December 2004 Archives
Although our government might be stingy, the American people are not. Go to Amazon.com to quickly and easily donate to the Red Cross. If that's what 90,000 people can donate, imagine what a few more of us can do.
[update 12/31 @ 1pm: almost up to $8.5 million]
I was listening to CNN on XM driving home from work and they were talking about US foreign aid to countries hit by the tsunami. (I think this was on Inside Politics.) Someone said that under the Bush administration foreign aid has increased. They cited aid to Iraq as a major part of that. I'm not sure about all the numbers, but is war and occupation really considered foreign aid these days?
I've been watching the stories coming from SE Asia over the past few days, and my heart goes out to those people who have lost everything from their homes to family members. I can't imagine what it must be like for life to be normal and then the next moment have it all changed to what must seem like an alternate reality. I also saw that the US is giving $15 million to aid the relief effort. Piddily... speaking of alternate reality. So I went to The Red Cross to donate what I could to help out. I'm not the biggest fan of ARC, but I felt the need to do something, and it went to the International Response Fund.
I had a couple of really awful, bizarre dreams last night. The first was that a UFO was flying over the store I work at. It didn't do anything bad, but it was odd in and of itself. Even stranger was that at one point I seemed to be controling it with my keychain remote for my car. After that things got bad. A terrorist came to the store and blew something up. I have no idea what it was, but there was burning shrapnel everywhere. I think some got in my hair. After that I woke up.
Later I had another dream that I was living in this apartment complex where a few people had been shot by a man who always wore an orange baseball cap. I'm not sure why I was still living there, but I was. So I was walking into the building from the parking lot, and I saw this guy pulling in wearing the baseball cap. So I ran to the building trying to get my key ready the whole way. I was apparently having trouble getting the key out. When I turned around I saw the guy chasing me with his gun drawn. I finally got into the building and locked the door behind me. As I ran down a set of stairs, I turned and noticed he too was keying his way into the building. I knew he'd catch me, and then I woke up.
What's with these crazy dreams? Huge Magazine's dream analyzer says "Wow, that's really weird" and "hmm.. umm.. that's pretty interesting." Very insightful. Dreaming@SWOON says that a dream about a gun indicates a feeling of injustice as it pertains to you or a friend. A bomb means that you feel a threat to your way of life. Hmmm.. are my dreams being inspired by radical conservatives?
I got stuck in the driveway today. Luckily it wasn't on my way to work this morning, but rather as I was coming home. Thankfully my knight in shining armor came out to rescue me. I bought 100 lbs. of rack salt for the driveway. I'm not sure how much good it will do, but we tried. We had all this snow yesterday, and then overnight Mother Nature decided to send us some rain. And then it got cold again. So there's ice everywhere. We lost part of a tree in the front yard which is very sad. I hate to see old trees coming down.
It was kinda slow this morning at work - I think many people had the good sense to stay home until the snow plows went through a few times. Of course as they day went on people came out in droves. Watercolour Boy says that there should be a term called "shopping rage." I agree whole-heartedly. People are buying anything and everything, even if it's not really what they wanted.
I'm sipping a lovely glass of White Catawba wine. It's from somewhere around Lake Erie, and it's very sweet. Kinda like liquid candy. Being that I need to be asleep in bed soon, I thought it might help. Only one more day until it's over - at least that's what everyone says. But really, they're all wrong. Because you know what comes after X-mas? Holiday clearance...
Is teaching values in school wrong? Does it show a lack of judgement of priorities to offer students information about issues that are not directly related to the core curriculum? That (I believe) is the question posed by the writer of Crystal Clear last Wednesday. The issue was brought up because of an event at a high school that was offered to promote factual information as well as perspective on LGBT youth issues. The event was during school hours, but was voluntary to attend. It is one of the ways the school promotes diversity and tolerance.
I believe that exposing students to knowledge is part of the educational experience. Not knowing the facts about issues doesn't empower young people to make educated decisions. And what good is our public education system doing if it doesn't turn out informed people? I don't think schools are there to push certain values or judgements, but opening up more perspectives for students by providing information is valuable.
Granted parents are there to teach those values that they wish to pass on, while schools help to make sure all the information is there. One side of a story doesn't do much to bolster an opinion or value. If a racist parent wishes to pass on that value then that is their prerogative. But at the same time, a the school may present that African-Americans are not inferior to white people or that black and white people have many things in common. Would we fault the school for their judgement? Is that a bad value?
What strikes me personally about this specific event is that if my school had such a thing when I was there, it would have done a lot to make my high school years better and more productive. I had to go search out the information myself. I was afraid at every turn of the way that someone would find out what I was looking for, and I would be outed. My grades dropped. My relationship with my parents and friends suffered because I couldn't be myself. And if I didn't hear anti-gay slurs each day of my junior and high school career, I might not have considered suicide when I did.
The author of Crystal Clear suggests via her juxtaposition of articles (about the BGLAD event and another about math and reading scores) that perhaps this LGBT event was not valuable. I respectfully disagree. That event may have provided information for a LGBT student who was under or misinformed. That event may have helped ease the burden of anti-gay slurs heard on a daily basis. That event may have helped provide a better support network for someone. It may have helped save a student's life. And when studies show that LGBT teens are twice as likely to commit suicide than their heterosexual counterparts, I think that justifies the fact that there is a problem.
What strikes me as both amusing and disturbing is the fact that some parents tried to crash the event by showing up and videotaping. Many schools, including this one, have policies against photographing or filming students without parents' permission. One parent felt so strongly that the students should not have been exposed to the information the school was providing that he went to the event himself, even though he had kept his children at home. Apparently he didn't feel that it was a good judgement on behalf of the school to have the event.
These days the word "values" is a highly charged term. Parents worry about what values are being taught to their children. However, if learning about diversity and tolerance for people who are different are bad values to certain parents, I'm glad that schools are providing an informed perspective.
(sources: Crystal Clear; Newton HS Calendar; New study confirms gay teen suicide risk; Parents crash school's gay tolerance event)
It's starting...
[update at 8pm: I've shoveled the front walk three times today, shoveled the driveway twice, and we had to remove snow from the satellite dish because it was impairing reception. (MythBusters is on tonight!) We've had about 6-8 inches today. So far anyway..]
Tonight at the store - it was madness! Before I even parked my car a woman yelled at me about how she was a pedestrian and I had to stop. This was while my car was 30 feet from her traffic hopping butt. Lines were crazy long, stuff was everywhere, people were pooping on the floor of the restroom (and one person took pictures - ew!), and there was nothing I could do about any of it. I tried. I really did. But there was just no stopping the madness tonight. Being my eighth holiday season at the store though, I think I took it in stride. (except the pooping - you just can't get used to that) I had a great group of cashiers tonight, so that made the night much better.
I think many people saw the weather forecast and noticed they are predicting between 9 and 16 inches of snow over the next 48 hours. And I've noticed that the high temp. on Christmas will be a balmy 10 degrees. Oh Weather Channel, I hope you got that one wrong. I hope where ever you are, you are warm and cozy!
and getting colder. A good day to be inside.
Today I rang a man up and gave him his total. It was $37.53. He handed me a $50 bill so I started to type it in.. five zero. Then he tells me to wait because he has the 53¢. So he hands it to me and I type in five zero five three, enter. Bang! Change was $5013! Jackpot at my register! I think the next few people in line gasped.
I'm so tired I'm afraid if I write too much it won't make any sense. But then which of my blog posts make the most sense? Today was a grueling day at work. We were extremely busy from about 9am until the moment I left. I closed last night and opened this morning so it all blurred together and became one, long day. A woman yelled at me today because she said there weren't enough lines open. The thing was there were several lines at that moment with no waiting. It was just that the first line she set her lazy eyes on had a few people in it. I also heard someone ask over the walkie if we had "baby dolls that wet themselves." For some reason it was so funny I broke a stapler laughing. I think perhaps I was getting slap happy.
I may have commented in the past that I think it's kinda rude when you're checking out to be having a conversation on the phone. It is utterly gross to clip your fingernails while being rung up. Who wants clippings flying around? What if one flew in your cashier's eye? Then you wouldn't be able to check out.
I saw a picture of our president at an economic conference above a sign with the word "challenges" misspelled. I find that ironic. I'm still confused about where the social security reform issue came from. Did he campaign on that issue, or did that just come about the day after he was elected?
I think tomorrow on the way home I will pick up a bottle of wine.
Enzyte. If it gives you that shit-eatin' grin all day long, I don't think so. Everytime I see that commercial I just want to slap that guy. Nothing wrong with being happy - there is something wrong with appearing to be on crack. The innuendo is funny though. The saggy garden hose. The mini-hot dog appetizers. The extra springy diving board. Perma-grin is nice, but not when it makes you look like an ass.
Shopping on-line. I really like shopping online. Working in retail this time of year, I don't want to go back into a store after I finish a shift. Stores are packed right now, and the ability to shop in my PJs and quiet of my own home is priceless. I'm becoming irritated though with some of the shops that make you enter your credit card info before they show you the total on your order. I'm not clicking submit until I see the total bill. One site added $30 for S&H - I don't think so.
And back to the in store shoppers. Gotta love them, they pay my bills. But at this time of year, don't expect to go into a store and have 10 employees ask to help you. Don't expect them to go shopping for you. And because you can't see signs with letters that are 2 feet tall doesn't give you the right to be nasty and crabby. If you want to be crabby about your holiday shopping, go shop online and piss yourself off.
Holiday gifts returns are a drag. I know, I do people's returns as part of my job. Apparently those people are upset that they have to be more responsible when returning their unwanted items to a store. There is an article in today's Akron Beacon Journal entitled Stores at point of no return. The author writes about how it has become increasingly more difficult to return things at stores, and about how stores often track how often people return things. Lin-Fisher, the author, writes that return fraud costs the retail industry about $16 billion a year. So why would it be bad to crack down on fraud?
Part of the article reads, "But tracking and denying returns seems a bit over the top to me. I understand that there's a problem. But what about those of us who follow the rules and perhaps just change our mind about the color of a sweater?" I can understand her frustration. It can be a pain to hang onto receipts and packaging, especially if you don't anticipate returning something. But these days, I hang onto all of my receipts anyway. If I buy a higher priced item, I am more than likely to keep the packaging for at least a few months - just in case it turns out to be defective.
I wonder how else retailers would prevent return fraud besides tracking returns? It's better than the old system of blood samples anyway. For anyone who keeps a receipt, I would think it would be pretty easy to return an item. You have a proof of purchase then. To expect a return without one doesn't make sense to me. Perhaps I'm just biased. Besides tracking those unreceipted returns though, how else would a retailer protect its return policies from abuse? Trust me, people try to abuse a return privilege all the time.
One person in the article said that she often buys two of something because she can't make up her mind about what she wants to buy. So with every purchase like that, she will make one return. I can see that with kids, but when buying for yourself if you can't make up your mind, perhaps returning another day would be better. If you buy two and have to return one you'll have to come back anyway.
Returns have changed a lot in the past 10 years that I've been in retail. When I first started in a retail store, we would return anything. We returned things that weren't even ours, things that were beyond recognition, and things that were downright disgusting. All of that was to please the customer. But people catch on. When DVD players first came out, people would buy one for the weekend and return it on Monday for a full refund. People buy things, wear them, use them, destroy them, steal them, and still expect a return. Not most people, but enough. Enough to cost $16 billion. If I had a budget gap like that in my finances, I'd sure try to do something about it.
Tracking people's returns may not be the best solution. The ideal thing would be for customers to not abuse the return policies. I think that's what has caused the shift in recent years to more rules for returns. And it would be nice to have a disclaimer at stores that do track so you know where your information is going. But most people don't take issue with casinos that record your every move in their establishment, and compare your face to national lists of people using biometric data. They are protecting their assets. Retail by comparison is a lot less invasive.
My advise to you: Keep your receipt. If you're buying gifts and the store gives gift receipts, give one. And take a look at the return policy before you buy. Most are short and to the point, and you can save yourself a hassle in the end.
(source: Akron Beacon Journal, Dec 14, 2004, Sec D, Page 1, Stores at a point of no return)
Thank goodness for MT-Blacklist! Someone tried to SPAM this blog 288 times today. This was in a period of 4 minutes and 26 seconds. All in the name of pharmaceuticals...
One more Sunday of huge advertisements in the newspaper before the end of the season. I always like looking through them to see what's on sale, and if there are any new, fun products. I don't usually go buy them, but it's fun to look.
I've noticed a trend especially in electronics ads. There used to be sales prices where you would go to the store and pay the price that was in the ad. Now you have to pay the regular price and wait for the rebate in the mail. (if it actually arrives) Now I know this isn't a new phenomenon, but it's getting more prevalant and more ridiculous. I mean, the big advertised price is $299 but you have to pay $798 upfront? Then there's 5 different rebates. That just takes all the fun out of buying something. Who wants to go home and do paperwork when you could be ignoring the setup manual?
Technology is so amazing to me. I suppose that's why I'm such a technogeek. The Athlon Sempron processor I put in my new machine is less than a centimeter sqaure. Of course the heat sink is huge, but it amazes me to think that a tiny little thing like that is running my PC. Last night I was thinking about our family's first computer - a 386 running at a blazing 16Mhz. I think it had about 4MB of RAM and a whopping 110MB hard drive. My first PC was an AMD 233. Now I'm up to 1.83Ghz. More power than the Voyager space probe in my office.
The new puter is up and running now. It takes only about 20 seconds to boot up! I'm like a little kid at Christmas - each program that I load I get all excited as I watch how quickly it opens up. I still have more programs and files to move over to it. And of course I'd be having some issues with the CDROM drives. My resident Network Admin just called from his cell phone with possible solutions. I just love him! :) So now I'm going to do some troubleshooting and listen to my holiday musis playlist. Funny how I can get into the holiday spirit when I'm not in retail land.
I thought I had all the parts to build the new PC. The hard drive arrived week before last. The motherboard and new video card arrived early this week. And I bought the processor and memory this evening. I was all psyched up to put everything together and boot up. I transferred the old CD-ROM, floppy, and misc parts out of the old case. I got the new case out and ready to go. We put the motherboard on the little shelf that comes out of the case, installed the CPU and memory. Then an uh oh.. the power supply won't work with the new motherboard. poo.. AND, even if it did, the power supply would cut off the huge fan and heat sink on top of the processor. So now I'll be needing a new case. Unfortunately the local CompUSA has ridiculous prices on cases. (power supply sold seperately) I'll be hunting around tomorrow for somewhere with decent prices....
What a bummer for a geek like me. :)
Blog Explosion is interesting, addictive, and sometimes annoying. First I can't stand when I win a mystery prize and type the characters in wrong. Of course that's entirely my fault, but It's like having your birthday present taken away from you. Then there's the occasion where you find yourself on a particularly horrible blog. (you may be in that situation now). Then you have to wait those agonizing 30 seconds, and by the time "go" appears you've already rehearsed hitting the number several times. Or there's the 989 and 998 on the same tile and your mysterious dyslexia kicks in and you hit the wrong one.
And I'm starting to see more legal notices on blogs. One that I saw this evening was noteworthy. The post was about how to be safe while shopping. All were pretty common sense suggestions, but at the end there had to be a disclaimer about seeing a professional before applying the advice to your own life. Where will the madness end? Disclaimers on blog posts, loyalty oaths at rallies, permission slips for the prom, side effects may cause fatal incidents...
I'm still finding cool sites to read to with Blog Explosion, and I've found other cool blogs through comments here from BE users. Perhaps someone should start to plan a BE convention, but of course you would have to hit the right number to get in, and then you couldn't talk with any one person longer than 30 seconds. And you might have to sign a waiver to attend.
This past weekend was a complete blur, and I'm just slightly amazed that I still know what day it is. I think that's mostly because I have today off. Each night that I worked was totally nuts, with Sunday night taking the prize for most annoying/mean customers. One person threw a game at one of my cashiers because he didn't agree with the price. I find that just hysterical - when a supposed adult resorts to child-like tantrum behaviour because they're mad. Then there was the woman who wanted one of our employees to go shop for her. I mean, she went to the jewelry department asking for help in sporting goods. Why not go to sporting goods for that? Then when it was taking a longer than usual amount of time to bring an item up for her, she got mad and left. As if she couldn't see the multitudes of people walking past her to think she was the only person in the store. Another man taunted one of my employees at the service desk because he couldn't understand why he couldn't return clothes after they had been washed and worn. Again, more childish behavior. I wonder if I shouldn't do a study on retail and adult behavior. I think I'd be afraid of what I'd find.
I was just poking around the Board of Elections website to see if there was a date they were going to send out paychecks for poll workers. I'm going to use the extra money to upgrade the old Celeron 400 PC. While there I went through the election results. After November second I saw Bush and Issue 1 and stopped about there. I didn't see the numbers though. Kerry won in Summit County 57% to 43% and Issue One passed 58% to 42%. Out of 25 Dem vs. Rep contests, 18 were won by Democrats. Summit Cty still leans towards democrats but not equality apparently. Hmm...
I also noticed that the local bar can now sell alcohol on Sundays.
Once more, I present you with the search terms people have used to find my website. It's like a randomly generated top ten list.
1. arguments against gay marriage - well, i suppose you'll find those here too
2. how to make methamphetamines - this one will be with me forever. The recipe is not here.
3. what makes people excited - I'm sure there are many things that excite people that you won't find here...
4. pee poo naa - huh?
5. pee on floor - see #4
6. lunies - yeah, those were the ones that typed in "pee poo naa"
7. b00bs - do people really spell it with the zeros?
8. swiss coffee paint - I had no idea it was so popular
9. lexus holiday commercials - they're back, and I still don't like them
and number ten:
"suck gay nipple"
Today while gay and lesbian Ohioans are expressly forbidden from getting married, their straight counterparts are brushing it off. According to many political groups, marriage is the foundation of our society and the reason for civilization. How dare people not get married and risk the destruction of our nation!
Since 1960 couples have been waiting longer to get married. It must have been the hippie love and weed that made them abstain from holy matrimony. These days there are many excuses. Some experts say that people are focusing on education and careers before starting families. What good is an education if you don't have a family to support anyway? What good is a career if you don't have a husband or wife to share it with?
One woman stated that, "People want to be more sure that they don't make a marriage mistake." Previous generations have been making marriage mistakes since the dawn of the great institution, and civilization has not fallen. The only marriage mistake would be to have children out of wedlock. Otherwise, just pick someone and marry them. You'll at least have a nice party with your family. And if worst comes to worst, then divorce is awfully easy these days. Then you can get married again!
Many people are living together in sin in these modern times. Couples often live together for years before tying the knot. One marriage opponent stated, "I don't know how people got married before living together first. This is crucial to see how you get along." It is not crucial. If you're not that compatible, just suck it up and deal with it. Everyone says the grass is greener elsewhere. Who cares if you're not compatible. The important thing is making marriage happen to keep our society strong. We must demonstrate our moral courage if we are to prevail in a tumultuous world.
Some are blaming their divorced parents for their cautious approach to marriage. Just like this generation to blame everything on upbringing. Their parents got divorced, but the children go on with their lives - there's no reason to halt ones life because of previous experience. That's just not rational thinking. Besides, marriage isn't all that permanent anymore. You can divorce if you want to.
Here's what's really important - marriage. It doesn't matter if you're truly in love or not. We must protect marriage from evil forces that seek to corrupt it's very nature. The union of a man and a woman is the basic building block of civilization. If people wait too long, there may not be any civilization left to get married in - especially if those promiscuous gay couples start moving out of Massachusetts.
A freaky thing happened today. While everyone was at work this morning and grandma was at home by herself, she got a phone call. The person asked for her by name, and then told her she was calling because I was dead. Grandma asked who she was, and the woman gave her a name that she didn't recognise. After that the woman hung up on her.
Later the same woman called back and asked for Grandma again by name. At this point I think Grandma wanted to get to the bottom of this. It turns out that this woman is looking for a relative with the same last name. Her husband had died recently, and the way she said his name (in a very quiet voice) sounded like mine. I think Grandma was relieved when I got home from work.
I'm so glad it got sorted out before anyone else got a call. Craziness...
I heard a radio talk show host today ask why we have a World AIDS Day. Because so many have died, and we need to remember them. Because so many have worked so hard to prevent the disease from its continued spread. And because enough is (still) not being done.
