I always download the utilities I need from download.com. Don't do a Google Search for the stuff you need, since any ads may be compromised. I don't know who the hell makes Spybot Search and Destroy but for years I've gone to download.com to get it; it's always one of the most popular downloads.
- An the new corollary I will pass on to my sister: If you suspect your computer is infected with spyware, don't click on any of the pop-ups said spyware produces looking for a cure.

Props to PC Mag for info on MS Antivirus.

And finally, here are the emails my sister got, in an effort to let any other victims know that they've been had.

From: eSafeBill Transaction 
Date: Wed, Aug 27, 2008 at 5:29 PM
Subject: Your MS Antivirus License purchase
To: my sister


Thank you for making a purchase with eSafeBill!

Transaction information:
Amount: 77.9 USD Including SCHD Bundle chosen
Activation Code: 873465112334272
Transaction ID: 
Order Number: 
Item: MS Antivirus License + System Cleaner and Hardware Doctor Bundle
You have chosen to purchase your software along with System Cleaner and Hardware Doctor bundle offer. Please download the installer for the additional software: http://222.73.37.203/i.php?tks=1
Quantity: 1
Date: 08/27/2008 12:21:40
Download source: http://222.73.37.203/i.php?l=msantivirusxp&c=c

This purchase will appear in your credit card statement as "Spyware-shop4..com".
Total amount of 77.9 USD will be charged to your credit card.
If you are not completely satisfied with this purchase, please do not hesitate
to contact us using SUPPORT REQUEST APPLICATION at http://222.73.37.203/i.php?l=secure.esafebill&c=c
Please do not dispute this charge as doing so may affect your credit rating.

===
ACTIVATION

Please download the software from the following link if you
do not have it already installed.
Download source: http://222.73.37.203/i.php?l=msantivirusxp&c=c

Please activate the program by entering the following
code when prompted.

Make sure you enter your activation code correctly.
Just copy it and paste into the activation code box with no changes.
The code consists of 15 characters.
Your code is: 873465112334272

The product is activated now.
In case of any difficulties,
please do not hesitate to contact us.

===
REFUND POLICY

If you are not completely satisfied with this purchase, please do not hesitate


to contact us using SUPPORT REQUEST APPLICATION at http://222.73.37.203/i.php?l=secure.esafebill&c=c
Please do not dispute this charge as doing so may affect your credit rating.

===
THIS IS AN AUTOMATED MESSAGE. PLEASE DO NOT REPLY.

Ok, lets note that dead giveaway too: if it says "Don't contact your credit card company to dispute the charge, it will affect your credit rating" then please call Visa or Mastercard right now and do just that. Their operators are standing by. :)

iTunes: why my wife must get Vista instead of Ubuntu on her new laptop

Being a geek, I buy gadgets. For Valentine's day, I bought my wife an iPod. Yeah, yeah, dinner too etc.

For our imminent anniversary, I'll be getting her a laptop. She wants mobility just around the house, and her desktop will be taken over by the kids.

I've been eyeing OLPC's offering, thinking that's what I could get for our 10 year old too and benefit from the networking things that device does so nicely. But since they are not offering the "Buy One, Give One" anymore, that options is gone.

I was thinking about the ASUS EEE PC too, since it's received good reviews and its ultra small. Her fingers are smaller than mine.

But the deal breaker is iTunes. She *must* have iTunes -- it's the thing she's really wanted. Not because it's the best, or cheapest. But it's what she knows, what her friends use, it's easy. Any laptop that doesn't support iTunes will disappoint her. And, fact is, she doesn't need a laptop, the pleasure she will get from having one and using it with her new iPod is the whole point. Everything. Not a "kinda cool, with concessions cause my husband is a geek, and thats really cool, but it comes with caveats*" outcome, I'm looking for here.

Yeah, I know, geek-readers, yo've been using your iPod on Debian or whatever for 2 years without a hitch, or your alternate-MP3-player-that-stores-2x-more-and-cost-.5-less on CentOS, but please see above. It's my wife, dude.

So, unless Apple comes out with an iTunes client for Ubuntu in the next couple days, I'll be paying Microsoft for an OS I'd rather do without. Yuck.

Huppahs.com launched

My sister Maria and I launched her web site this week (on her birthday, in fact). It's very basic php and for now the only method of payment is thru PayPal -- kudos to Maria for that idea and for coding hooks for their cart.

The final version will be fully LAMP. My friend/employee Jeremy Price is hosting for us on his Linux box. Apache (duh), pHp 5 and mySQL on its way, after we get the credit card processor account set up.

So check out Huppahs.com, even if you not currently planning a Jewish wedding.

Trip to Colorado turns into Trip to Lake George, Part 2

Having just email blasted a link to Part 1, I realize I haven't gotten around to writing Part 2, about how Lake George turned out to be our best vacation ever.

I'm too tired at the moment to write about Lake George. Hosting a barbecue this rainy day has wiped me out. A picture is worth 10k words? Here's 40k or so: ttp://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=ycksfne.1c73twdy&x=1&y=-38ysc3

Trip to Colorado turns into Trip to Lake George, Part 1

My family (a wife and five kids, you know) planned to be in Colorado this past weekend, for an informal memorial service for Mandy's grandmother who passed away last year. Mandy's dad organized the service, including arranging and paying for our flights. He'd be traveling with us. We'd be met in Denver by other extended family traveling from various parts of the country.

We agreed to meet at Stewart Airport, minutes from our house, between 5 AM and 5:15 for a 6 AM flight.

We arrive together. I drop off Mandy, the kids, and a pile of luggage at the curb, then find my way to Overflow Parking and back. I've flown out of Stewart a dozen times and never known Overflow even existed; its just not that busy of an airport. But a bus is waiting for me right behind my car, the driver reminds me to turn off my headlights, and speeds me back to the terminal.

Ever travel with five kids? I get the diaper backpack on Rose, age four, the toy backpack on Seth, six, the laptop and gadgets backpack on Meg, eight, and the snack backpack on Rourke, 9.9. Extend luggage handles, Meg pulls the small, Rourke the medium, I throw two toddler car seats over my shoulder by their straps and clasp large luggage. Mandy sees the plan and picks up what's left: Shane, 2.

John is waiting in line to check us all in by the time my pack and I get in. He's brought in two booster seats from our pile. Cool.

The line is huge, for Stewart: maybe thirty people at the airTran check in, and John says that they had just opened up a 2nd line and he had jumped into it, so was only four people deep.

There are four "self check-in kiosks" but I hear the attendant explain that people need to go one at a time because even though it is "self check-in" they still need to go through her. The wait is about fifteen minutes; one of the attendants called out while we were next in line: "Is the Bywater party here?" "Yes!" I called back. "Is the McLaughlin party here?" next. "Yes!" again; Mandy's maiden name. Cool, they know we're here. I'm feeling better.

So we finally get to the counter, and an attendant starts to check us in. It's now 5:30. At first she says that the flight was just closed but she can claim she was already checking us in and re-open it. But there is a problem, she doesn't have tickets for all of us. She reads off the names that she has tickets for, but doesn't have Rose or Rourke listed, and only has one Margaret (missing either Mandy or Meg, that is). I hand her back the ticket that she had just given us with Rose's name. My guess, in hindsight, is that they are in the process of giving our seats away upstairs at the gate as we are trying to get checked in downstairs.

She calls over a supervisor for assistance, and is truly trying to help us. She tells us that she is not going to be able to get us on, and even if she is they are going to close the doors ten minutes before the flight, and we still need to get through security. I ask if it's worth trying to get the kids rushed through security, the supervisor nods, so I bolt that way.

Mandy has already had the kids in line, and made it to the first security guard, who doesn't let our gang through because we don't have boarding passes. I explain that they are being printed, our flight is about to go, and the attendant had recommended I get moving through security since we have five kids in tow. The security guard bluntly states that we can't get past her without boarding passes. Grrrr. I bolt back to the check in.

Things there are over. No way we can get on the flight with eight of us, as it has been "way oversold, and closed." No way is there anyway to get us there before Saturday. Not with eight people. Ouch. John decides to bag the trip.

Regroup. Meg is crying because we aren't going on an airplane. Mandy and I put our heads together and decide to bring the brood to Perkins for breakfast while we figure out a new plan. On the way, Mandy calls Rocking Horse Ranch to see if they have rooms, but their Reservation Desk doesn't open until nine.

Ok, Lake George then.