Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,
My wife Kate spent about an hour this weekend comparison shoe-shopping online. In my family we have runners, hikers, pronators, supinators, and, no offense to us, shoe losers. In fact, once we bought an expensive pair of Keen sandals for Jukie, and then walked over to our favorite eatery / Irish Pub for dinner. After eating, Jukie absented himself from dinner by lying back on the padded seat along our favorite booth and then, without our knowing it, dropped to the ground to retrieve his shoes.
When we were leaving, we couldn’t locate Jukie’s second shoe, and quickly realized that he had somehow secreted the shoe inside the bench. The de Vere’s manager (Josey) and a few servers tried in vain to extricate the brand new hiking sandal, but to no avail. It is still there today, and probably will be for decades. Although many restaurants have come and gone from 217 E Street since I moved to Davis in 1990, I expect de Vere’s Irish Pub to have a long tenure in that location.
Yesterday morning Kate opted to buy Jukie’s new pair of boots locally. When one of our favorite local stores, Outdoor Davis, didn’t have anything that would fit our boy’s high arches, Kate ventured over to Big 5 Sporting Goods, one of the local chain stores that sends a multi-page full-color insert to every Sunday subscriber of the Davis Enterprise. There she found Jukie a pair of boots and six pairs of socks. Jukie’s in-store antics must have distracted her while she was signing for the purchase, for she didn’t notice that Big 5 had charged her twice for the boots.
When I called yesterday evening to point out the overcharge, and ask that the store refund us the money for the second pair of boots, I was told by Steve the manager that they would refund the money only if their inventory reflected that they had sold us one pair of boots instead of two, and that we would have to come in today for our refund. How did Steve feel about over-charging us? How did he feel about our having to drive back to Big 5 during Thanksgiving vacation? We don’t know, for we heard no apology for the overcharge. We will see if Kate is treated with that same assumption of guilt when she returns to Big 5 today.
During our extended phone conversation, I didn’t tell Steve the manager that I consult with companies on customer service and media relations. I guess he didn’t know that he was speaking to a member of the media. But I do know that anyone working with the public should know that we are all members of the micro-media, and that anyone with a blog, or a Facebook or Twitter account, can tell a story. Excellent customer service makes it much more likely that the customer will share the narrative that a business owner would like to hear.
I guess my family and I keep returning to de Vere’s Irish Pub not only because of the friends we have made here, and because of the tasty food and cocktails, but because of the consistently excellent customer service that we’ve enjoyed at our favorite Davis restaurant. If you feel the same way, feel free to share your story. If you share it with me, you may find yourself quoted in next week’s post-Thanksgiving edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter. Until then, Jukie and I will give thanks for our comfortable shoes.
Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on superheroes, the telecom industry, splitting checks, poets laureate, avoiding interceptions, rising fees, Jackie Kennedy, basketball, that which thrashes, heroes born in Pennsylvania, fishmongers, gowns, understanding billions, the song of a city, widespread genera, Longfellow, mantles, Scottish dangers, app addicts, Elizabeth Bishop, nosy oxen greens, impending glaciers, Pinocchio, sexy blonds, Gwendolyn Brooks, pumpkins, axes, Irish beauties, Asian-American women, favorite colors, crusts, Robert Frost, white flowers, Aggies, and Shakespeare. Have you read Hamlet recently? I try to reread it or re-view on stage or screen it at least a few times a decade.
The schoolchildren of Davis seem to have the rest of this week off from school, so I’m sure that tonight’s Pub Quiz will be overrun with teachers. For them, I have included a mathematics questions that perhaps any of us could solve if we had enough time. Because of the time factor, I moved that question from the second half of the Quiz, to the first. I wonder who will come in first tonight? Come by to find out, and bring some friends!
Your Quizmaster
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Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:
- Mottos and Slogans. What company whose name starts with S has used this slogan since 2005? “Ingredients for Life.” Hint: An earlier slogan was “Everything You Want from a Store and a Little Bit More.”
- Internet Culture. On November 10th of this year, President Obama recommended the FCC reclassify broadband Internet service as a telecommunications service in order to preserve WHAT? I am looking for a two-word phrase.
- Newspaper Headlines. Recently Governor Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency because of the “possibility of expanded unrest.” For what state is Nixon the Governor?
- Know your US States. What is the exact number of states in which the letters NEW appear in any order, consecutively or not, in the states’ names?
- Pop Culture – Music. “Hey, Soul Sister” was the top-selling song on iTunes Store in 2010, and the second overall best-selling song in the US in 2010. Tell me the monosyllabic name of the American rock band responsible for “Hey, Soul Sister.”
P.S. Happy Thanksgiving to you and your families.