Saturday, June 25, 2011

Get Into The West Canada

The West Canada Creek (ok it’s really a river) is good for the soul, a place to feel “at one” with the Life in which we “live, move and have our being”.
Our counsel? Get into the West Canada as often as you can. Whether fishing, kayaking or tubing, time spent in the West Canada always rewards openhandedly.
Hear the many songs it sings as it rounds its serpentine bends. Listen to the whisper of slow moving water gliding through deep pools, the chirping ripple of sparkling shallows, the rush and pound of strong rapids. Each has a musical voice lovely to the ear.
Open your senses to the West Canada’s caress. Move though a shady overhang of fragrant firs and tingle with delicious goosebumps. Then find yourself warmed by brilliant sunshine blanketing your skin like a hot towel after a cold shower. And dance with the swirl and roll of boisterous rapids where large boulders defy the waters.
Share the joy of each moment with those you came with and folks you meet along the way.  Most especially, be aware of your kinship with our fellow species - with darting songbirds, hovering dragonflies, busy waterfowl, elegant trout  and deer bending to drink - all will let you pass as naturally as though you are just another floating leaf. 
It feels so good to be a floating leaf and, amazingly, these moments are memories that last forever.

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Why Partridge Hill Treasures WCNY-FM

Dear Friends of Partridge Hill: This morning we awoke to the glorious sounds of Mother Nature, songbirds chirping, geese murmuring and the stream rippling outside our window.  Truly we live in Heaven here in Barneveld!  We find it easy here to remember just how blessed we are with Life's loving  gifts.  Here, beauty gives a face to divine Spirit; and we do feel the Love.

For us, being able to tune in to WCNY-FM is a wonderful complement to the beauty around us. Those of us who have travelled extensively, know that there are too many areas where no fine music is available.  We find it troubling that many big cities, who should know better, fail to provide the touch of the classics to a world so badly in need of the beauty and wisdom they express.

Today, we  contributed, online, to WCNY-FM and it felt oh so good to do it.

We hope Partridge Feathers will grow into a community of like-minded people working to protect the finer things of Life  and banding together to fight things that threaten them.

We'd love to hear your views on  things you find uplifting   as well as things you find threatening.

And now, we are headed out for a bike ride!!!

Dan & Suzanne

Monday, June 13, 2011

Let's Hear It For Personable Professionalism!

It's wonderful when people act like - well - like they should.  To me this means being superbly professional while also being just plain human and downright likeable.

It's all too rare; so when it happens let's all be sure to rave about it. After all, it's a fact that bad behavior ignored increases while good behavior ignored goes away.

So I want to rave about an IRS phone representative I spoke with the other day. I called because both my wife and I got the same notice from the IRS saying we owed them money for our 2009 taxes and that interest was already being incurred. The notice claimed to be a "second notice" although neither of us had received a first notice. And we were especially unhappy about it because we had a document rom our preparer advising us that we would be receiving a sizable refund.

So, naturally, I called.

The phone wait time was lengthy while "all representatives" were "busy helping other callers"; but happily the music was quiet, unobjectionable and completely instrumental. Note to all planners of phone services - we all have distinct musical preferences and they probably aren't yours. Keep it low key, upbeat and as classy as you'd like your service to seem.

Also, I was grateful with the relatively few number of times I was advised that my question could likely be answered on-line at their website.

Then, just as I was starting to think I would never find an agent with time. A real person picked up. She gave me her name and number and worked with me for at least 40 minutes. She listened to my concern and asked me if I would wait while she looked into it. Over the space of our call, she found they "they" (meaning some IRS clerks somewhere)hadn't posted some of our payments over to our account. The net was that, yes, they owe us money and we should not worry about to dunning notice.  If our refunds do not arrive within a couple of weekes we should call her, yes her, back.

Throughout, she was eager to solve the problem and to explain to me what had happened and, maybe just as important, we shared a few laughs. She had a sense of humor and seemed like a person we'd enjoy having over for dinner.

In my view, THAT is personable professionalism.