Music on Hold - Or While You Wait for Me to Post Advice for Writers...

I'm trying to get the next book finished, so not much posting going on, I know. But for those of you who are looking for writing advice and publishing advice, let me give you a couple of links to sites that are worth your while. Read them. Twice.

First and foremost: SWFA's Writer Beware. My friend Lee Goldberg spearheaded a successful effort to get additional support for this site from MWA — and MWA deserves praise for pitching in -- one of its many efforts on behalf of writers.

I strongly encourage you to spend a lot of time on that site.

Then, take a look at Pub Rants (short for Publishing Rants.) Agent Kristin Nelson kindly takes the time to instruct newcomers (and experienced writers as well) on this blog, which will give you her views on the business of publishing and help you to understand the work of agents and how they can help you -- and how you can best approach them. Start with the Agenting 101 blogs!

More later. I have to get back to work....

Back from Mayhem...and about Facebook

Just back from a wonderful time at Mayhem in the Midlands. It is one of the best organized fan conventions in the U.S., and always held at a size that allows people to actually spend time together -- as opposed to the usual feeling one gets of having waved to all of one's acquaintances while crossing Grand Central during a marathon.

This year Dana Stabenow was the Guest of Honor and Zoe Sharp was the Caroline Willner International Guest of Honor. Dana and I have been good friends for some years now, and she asked that I serve as the "Toastmaster" this time, which means I interviewed her at the convention on Sunday. At some point, that interview will be available online. I really enjoyed getting to know Zoe, and look forward to reading her work. The first books in her series have been picked up for reissue by Busted Flush Press, so watch for announcements from the BFP Website next year.

Ann asked about Facebook. Here's a badge that I think will get you through to my page there:




I'll try to put that in the sidebar of the blog. Wish me luck! First I have to deal with an unruly dry cleaner. Seriously. More on that soon.

Sculpture on a Monday

I'm back home until Left Coast Crime, and have lots of stuff to talk about from the American Academy of Forensic Science meetings, more about The Messenger, and other topics. But before launching into any of that, I thought, why not take a moment for beauty?

Many thanks to my friend Donald Grant, who told me about Kristen Hoard's sculptures and other works of art. You can see her work by clicking here. ( http://www.metalphoria.com )

Above: "Small Fire Tree" by Kristen Hoard

Invading other blogs

I'm back home now, and have a few minutes to come up for air and thank all of you who showed up at events where I was signing. That's the part of touring that I love most -- meeting readers! If you missed seeing me at the stores listed in recent posts, many will still have signed books available. And if you don't live near those stores, all of the ones listed on the sidebar to the right will ship signed books while supplies last. Also, I do have other events on my schedule, and you can click here for more information about them.

I've been traveling a bit on the Internet, too -- a couple of friends invited me to guest blog.

Recently, Elaine Viets allowed me to vent about devising the pitch for a new book on The Lipstick Chronicles.

Rhys Bowen interviewed me on Jungle Red Writers.


They're both fun blogs, so take a look around while you're there!

Thankfulness

In the U.S., we've just celebrated our Thanksgiving holiday. I have so much to be thankful for, and this holiday, which gives a chance to reflect on that, is one of my favorites.

As always, I thank my fans for their loyal support, and hope your own holiday has been fabulous.

And on the lighter side, here's something to make you smile!

About ten posts worth of random notes

Many thanks to Maryelizabeth Hart of Mysterious Galaxy for letting me know about this gem.

~~~

My sister, Sandy Cvar, will be teaching "Introduction to Linocut" at the International Printing Museum on Saturday, September 13, 9:30-4:00. This will be an easy way to learn how to carve linoleum to make a print. You don't need to be an artist to have fun with this method of printmaking!

We loved our recent visit to the museum. Even if you don't want to try working with linocut, if you're in the South Bay area, stop by and visit them.

~~~

We just subscribed to HBO. Why? True Blood, which is based on Charlaine Harris's fabulous Sookie Stackhouse series. We are also looking forward to the next David Simon project.

~~~

Last few days have been hectic. Having finished proofreading The Messenger, I sent it back to my editor. Sandy has finished some graphics for the update of the Web site, and Madeira James is at work on the new look.

I made a trip to see my folks, was a party to -- won't bore you with the long story -- destroying the firmware on my dad's iPhone. (Yes, in their 80s, my parents are using iPhones and texting, using Maps, checking stock quotes, downloading apps for games and all sorts of other cool stuff. And yes, at that age, I hope I'm willing to take space shuttle trips or use whatever cool tech is available then.) So I took the phone into the Apple store in Costa Mesa, and with the kind and efficient help of Genius Bar genius Johnny, got it up and running again. So two trips out of town, but I got to see the parents a little more often that way, which is always a good thing.

~~~

One of these days I'm going to have to post something about the Skeptical Inquirer. Which may sound like a strange thing to say, since I've just written a supernatural thriller. But there you have it. I don't really believe there's a city in Southern California named Las Piernas either. Sorry if I just made anyone cry. But I also saved you gas money by preventing you from driving around looking for it.

Anyway, great article in the Nov/Dec 2007 issue (yes, I'm behind on almost everything) by Denis Hamel. It's about a quotation floating around the Internet and elsewhere, lauding astrology and falsely attributed to Einstein. You might say that you don't have to be Einstein to suspect that he probably didn't believe in astrology, but the hoax persists. Hamel's article not only shows that Einstein didn't author this "quote," but shows that even given proof that it's a hoax, some folks refuse to remove it from their sites. I'm not the first person to tell you not to believe everything you read online, right?

~~~

I'm going to do a little work for the Crime Lab Project and then get back to work on the new book. Follow me on Twitter if you want details from here.

Have a good one! And thanks, Vgan -- I'm also glad the world did not implode when they fired up the black hole machine today. Not that I was really worried.

Nature's dust mop rides again

The contest is on.  

If you go to this site (aka http://ping.fm/p/AFvQH ),

you'll see one of my dogs, Britches, wearing an attractive yellow leaf.

Britches is one of nature's dust mops.  He goes outside, and a little bit of outside comes back in with him.  If you have a dog or a cat that provides a moving sampler of nature on four paws, link to a photo from the comments section.  If you need an easy way to this, consider opening a ping.fm account.  (As previously noted, I love ping.fm -- makes it easier for me to blog, keep up with Facebook and Twitter, etc.)

No prizes.  Just my complete sympathy.

Making prints

Not fingerprints, this time, but artwork.   

As some of you know, my sister is printmaker Sandra Cvar, who will be giving printmaking demonstrations at the International Printing Museum on Saturday, September 6th*, between 10 AM and 1 PM.  It's Family Printmaking Day, and Sandy will be demonstrating everything from potato prints to linocuts.  I plan on being there, and I hope you'll join in the fun if you're in the area.

The museum includes a collection of antique printing machinery.  Admission to the museum is $8 for adults and $7 children/students.  Pay at the door, but RSVP to Rachelle Chuang at 

bookarts --at-- printmuseum.org.  (Convert that into an email address.)

The International Printing Museum/Book Arts Institute

315 Torrance Blvd

Carson CA  90745

310-515-7166

*Not, as previously bumbled, 9/9.  Sorry about that.

All well and good until it rains

My sister Sandra, who is an artist, spotted this cool blog post about an artist who doesn't just scrawl "wash me" on dirty car windows.

http://tinyurl.com/4fhvmj

And if you want to see some of Sandra Cvar's work, click here:

http://www.sandycvar.com/gallery/index.htm

Go crows!

A story from Reuters about my favorite birds, defending their homes. And wreaking a little havoc at the same time.

Happy Birthday, Peter O'Donnell!

Today, April 11, is the 88th birthday of my greatly admired friend, Peter O'Donnell. He created Modesty Blaise and also wrote wonderful gothic adventure novels under the pen name Madeline Brent. To learn more about him, visit Modesty Blaise, Ltd.

Confession

Sometimes, I actively seek out the ridiculous. In this particular case, I have it e-mailed to me every day:

Tarzan Classics -- one of the many denizens of the funny papers available through Comics.com

Tarzan became a comic strip in 1929, about 17 years after Edgar Rice Burroughs's short story, "Tarzan of the Apes," was published. I think the current story running on Comics.com is from the 1950s. I could easily do without Tarzan killing so many animals (happens just about every week in the old strips, but I don't think the present-day storylines are quite the same) and I do hope to heaven that no one tries to learn what Africa or its people are all about by reading the strip, but I admit that I smile to myself whenever my e-mail inbox shows that one of the strips has arrived. Why? Because they are just so ridiculous!

I got hooked on them when I decided that as hilarious as Dilbert is, I needed a little less realism. So I went browsing around on the site, and saw Tarzan, which seemed to fit the bill.

Soon, I opened an email containing a Tarzan strip in which the Ape-Man and his compatriots are carried underwater, unconscious, to a great depth by sea people who live in an underwater kingdom. Everyone is alive after this journey.

That's when I knew I had to see Tarzan every single day.

In the most recent episode, Tarzan has acquired a young boy as a companion (a story which is, in itself, rife with implausibilities) and they have climbed a sheer cliff and come across — as one does — dinosaurs that are eating "blind bats" as if they were flying popcorn. Tarzan and his companion are escaping by feeding large chunks of black granite to the dinosaurs in the hope that this will give them fatal indigestion.

A few days ago, Tarzan said of the giant prehistoric lizards, "This sight would certainly be difficult to prove to the world below."

Amen, Tarzan — King of the Apes and the Understatement.
They'd think you were crazy. But that's why I read you!

That Time of Year

I have taken an informal survey among friends, and found that many of us are having moody -- if not down right cranky -- days during this run up to the holidays. So if you're feeling a little blue or irritable, your misery has plenty of company to love.

I've at least temporarily taken care of my own moodiness by going to beautiful Kaua'i. Tim and I went to celebrate the wedding of our friends Toni and Billy, who are also Tim's bandmates in Down Tight. We had a great time there and enjoyed the company and kindness of new and old friends.

You may not be able to fit a trip to Kaua'i into your plans, so I'll offer a reminder that another Christmas season tradition is available to make you laugh: the Chicago Tribune's annual "Scared of Santa" photo collection. Enjoy!

Slowly but surely

I'm way, way, behind on all kinds of things. Posting here, for one.

But I'm trying to catch up, and slowly but surely I'm making progress.

For the moment, I want to respond to some comments left here, and decided it would be easiest to do that in one post rather than hope that people see my reply back in the archives of the blog.

So with apologies for the delay, I want to reply

to Mike, who is now already down in San Diego (and I hope you are enjoying that lovely city!), I can only hope you've already gone to Thornton's Irish Pub in nearby El Cajon and discovered that they have lots of parking, great entertainment, and wonderful food.

to Joyce, I can think of few ways to better waste time than 30 minutes of icanhascheezburger.com -- laughter is the best medicine, as they say.

to Louise, yes -- if you had told me a few years ago that I would be a big fan of an alligator, I don't think I'd have believed you. There you have it.

to Sharon, with thanks for asking, yes, Bloodlines is the next Irene Kelly book. Kidnapped after that. You can see the list of books in order on my Web site. The books with numbers as titles (Nine and Eighteen) are the only two not related to the series, although Eighteen (in some booksellers computers as 18) has two Irene short stories in it.

to Bill, thank you! I'm so glad you liked Kidnapped! I appreciate your taking the time to let me know -- hearing kind words from readers helps me through the days when I think my keyboard could be put to better use.

to Elizabeth, thank you. No need to feel guilt over the pleasure, though! ;-)
I can't really help people individually with their manuscripts or research problems -- I'm writing my own books, running the Crime Lab Project and the Crime Lab Project Foundation, and busy in other ways as well. You didn't tell me the nature of your questions, but if they are about writing a mystery, start with the MWA Handbook, Writing Mysteries.
If you can attend Sisters in Crime's Forensic University of St. Louis, go! It's a great opportunity. I'll be there, and that would be a great place to catch me to ask specific questions. I'll also be at the Surrey International Writers Conference. That's another good place to ask questions.
If you can't go to those events, and your questions are about police procedure, get Lee Lofland's new book. Questions about forensic science, read Doug Lyle's Forensics for Dummies and his new book, Forensics and Fiction. He also has a good course available on DVD. Hope this helps -- best of luck!


Photo of tortoise above used courtesy of bigal101 (Allan Lee), through morguefile.com

Still on the face of the Earth

although it may seem as if I've dropped off. This has been one wild month. And I'm still trying to finish writing a book....

So, you may not see much of me here for another week or two, but I'll be back, as the governor of this state once said in a movie.

In the meantime, if you want something extremely silly to look at (especially if you are a cat-lover), cheer yourself up here.

Getting back in gear

Thanks for your patience! I'm back home from a family reunion, the last day of the class was yesterday, and while there are any number of irons still in the fire, I'm probably going to be able to post here more often now.

A friend of mine sent a link to Ursula K. LeGuin's commentary, "On Serious Literature," which I am adding to a long list of reasons to cherish LeGuin.

Spring break may be over...

but I'll bet some of you still have these creatures in your house. And apparently, they're nearly as indestructible as these.

Still, I think this is carrying things too far.

And while we're at it, do you suppose they could supply ammo for this? Probably not. But if any of you are aunts and uncles who supply the nephews and nieces with toys that make their parents say, "You shouldn't have!" in a meaningful way, you may want to consider this gift item.

(My niece Timbrely, who still gets weird presents from me, provided a couple of these links. Not the one that caused you to say "Eeeew!")


Photo above courtesy of rosevita, from morguefile.com.

My least favorite day of the year approaches

It's a sin to go to bed on the same day you get up.
~Jimmy Walker, Mayor of New York City in the 1920s

Although I've long known the quotation in a slightly different form, I've finally found out who said it. By 1920, Daylight Saving Time had only been around for a couple of years, and I wouldn't be surprised if it led to Mr. Walker's proclamation.

If you think it's a bit much to label the "early to bed" behavior a sin, I can only tell you that you must try walking around in the night owls' shoes to realize how amusing it is to see the tables turned.

Night owls are constantly labeled as lazy, just because they don't adhere to the "larks'" schedule. Most night owls try not to disturb the larks' sleep, while forced to try to sleep through the larks' extreme daytime noisiness. Over the years I've heard my lifelong circadian rhythms labeled a "sleep disorder," been told that only people who are up to no good are up at night, had larks who spend far more hours lying about than I do tell me that I'm a slug-a-bed if I don't want to answer the phone at nine in the morning. We night owls are often forced to live with the larks' business hours, or were until the Internet freed a lot of us with its 24/7 convenience.

Some of you who have been in Sisters in Crime for a long time may remember my "Night Owl Manifesto." As I said then, I loathe "spring forward" and love "fall back." So you can imagine how unhappy I am that this year, Daylight Saving Time arrives here in the U.S. a month earlier than usual, on March 11 at 2 AM. Since I'll probably be up when it suddenly becomes 3 AM, it may not be as disorienting for me as for some. But there goes an hour of the lovely night.

I found an interesting discussion and history of Daylight Saving Time on the "Web Exhibits" site. Made me realize how much we take standardized time itself for granted. For many years, the time was whatever the locals agreed it was. (Makes one wonder about those time machines in futuristic fiction that can take a person back to "4:15:01 PM on January 10, 1608." I'll save the calendar discussion for another day.) As the site mentions, "Britain was the the first country to set the time throughout a region to one standard time," and most of the country was on GMT by 1855, although the law establishing it throughout the country didn't pass until 1880.

This desire to standardize time was in response to the demands of the railroads, who also exerted pressure in the U.S., although the first person to try to make a push for it in the U.S. was an amateur astronomer and correspondent of Thomas Jefferson, William Lambert, who brought the idea before Congress in 1809. (I suspect many amateur astromers are night owls, too.) According to the Web Exhibits site:

Standard time in time zones was instituted in the U.S. and Canada by the railroads on November 18, 1883. Prior to that, time of day was a local matter, and most cities and towns used some form of local solar time, maintained by a well-known clock (on a church steeple, for example, or in a jeweler's window). The new standard time system was not immediately embraced by all, however.

Apparently, Daylight Saving Time was an idea of Ben Franklin's that took a couple of centuries to take root. Too soon for my tastes.

All of this probably falls under the category of "more than you really wanted to know," and if so, just take this as a reminder for those of you in the U.S. to set your clocks forward and check the batteries in your smoke detectors this weekend.

For my fellow night owls, let's just keep to ourselves all the finer aspects of the long, quiet hours of the night and of greeting dawn at the end of one's day.

Maybe old Ben meant something entirely different by "early to bed."


The lovely photo of the owl, above, is used courtesy of Bob Wragg, who kindly made it available on Morguefile.com.

Another fun addiction

A friend sent me a link to this site, which will tell you how popular your name or your friends' names were in the U.S. during the last 100 years, provided the name was in the top 1000 names during a given decade. The stats are derived from Social Security records.

My fascination with the CMOS Q&A

I've asked myself why I like reading the Chicago Manual of Style's Q&A page so much. The answer isn't that I'm fastidious in matters grammatical. (To phrase it awkwardly.) I never get a manuscript back from a copy editor without realizing that I have caused that person to do a lot of work.

As with my heavily marked-up manuscripts, I do always learn something when a new Q&A is posted on the CMOS's Web site. But that's not the attraction.

Alas, I must admit that what I really enjoy is reading the entries where the "Q" is posted by someone who is high dudgeon over the perceived misuse of some phrase, term, or punctuation mark by his or her colleagues, and in the "A" the questioner is told -- in the politest way, of course -- that he or she is trying to force others to adhere to a rule that doesn't exist.

Kind of a double-reverse schadenfreude on my part, I admit, but there you have it.

Another Fun Discovery - Thanks to Timbrely!

Okay, I am going to have to spend lots more time on this site and looking at the T-shirts, but I think I'm already in love with Jessica Hagy's Indexed. Today's "We're All Going to Hell" is just one example of her fascinating ability to say it all on an index card with one graphic.

Take a look at "Sometimes Average is Good."

Or, "There Must Be A Catch."

And if you read the Irene Kelly short story "Call It Macaroni," then you can understand why I like "Nourishing."

Timbrely, thanks again!

Finders Keepers

The easiest way for me to lose a bunch of stuff all at once is to clean the house for company. So I'm still looking for objects lost in December.

But my husband has made sure that I no longer lose my keys or my purse somewhere within my own home. Hunting them down has, on occasion, taken a great deal of time. But now, for all those people who set down groceries, bring the dogs back inside, answer the phone while putting away frozen foods, have to look up something on e-mail for the person on the phone, and then can't the keys a day later....there's this marvy gizmo!

And oh yes, I've used it already!

Walking the walk

Yes, still working....but while I write and try to get materials ready for LCC and all kinds of things you probably don't want to be bothered reading about, check out this cool site from Google Maps -- an online pedometer.

What you can do with this is chart out a route for a walk or a run and be able to see the distance of each leg of your travel.

Tim let me know about this one. I believe his secret plan worked -- I see we'll need to go back to one of the longer routes for our walks.

Photo above courtesy of bamagirl, from morguefile.com.

Yep, I'm on a weird news kick

(Dusty, that "Yep" is for you.)

Since Britches is 0-2 in his battle against striped wildlife, if we go up to Canada to help this poor skunk get back home, we'll probably leave Britches and Cappy on this side of the border.

I'm getting some writing done these days, so the story of Britches v Polecats will have to wait.

Jennifer Jordan Led Me Astray

from doing what I meant to be doing a few minutes ago with an entry on her blog.

So, of course, after I saw her results for the Accent Quiz on the GoToQuiz.com site, I had to take it, and ended up:

Your Result: The Midland

"You have a Midland accent" is just another way of saying "you don't have an accent." You probably are from the Midland (Pennsylvania, southern Ohio, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, and Missouri) but then for all we know you could be from Florida or Charleston or one of those big southern cities like Atlanta or Dallas. You have a good voice for TV and radio.

The actual accent is mongrel. I was born in Houston, Texas, to parents from Kansas. The first six-and-a-half years of my life were spent there. I retained the accent for quite a while after we moved to California. I was kidded about being "Tex" until about the fifth or sixth grade, and even now, people catch me saying all kinds of words in the Lone Star style. Then, after lots of influence from the West coast, I married this fellow from Buffalo, who teaches subjects including accent elimination, and has tried (without consistent success) to teach me the difference between "pin" and "pen."

All of this proves that I may be edging toward the 26% in this article, called to my attention by my sister Sandra, who should have been doing other things, too.

I'm not there yet, though. I did finish a chapter today. I may finish a second one before I call it a night.

Wish me luck -- I'm making my own by getting the hell off the Internet. If you heard me say that aloud, you'd tell me I should be on the radio...

Wonder if it's covered by homeowner's insurance?

Among the stories from the Associated Press today, revenge of the three pigs.

TP, where would we be without you?

If you've been reading this blog for more than a week you know that just about anything may capture my attention. Today I stumbled across an account of the history of toilet paper. Now, here's an immediate caveat: this is a report from 2001, so all the great strides that have been made in the TP world in the last five or six years are not included.

My favorite quote from the article by Buck Wolf comes from the star of a long-running series of Charmin ads:

Dick Wilson, the vaudeville veteran who portrayed Mr. Whipple on TV, later recalled his agent calling him about the project.

"My agent asked me, 'What do you think of toilet paper?' And I told him, 'I think everybody should use it.'"

Photo above, "TP Tree," courtesy of Click at morguefile.com. He says about it, "Each year, high school graduates target this well-loved elementary school teacher's yard for the ceremonial TP (toilet paper) attack."

Dustjacket art

Dust jacket art is worthy of a blog of its own, and probably, somewhere out there, someone has one up and running. Book collectors in the know learn to spot subtle differences in dust jackets that occur between editions. Some are true connoisseurs of the art itself, and shown covers of a certain era, can name the artists and illustrators of frontpieces and plates.
I love some of the dust jacket art from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Frank Krieger of Newport Vintage Books has an intriguing collection of images of dust jackets on his Web site, including these for Rafael Sabatini's novels. N.C. Wyeth (who was the father of Andrew and other famous Wyeth family artists) was among the artists who brought scenes from Sabatini's adventure tales to life.

You might have fun with these Nancy Drew dust jackets from the 1930s and 1940s, many by Russell H. Tandy.

And there is always this site, where you can see the work of Pogany and many others, and read their biographies.

For me, though, nothing beats a little time spent in the virtual art museum of Violet Books' Web site.

How do I feel about the covers on my own books? My books have been wrapped in cover art both delightful, and...umm, not so delightful. (I'm sure readers have their own nominees for the latter category.) I'm also always fascinated to see how the art changes in the editions published in other countries. I think if you look at the International editions pages on my site, you'll see some truly striking cover art, and some that will ... be nominees.

One of the challenges of crime fiction covers, I'm sure, is to come up with images that may be disquieting but which aren't repulsive. In recent years, I've been very pleased with the cover art on my books. I'm especially happy with the work Ray Lundgren has done on the U.S. editions. He's good at capturing some essential something from each of the books for which he's created covers. He manages to do that in a way that always makes me feel drawn to the book while still conveying an intriguing amount of suspense. I can only hope he's elicited the same reaction in my readers!

Update on Scary Santa: gee, thanks honey

Oh, now I see that this goes way beyond the current crop of traumatized children. Wives are sending in photos of their husbands, young boys screeching on Santa's knee back in the 1950s. Mothers are sending in photos of their (now) adult children.

Either these families have a cruel streak or a good sense of humor. Maybe both.

Scared of Santa?

The Chicago Tribune photo pages are always a fun place to browse, but the folks at the paper really outdo themselves when it comes to St. Nick. First, there is the "Scared of Santa" extravaganza, currently standing at over 140 entries. The faces of the Santas are almost as hilarious as those of the kids. And one can just imagine gleeful parents making their future teenagers squirm by reminding them that a paper with a huge circulation featured a photo of them howling in terror on Santa's lap.

Then, there's the slide show of the July convention of the Amalgamated Order of Real Bearded Santas. Which all goes to show, as the Internet proves on a 24/7 basis, there is something out there for everyone.


The photo of the Victorian (and rather shifty-eyed) Santa above isn't from the ChiTrib, though -- it's a photo by Xandert (aka Dawn Turner) who kindly made it available on morguefile.com.

Getting Human for the Holidays

You may be aware of this site already, but if not, consider this a gift for the holidays:

Have you ever called a big company, trying to do business by phone, only to
- have to press an endless number of codes?
- have to decide between preset menu choices that don't have anything to do with your reason for calling?
- never reach a human being?

If you are crazed by the difficulty in reaching a human being when you do business by phone with big companies, try going to Get Human (http://gethuman.com )before you make your next call. Paul English, the founder of Get Human, certainly struck a chord with other humans when he first started posting methods to bypass the computers on his blog. What he started has grown into an advocacy movement that has attracted millions of followers. The blog became a Web site with a good-sized database on it.

So, if you are in the U.S., and want to go directly to the database for Get Human, just click here.

That will take you to a list of many big companies, with instructions to help you quickly connect to a human being.


Photo above courtesy of Paul Middlewick, from morguefile.com.