Last week I got an award a work. It wasn’t monetary in nature, it was an award for upholding the Core Values of our company. I had to be tricked to get to the meeting where I got it because there was really no logical way that I would have been invited to the meeting. But my manager was able to keep it a secret and my VP and some others awarded a few of us with it. It’s always nice to be recognized.
So what did I get it for… well, I might have said that I manage a help desk. One of our agents was on the phone with the a customer (our customers are internal employees) and he wasn’t doing so well and needed help. She recognized there was and issue and found me as the agents manager for help. She stayed on the line and we all coordinated getting EMS to the agent’s house. In the end, the customer was really the hero because she was the one that took initial action.
But I don’t say all this to try to brag. It all made me think about how much we need to look out for each other these days. The customer could have thought that the guy was being rude or trying to be a jerk with the way he was responding, or not responding, but she didn’t. She cared about someone she doesn’t know enough to go out of her way to get the guy help. But think about that the guy is just in his house alone and without being on the phone with that person and her taking action he wouldn’t have received help.
We really need to watch out for each other because these days if we are in our homes, there might not be anyone else. Check in on your family and friends, especially those who might be prone to different issues. You might be the only one they have and not even know it.
Hope all is well in your world!
The Monthly Numbers
After months of some good, but not great numbers, August absolutely exploded. I’ve basically been complaining about not getting what I expect to get back. I’ve been sending out more this year in general and after a good start to the year I’ve had a few disappointing months. The numbers would be good for last year or the year before, but disappointing giving what I have going out.
This month though you can see I had a few monster days and in the end, really some pretty consistent numbers overall. Consistent, well, I got something every day. EVERY DAY! I’m not sure if I’ve done that before. I’ve had pretty good stretches, but I don’t think a whole month. I don’t remember doing anyway. The days that you see with nothing below… Sundays!
Add to that a few monster days like the 15th where then successes and one failure came back, then a couple days with seven successes, then seven more days with at least four successes and that adds up to a good monthly number. Of the four failures, one was a bad address and the other three were back from guys that I didn’t know charged.
For the second month in a row my Heat Map is very monotone in color. I’ve just been sending so much baseball lately. I will say though that towards the end of August I started to try to diversify a bit with some more football and basketball going out. So you’ll probably see this be a little more colorful in the future.
One thing that I noticed as I was putting it together was the peak in 1993. With the way I enter the numbers I like to see how some of the charts change as I enter the number. When I started putting the data in I saw that peak with only the baseball data in and I was really psyched. I was thinking this might be one of my first months that isn’t driven by 1989, 1990 or 1991. But then I started entering the other sports in. Still, I love that peak.
The other thing you can see is that I got something for ever year from 1973 and 2012. And if you expand that a little further you can take it to 2015 with only 2013 the only year not represented. That’s another first for me I think. Usually I have some late 90’s and early 00’s gaps.
I’ve talked about this before but the reason for that has to do with some pickups I made in the Spring. I think I can especially attribute it to my neighbor Sean and all the cards I took off his hands on yard sale day in the neighborhood. He definitely had some good 90’s and early 00’s cards that I’ve been putting in my requests ever since.
So I mentioned that I like to see the data as I enter it and see what it does to the graphs. This one was a fun one to see. Not that I expect everyone to remember some prior months, I don’t… but there was a month recently where one city/region just killed all the others. That happened again. But the crazy part is how much one team carried it and how much it beat the other by, especially considering those other cities/regions did really well too. Last month only two cities/regions were over 15 and this month its six!
Chicago DESTROYED everything else. It almost doubled up Montreal, Minnesota, and New York. That is just such a crazy difference. The White Sox I got back were absolutely nuts. But the way I put it in I was like, “wow, 17 for the Astros…,” then “Geez, 21 for the Expos…,” and then, “OMG, 25 for the White Sox!” When you look at the individual teams, every team in this months Top 10 would be in the Top 4 for last month’s numbers.
Here are the Top 10 individual teams for the month (by cards returned):
- Chicago White Sox – 25
- Montreal Expos – 21
- Houston Astros – 17
- Minnesota Twins – 16
- Cleveland Indians – 14
- Colorado Rockies – 14
- Milwaukee Brewers – 14
- Philadelphia Phillies – 12
- St. Louis Cardinals – 12
- Chicago Cubs – 11
Getting Trendy
In the best months I had in the beginning of this year my high for a month was 84. This month I got back 86 successful returns and four failures. That was a huge change from last month. I was so happy to finally break 60 again last month and not I’m breaking 85. With the returns coming so consistently I could feel like it was going to be a really good month too. There didn’t feel like there were any real lulls. Sometimes it looks like that in the data, but when I have some really good days it makes me feel different as long as I’m getting something back. Then another big day would just be gravy!
Last month you could really tell how much baseball was ruling everything, but this month it feels like an even bigger difference. You can barely even see those other bars in the month with that big tall baseball bar. I almost feel bad for those little guys. Maybe that’s why I’m diversifying. It’s OK little guys, we’ll get you back up there soon enough.
So while the numbers of returns went up, the number of cards well,… THAT WENT UP TOO! I know, surprise surprise right. Of course it’s going to go up dummy. I know it still feels good. And just like this being the biggest total returns of the year, 300 cards back is the biggest numbers of cards I’ve gotten back in a month this year. Well, actually maybe ever.
The Overall Numbers
Last month I had to say that it felt like a good month. It was better than the previous months but still wasn’t where I wanted to be. This one is obvious – 86 successful returns and 300 cards back. An awesome month. Now to try to figure out how to keep that up.
When I look at my Year-over-Year numbers I was 46% better for returns and 56% better for total cards. I got 108 more cards back this month than last month. That number seems really crazy. When I look at that from a pace perspective, if I am doing my calculations correction I think I am about 45% better than where I was last year for returns and 64% better for total cards overall. I think another crazy number is that if I had a similar month next month, I would match my total cards for last year already.
He’s Making a List
I always take a look at the stragglers each month and there wasn’t anything too terribly bad. I’ll keep the low limit at 200 below. There are four down there but as I look at my numbers there’s only one other return that was over 100 days. My average days back was about 42 days with the median number being about 16.
Here the list of anything over 200 days:
- Greg Brock – 482
- Jordan Pacheco – 271
- Jim Pankovitz – 223
- Jabar Gaffney – 218
As always I have favorites for various reasons. Here’s my list for this month (there’s a lot to choose from): Derrick May, Bobby Jenks, Mark Grudzielanek, Kenny “Sky” Walker, Dave Telgheder, Larry Bowa, Denny Hocking, Joe Borchard, and Scott Elarton.
I hope you had a good hobby month too!