How do they make money? never mind...

I happened to visit an old friend in blue Virginia the other day, and while driving about town we stopped in a bank so he could get his name corrected. (They had added an e to the end of his name: so, for example, if it had happened to me, the account name would have been "Johne Perry".) My friend had opened an account there because they were offering a free flip ultra camcorder, which Google tells me sells for $130 or so. All you have to do is open a checking account with at least $100, then within 45 days use your Visa Debit card for 8 purchases, and use their online banking's bill payment service at least twice. My friend had decided to get himself the camera, then (if I understand correctly) close the account.

This is rather sensible from a consumer's point of view. I'd ask myself how the bank makes money, but then I looked at their deposit rates. A Money Market account pays 0.1% APY for a deposit up to $9,999. The credit union where I keep my deposits currently pays a 1.51% APY as long as you keep at least $250 there. So for a $9,999 deposit, the bank will by the end of a year pay you $10 and give you a camera. Okay, so my credit union won't give you a camera, but by the end of a year they will have paid you $145, which is more than $10 plus the value of that camera. Plus, my credit union will pay $145 the next year, too, whereas this bank will stil pay a measly $10. Part of that problem solved.

While perusing the place, I felt as if I was somewhere other than a bank. There was a penny arcade for kids. A sign told me to,

SMILE!

We're happy to see you. For your safety, we are monitoring the premises through video surveillance.

I don't get why I should smile, but, okay, I smiled my crooked smile. Another sign told me that I could earn points by using their Visa Debit Card whenever I signed for purchases.

Oh, and there were lots and lots of free pens.

Well! my credit union only gives away free suckers: SIGN ME UP!

... Read More!

You can't go home again

My wife and/or I noticed a few things on our drive from Mississippi to Virginia. In no particular order:

• The large trees that line the interstates and main highways changed en route. In the Hattiesburg area they were almost all pine; in North Carolina we noticed a lot of deciduous trees mixed with the pine.
• I noticed today that the birds sound different at my parents' house than at my own. The ones here sound more exotic and marshy (if that makes sense). Newport News is right on the water (the James River, York River, Chesapeake Bay, and Atlantic Ocean are all within a bird's flight) and my parents' neighborhood has many, varied, larger trees. My neighborhood is not one of those treeless landscapes one gets in new neighborhoods (much of my house gets shade during the summer months), but the trees there are puny by comparison.
• Everywhere I go, there is no one I know. I was in a library today, then in the mall closest to my house, and I saw no one I recognized. I wasn't exactly scouting for old pals, but I do find it remarkable that I can return to my hometown, pass through very public areas, and recognize no one. How very different from the world I meet in so many books—from the world that my wife's family knows, or that I know from Italy.
  
  I did strike up conversations with two people in the Mall. I was at a jewelry store and the attendant turned out to be a Tatar from Uzbekistan. When she learned that I was married to a Russian, she said that I looked like someone who knew Russian. (Why? I wonder if that's just a polite form of small talk.) We had a neat conversation.
  
  A few minutes later, my eye happened on a painting in an art store, and while looking around I spoke with the cashier. She is originally from the Azores, part of Portugal. I embarrassed myself by saying they were part of Spain, and she scolded me. She's married to a former Navy man, and it turns out we've seen many of the same places: parts of Rhode Island, for example, and her husband's ship was also stationed a while in my mother's hometown of Gaeta.
  
  Figures that I would travel home, see no one that I knew in the eighteen years that I grew up there, and find pleasant conversation and shared experiences with immigrants. Welcome to America.
• Speaking of the public library, I used to walk there all the time as a child. It was a small, flat building, unremarkable aesthetically. They remodeled it after I left for college, and boy has it changed: it looks more like a church than a library. Here's a photo (?) I stole downloaded from the website librarything.com:Keep in mind that this building lies near two other churches, one of which plays bells every quarter hour, and hymns every hour. I half-wonder if they deliberately designed it to resemble a church.
  
  Whatever the case, it was a great place to spend a few hours immersed in study.

... Read More!