It continues.

I’m still not going to write the name of the business, because, once again, my intentiontion was never to hurt the business, which is why I did not publish the salon name in the last post. (Which, with the tens of thousands of views it got, would have easily outranked the famous Yelp review on Google.) I was happy to just let this rest.

But he had to try again. And it’s just too funny not to share. I look forward to getting slapped with another fake lawsuit for this post.

So I got this message on Yelp yesterday from Paula M:

Hi Cheryl,
I am writing you because I didn’t realize my residence was on yelp, and I was wondering why people have shown up at our door for haircuts. I asked the girl tonight where she found out about my address, and she said it was on yelp. I didn’t realize somebody was leasing my new place as a hair salon prior. I just moved in about 3 months ago, and there have been 2 people ringing my doorbell and asking if there is still a salon here. I said, “I’m sorry, but this is a residence”. They looked at me like I was crazy. So I just did some research tonight on the computer (I am not computer savvy at all..lol), and saw your had a review about the former place. There is no place to call yelp about this issue, and was wondering if you knew how to delete the information or what I can do. I apologize for the trouble. I am inquiring about [BUSINESS NAME REDACTED] at [BUSINESS ADDRESS REDACTED] I am not sure if I need to check back on here or if your response goes to my email. Anyways…my email is paulajmurphy1960@gmail… Can you please let me know what to do. Thank you-Paula

I started laughing at this point, because there was barely a .2% chance this was a legitimate person and not just this guy trying to get me to delete this review. I mean, this “not computer savvy” lady takes the time to fill out a full – and hilarious – Yelp profile.

SHE LOVES KNITTING AND JEOPARDY! Oh boy.

I’m also pretty positive if you do a Google image search of some variation of “fifty year old woman,” she’d be on the front page of results.

(UPDATE: @sarahisastalker has informed me that she is located on mobile page 13 for the query “middle aged woman”)

(UPDATE 2: @amyrosebrown has discovered that “Paula M.” is actually bestselling author Kris Radish.

So I decided to investigate. Obviously.

I have a fake Facebook account. I’ve had it for almost four years now. I created it so I could get the 25th “Like” on a business page I was administering to set a vanity URL. I forgot it existed until I had a brief and shameful Sims Social phase where I used it to cheat. I never send messages from the account – but since the profile picture is of an attractive young girl (some random blonde I found on Google), I’ve got a LOT of creepy messages from other users. Some of them I personally know (and know are married.) But I digress.

I sent the stylist a message from the fake account after I got the Yelp message. I asked was where the salon was located, because I was interested in getting a haircut. I got a quick and friendly reply – he gave me the address, directions, and a phone number so I could schedule an appointment.

Well wouldn’t you know. It’s at the same address.

Apparently my friend Paula from Yelp has a roommate.

UPDATE: Paula M has changed her name to Julie W and no longer likes knitting or Casablanca. Damn.

So with that, I wanted to share some of my favorite Leapstuff I’ve run across:

• 30 Rock had an entire episode about Leap Day that aired last week, taking it to Festivus levels of inventing a holiday equipped with a color scheme, traditional foods and a mythical mascot who gives candy in exchange for children’s tears.

• 11 Things has a list of random facts about leap day (11 of them, shockingly.) For example, Leap Day is not every four years – it is every four years unless the year in question is perfectly divisible by 100 but NOT perfectly divisible by 400. Um, what?

• The Daily What posted this awesome scientific explanation of Leap Year.

• The Daily What ALSO posted this not-as-scientific video of a girl who is very confused, and angry, about the existence of Leap Year

• A comic from Savage Chickens – I petition we move Leap Day to June

• Today’s Google Doodle combines leap day with the nineteenth century Italian composer who claims it as his birthday.

Got any fun leap day links? Share them in the comments.

(Also, I’ll try to post again before the next leap year.)

It’s “Cheryl,” for the record. PRETTY TRICKY.

Anyway, I bought a car! (Though according to my friend John, I won it in an Apples to Apples tournament.) The Cavalier – yes, the one that once had a family of squirrels take up residence – finally died. It’s just sitting in front of my house for now – I haven’t yet found a replacement family of squirrels to call it home. Also, I kind of like the redneck feng shui of an abandoned rusted car in front of my house. What can I say, I was born in West Virginia.

SO BACK TO THE “I BOUGHT A CAR!” PART! IT’S A 2009 CIVIC EX-L! IT HAS LEATHER! AND A SUNROOF! AND BUTT WARMERS!

I think my favorite part of the car is the split-level digital dash, or the built-in iPod connection (the Cavalier only had a broken tape player), or the fact that when I hit the brakes I’m confident for the first time in many years that my car will actually stop. Who am I kidding – it’s the butt warmers.

I got a new insurance policy with the car through Progressive. They sold me with the “Snapshot Discount” program. Basically, you plug a device into your car, and it tells the insurance company about your driving behavior, and you get a discount unless you drive like a douche or frequently at 2am.

I got home last night and found that my Snapshot Doohicky® (trademark mine, not theirs) had arrived! I excitedly ripped open the package and woke my husband up off the couch to insist we install said Doohicky®. He rolled over and went back to sleep. I drank a beer or two or three.

Eventually I noticed that the Doohicky® came packaged with a cute little diagram showing me all the easy places my diagnostics port might be.

Drunk momentum rising, I decided to stumble outside in the freezing cold and pitch dark and search for the port. But with the above diagram in hand and lots of poking around in spots 1, 2, 3 and 4… I found nothing.

Not one to be defeated, I decided to check the Progressive website for the port location in my specific car, and maybe have another beer. This is what I found:

Looking at it now, I get that it’s the underbelly of my steering column, which I’ve obviously never seen before since I don’t often crawl around by my gas pedal. However, in the moment I thought: HOLY CRAP. LOOK AT ALL THOSE WIRES. I DIDN’T SEE ANY WIRES! I MUST EXPOSE WIRES!

At this point I went back to my car, convinced I needed to rip panels off to find this thing. Fortunately, the panels are attached pretty well and I was unable to succeed in tearing apart my new car. Dejected, I went to bed.

I woke up this morning and tried to start my car.

Nothing.

Because my drunk ass left the interior lights on when I was trying to rip out panels to install Doohicky®.

Le sigh.

While I waited for a savior to jump my car, I glanced under the steering wheel to look for the diagnostics port.

It was just laying there, exposed, definitely NOT behind bolted-on panels, mocking me.

Anyway now I’m obsessed with tracking my trips. Look, this is me, twice a day, every day, driving to work.

Now I know that my office isn’t really a mile and a half from my house. It is 1.83 miles from my house.

I can also see how fast I was going. Either I hit a few redlights or I need to discover cruise control.

Isn’t technology fun?

This was the review that I posted shortly thereafter to Yelp. I removed the business name here, but I haven’t deleted the review from Yelp.

Rating: 5 Stars

Review:

I had a few too many beers at the bar after work. I was chatting with this guy and he very forwardly offered up that he had what I needed back at his house. Against my better judgment, I went back with him. I walked into his place & he handed me another beer, we smoked a cigarette, and then he sat me down and gave me EXACTLY what I desperately needed…

A cut and color!

Seriously, who picks up a hair stylist at the bar and – at 8pm on a Tuesday after you’ve BOTH been drinking for a loooonggg time – goes to said strangers house for some root touchup? THIS GIRL.

*NAME REMOVED*s salon is a fab space. I expected a basement corner or something – I had no idea what I was getting myself into, see: beer. But NO! A legit studio in an old Victorian duplex in Olde Town East with teal, orange and tope striped walls. Chic. I posted a couple photos.

We listened and danced to Lady Gaga and Cher, took frequent smoke breaks and crushed a six pack. In between all that, somehow, he perfectly matched the color of my hair to my roots, flat-ironed The Beast and gave me a terrific cut.

*NAME REMOVED* himself – hilarious. Snarky. Blunt. My kinda guy.

This posh private experience will set you back $85+. Totally. Worth. It. Call *NAME REVIEWED* and make an appointment immediately!

Yelpers marked the review Useful (6), Funny (8), Cool (5), a fair amount of feedback on Yelp standards. I got a few compliments for it. I added it to a list called “Superb Services” with the best service providers in the city. I think a few people actually made appointments with him because of it. I never went back to him, because I texted him once to inquire about an appointment and he didn’t respond, and I hate calling people. So I moved on.

I had almost forgotten the experience. Until I got this message today:

Hi Cheryl, this is *NAME REMOVED*. I came across your review for my salon (*SALON NAME REMOVED*), and my clients and I are a bit enraged by how you have deferred my reputation. Please be prompt to delete the defermating review, or legal action will be taken. Thank You, *NAME REMOVED*

lolwhat? I wrote you a 5-star review. A long ass time ago. Which you ASKED ME TO WRITE. And which, had I been asked politely, I would have removed without hesitation.

We’ll let it slide that he said “deferred” instead of “defamed.” He followed this up by writing his own review of his business (which Yelp will delete shortly – it’s against their Terms of Service.)

Hi, this is *NAME REMOVED*. I just found out a false review has been written about my salon. I do not know this Cheryl H. woman. I never did her hair, she never same to the salon, and I never “offered” to do her hair. I would not do someone’s hair who was under the influence. I also don’t approach people to do their hair, I usually do referrals. She may have got my photos from my myspace,facebook page, and/or my website and posted these on Yelp. If you want reviews and info, please go to *URL REMOVED*.

Thank you and sorry for this confusion.

The “photos I stole from Facebook” were taken on my cell phone. I have another photo of me IN the studio, with him, somewhere. I hope to find it soon and mail him a print. (UPDATE: See below.)

Either he was so black-out drunk that he does not remember this, or he decided that the way he presented his business to me the first time was no longer how he wished to be viewed by clients and prospects. I stopped laughing long enough at the situation to share a few lessons learned:

1) Monitor the internet continually for your brand.

The fact that it took him over a year and a half to see a review of his business that is ranking #1 for his business name and posted on arguably the most popular review site in existence is astounding to me. There is no business with the same name, so there’s no excuse for missing this. Set up a Google Alert RIGHT NOW for your business name. Monitor review sites for your business. There’s no reason for not knowing what people are saying about you in real-time.

2) If you’re going to ask people to review your business online, you have to accept that you can’t control what they write.

This was a review I was ASKED by the salon owner to write. Obviously I wasn’t obligated to write it, but I wanted to promote good work. I wrote a tremendously positive review of his abilities, adding in my usual snarky style about the atypical experience I had. What did you expect me to do? Lie, and say I made an appointment with you through normal means and everything was sober and regular? If you didn’t want me to share the experience, you shouldn’t have explicitly asked me to several times, or you should have kindly requested that I omit some details. I reviewed MY experience, which was, you know, tipsy.

3) Be consistent in how you present your brand to people.

The first experience a customer has with you is the one they are always going to remember. And the one they are going to tell people about. Don’t do something you don’t want shared, and it won’t be shared. If you don’t want people saying you color hair when you’re inebriated, don’t color hair when you’re inebriated.

4) Don’t threaten to sue people who are advocating you

No explanation necessary.

UPDATE: I found a photo on, funny enough, my Yelp profile of me in the salon. I have placed it next to the photo I “stole from online.” But hey, I probably photoshopped the background in for the sake on sticking to my lie, right?

What else was I supposed to do?

Catch up on the past 20 episodes. You can’t afford to miss these. Not because they lead to financial gain or anything. On second thought, you can afford to miss them.

JUST DON’T.

But my friend The Naked Redhead called the series out today and I broke out in a cold sweat because all of a sudden millions of people were going to come to this site to find an ABANDONED VIDEO SERIES AND THEN THEY WERE GOING TO SHOW UP AT MY HOUSE WITH PITCHFORKS AND DEMAND MY HEAD ON A GOLD PLATE BECAUSE SILVER ISN’T AS VALUABLE IN THE CURRENT ECONOMIC CLIMATE AND THEY WANT A GOOD RE-SALE VALUE FOR THE PLATE AFTER MY HEAD STARTS TO DECAY.

Or something like that.

And yes, this is technically episode 20, because the last one, albeit a… slightly different… format than usual (a medication-induced disaster) still counts.

Enjoy.

Peep past episodes here.

P.S. Tweet a thousand “Happy birthday” messages to my husband, @DemetriusHall

P.P.S. Join me at Woodland’s Tavern to celebrate IPA Day with Drink Up Columbus and Cbusr tonight

“Why did THAT blogger get the free stuff from the PR company?”
“Why was HE asked to speak at the conference?”
“Why do THEY always get to go to the private parties?”
“Why does SHE have so many followers on Twitter?”
“Why does the media always focus on HIM?”
“Why didn’t I get the promotion?”

Bitchityblabbityboo.

Listen.

The thing THOSE people have in common is that they work harder than you. They put more time into it than you. They go to more stuff than you. They write more blog posts. They build their online and offline networks. They might not be smarter than you, but they’re sure as hell going to continue to be more successful than you.

Stop complaining about people who are more successful than you because they work harder. Just work harder.

Nope. I’m here.

(That’s a pin. Because it’s so quiet that you can hear… nevermind.)

Three reasonsexcuses for not creating content in a while:

1) I’m blogging 3-5 times a week on DrinkUpColumbus.com these days. That just about drains all of the writing cells outta my brain.

2) I’ve been planning a lot of cool things. If you’re not in Columbus, you’re missing out on ALL THE COOL THINGS. Sorry ’bout your luck. The Drink Up Launch Party, TechKaraoke, IPA Day and more. Mas timesuck.

3) I got married in May (remember how much fun I had planning that?) So… I’m in my honeymoon phase And by honemoon phase, I mean we enjoy taking lots of naps on our couch to bad TV programs. Really sexy naps.

I’ve got a few post ideas in my head, including stories to top faking being possessed. I promise to return to 3 Things videos soon, too. Thanks for sticking around

Well, one major social network really DOES show you who viewed your profile, LinkedIn.

If the viewer is connected within three degrees of you, or if you have a premium account (moneybags), LinkedIn shows you their name and links you to their profile. Otherwise it gives you some perverse guessing game where it tells you that one of the below ten people who all work in the same industry at the same career level in the same city viewed your profile. Can you guess who?!

Can you guess who, it’s a mystery.
Does your person wear a hat? No. You’re history! But I’m still here!
Can you guess who?
Does your person have a beard? Uh-huh. You’re out of here.
Can you guess who, do you have a clue?
Does your person wear glasses? Yes. I’m gone! Me too!
Can you guess who? Not you or you. You’re Sam! You win! LET’S PLAY AGAIN!
Guess Who: Gamecards do not actually talk.
(was that disclaimer really needed? haha)

I never play the guessing game. Mostly because I don’t want to click on someone’s profile to try to ascertain if they would have had a reason to be on my profile, because then THEY can see I was on THEIR profile, and they’ll have to wonder, for the rest of their lives, what the redhead wanted, and why she didn’t have the decency to say “hello!”

But for the people who I can identify, I often click over to their profile. And then judge them. Because in my head (see: this) they judged me first. I mean, they searched LinkedIn, found me, and I was what they thought they wanted, but when they finished reading my profile… they left silently and never gave me a second thought.

We never even had a chance.

These were roughly my vows, or at least, what I think I said… I was kind of spazzing out

They told us it was going to rain today, but here we are, getting married outside. It worked out. In the five years I’ve known you, everything has always worked out in the end. ::starts crying:: DAMNIT! I vow no matter what, this will always work out.

Demetrius Hall, thank you for being there for me every step of the way.

Thank YOU all for your support throughout the years. I’ll keep adding more wedding photos to Flickr as my wonderful photographer gets them to me!