Making baby Jesus cry for over 2000 years...

%5 of My Ebay Buyers Need to DIAF.

I have been selling items on Ebay for over 10 years.  (ouch! has it really been that long, yikes!)  During that time I’ve communicated with and sold items to a lot of people.  I’ve had conversations with some of them, I’ve made a lot of people happy.  I’ve made some mistakes and I’ve had some customers who have made mistakes.  95% of the people I’ve dealt with are good people and I’ve been happy to do business with them.  It’s that other 5% that make me stabby.  There was a time where I was a very patient and accommodating seller (it was a brief time, but it happened nonetheless).  Now… not so much, and here are a few reasons why:

 

I spend a bunch of time cleaning an item, photographing it, listing it, answering questions, sending invoices, paying fees, etc.  During the listing part I put in the weight of the item and add $1 handling fee.  This fee off-sets the cost of packaging tape, labels, envelopes, etc, as well as the final value fees that Ebay charges on SHIPPING AND HANDLING.  (That’s right, fuck you Ebay, this is your fault.)  This total shipping cost is presented to the buyer up front, they know before they bid that they have to pay it.

 

So this lady buys some old stickers from me.  She emails me all excited that she won them and how awesome they are and how cool they will look in her collection.  She pays right away.  I pack the item right away, carefully.  I put it in a plastic baggie, wrap it up nice and tight and tape it flat to the bottom of a small box and ship it out with tracking number and think “Gee, she’ll be happy to see how well I’ve protected this 60  year old piece of paper when it arrives” and move on to my next package.

 

You can guess where this is going, right?  Do ya think she admired my handiwork? Fuck no.

 

She leaves the following feedback:

 

“3 stickers could be mailed in an envelope for significantly less than $2.71”

 

…

 

WTF?  She was happy!?  I don’t get it, so I’m sure that most powersellers who are concerned about keeping their customers happy would email her apologizing and offering to refund some money.  I’m pretty sure that’s what she was expecting, but I’m not one of those Powersellers.  Here is the email that I sent (the first part is kinda boring, it’s that last line that added that little something extra):

 

“I don’t understand, you were happy about the “unusual” item when you purchased it, & now you are unhappy about shipping charges after I went above & beyond to make sure that they arrived safely, in a timely fashion. I was up front about the shipping charges before you purchased the item, they were fully disclosed in the listing, I didn’t force you to bid. I don’t send things in flat envelopes, you want to know why? Because for one thing, I cannot purchase postage online for flat envelopes. That means I have to make a special trip to the post office ON MY LUNCH BREAK, pay to park, stand in line, & then hope that nothing happens to that envelope when I put it in the mail without any kind of tracking information. If something DID happen to it who would be the one that would get all the blame? That’s right, ME. So forgive me for charging a REASONABLE amount to ship securely in a box. I guess I should have just taped it to the back of a post card & hoped for the best. Merry Christmas“

 

I should have ended it with “eat shit and die” but decided against it, seeing as how it’s so close to Christmas and all.  I wouldn’t even be that mad about it if it weren’t for Ebay’s new star rating system.    This bitch gave me a low star rating which hurts the amount of “discount” I receive on their super-high selling fees.  (The more I think about it, the more I’m considering going back and adding the “eat shit and die” part, hrmm...).  I am only allowed to have 2 people out of thousands think that my shipping costs are too high before I get my discount taken away.  I already had 2 of those people from earlier this year, they were about to scroll off the end of the list and now I have another one.  Next time I’m charging you $45 for the loss of my discount, Bitch.

 

Then I have this other cheap ass bastard email me after bidding on something but before paying  (this is an international buyer, so his star ratings don’t count, but it still pissed me off because again, the costs were presented up front AND because the guy is a douche):

 

“Good Morning
I have received an invoice for the two slides which I won this past weekend. The shipping costs are listed at $5.75 when the actual postage is $.80. I can understand an amount slightly higher than 80 cents to cover the cost of an envelope but I am not sure how you are justifying $5.75. I’m happy if you place them between two pieces of cardboard and place them in an envelope. eBay’s policy is that shipping should be the reasonable actual cost of shipping. It is not intended that the vendor profit from shipping. $1.50 is what most vendors charge. Please advise.”

 

Now, again I wanted to reply with “eat shit and die“, but seeing as how I didn’t want to have to relist the item,  I tried not to be too much of a bitch right away, so I stuck with this:

 

“I package everything in boxes with delivery confirmation or if it’s an international shipment, it gets a custom’s form (with a tracking number). If I don’t provide delivery confirmation to Ebay, my shipments are not covered by ebay’s seller policy. I am at work right now, so I will see how the invoice was calculated when I get home, but I am entitled (as per Ebay’s policy) to charge a handling fee, so I wouldn’t expect this package will go much below $4.00. Ebay also doesn’t require me to combine shipping, that is a courtesy that I’ve extended to you. Just a reminder, you agreed to the shipping costs when you bid on the item. They were presented to you up front.”

 

And then the asshole comes back with:

 

“I fully understand that the shipping cost was stated in your ad and if it comes down to it, I am, of course, obligated and prepared to pay that amount.

I am, however, asking you to reconsider. I do not need two slides to be shipped in a box. I have found that if it looks like a parcel it travels like one, which can take up to 4 weeks from the U.S. even if first class postage has been applied. If it is put in an envelope and it looks like letter it comes through in a week or less. No declaration required. I also don’t require tracing. Had I paid over $100 dollars for the image, I might feel otherwise, but I only paid $12.00 for both slides. If you could simply put the slides between two pieces of card stock (some vendors cut up cereal boxes) I would be happy with that.

Excluding yourself I paid 6 vendors this morning for slides I won over the weekend. The shipping and handling costs varied from a low of $1.25 to a high of $2.50; with the overall average being $1.66

Give it some thought, and see whether you can do something for me,

Yours sincerely,  xxx”

 

Oh. Hell. No.  

 

My reply this time could have come directly from one of these blog-rants (again, the sentences at the end are the kickers):

 

“Sigh,

I really dislike arguing, I understand your point, but I’d like to share with you my point of view.

1. If I mail a package without a tracking number and it doesn’t arrive *I* am responsible for that package, Ebay holds me responsible, I have no seller protection at that point, you get 100% $ back. Buyer’s have ALL SORTS of protection, Sellers have very little.

2. If I mail a package containing merchandise WITHOUT a customs form, I am breaking a Federal Law. If I get caught, I could be in a lot of trouble. Even if I put them in a regular envelope, by law I am required to put a customs form on it.

3. If I mail this package with first class mail in an envelope, I cannot print shipping out online. I have to drive down to the post office over my lunch break, pay to park and then stand in line and wait to pay for it. The post office closes at 4:30 and I work until 5, so lunch time is the only possible time for me to go. I generally print all of my shipping labels at home and my wonderful Mailman, Terry, picks my packages up for me while I’m at work. However, in the past before that service was an option (and before my son was born) I had to go to the post office all the time. They know me down there, quite well. They know if I am coming in there over lunch that it’s merchandise and will expect to put a customs form on it, because I don’t ever mail anything else.

So in a nutshell, in order to save approximately $2, you are asking me to a.) completely put my faith in the US and Canadian postal services and hope for the best when I mail this out with no tracking, b.) Commit a Federal Offense, and c.) Give up my lunch break and pay to park my car.

Is there anything else you’d like? My first born’s name is Spencer, should I hand him over to you as well? Do you need a kidney? I am not profiting off of my shipping charges, Ebay charges the same final value fee on shipping as the item cost, there’s no reason to do that. I am simply following the rules.”

 

Again, what I should have said was “FUCK YOU ASSHOLE“, but I didn’t need to, because after that whole bit about the kidney and delivering my kid to him he didn’t respond to me anymore, he just went in and paid the damn shipping like he should have done in the first place.   (and might I add, he’s bid on more of my items after that, he knows I have the goods, but he keeps his bitch mouth shut now)

 

And then about a week after that I get 3 assholes in the same number of days who bought something and then decided immediately that they “didn’t want” it.  Fuck all 3 of you.

 

Asshat #1:  ”Hi,could you,please, cancel the agreement abouth BARBIE Vintage 1982 Mattel Angel Face ?I am sorry,but i cannot pay these money .thanks”

 

If I could have driven to florida and punched her in the face, I would have.  For these kinds of people I generally try to make them feel as guilty as possible by telling them that if they don’t pay for it, my 3 kids are going to starve.  It had never actually worked before, but I always try.  She came back with:

 

“Hi, I understand that this is for you a way to keep his family and respect him but I can’t spend all this money to make you want a barbie. I want to tell you something that maybe you don’t know: If you cancel a transaction by submitting the request to the reviews the seller does not pay to ebay no insertion fee.if you don’t believe me you can ask customer services , sorry ,have a nice day .”

 

I love how these assholes try to explain to ME how Ebay’s fee structure works.  Bitch, I know how it works, I don’t want my sellers fees back, I want my fucking $130!  The simple fact that she knew how the system worked so well convinces me that this isn’t the first time she’s done this, so I made sure that bitch got a non-paying buyer strike.    I had to relist the doll and only got $30 for it the next time, which is exactly what I expected to happen.  I should mail her a piece of dogshit…

 

Then the next day I get Asshat #2:  ”hello,
I’m very sorry for inconvenience but I’ve changed my mind, and I do not want to buy this item, would you please help me out to retract my last bid if possible,
best regards,”

 

WTF IS WRONG WITH  YOU PEOPLE!?!?!  The auction is over, so no, I can’t retract your goddamn bid and I’m not going to either.  I emailed the bastard and told him if he didn’t pay he was getting the non-paying bidder strike.

 

Then he tried begging:

 

“hello,
Yes I really understand you and you’re totally right, I just have to accept that the bidding I’ve made was just out of my buying power, I just made a high bidding, very unthoughtful, in a hurry, I should have bid for what I’m willing to pay, I accept my fault,I’ll really appreciate if you please retract my bidding for this time, I’m very very sorry and you’re very right.
Best regards,”

 

When that didn’t work, he tried bargaining with me:

 

“God, I’m terribly sorry or this situation, I feel very very bad, the max amount I was willing to pay was about $50-55 for this item, I can happily submit this amount and plus shipping if there is any way to do it OR, If you’d like I can pay you this total of $84 as including shipping to Turkey via Registered/Signed mail, let me know if that will work for you, and then maybe there is no need to cancel the bid, (registered shipping for small items is usually $22 to Turkey)
Best Regards,”

 

What?  Fuck you.  I told him this was an auction, not a negotiation and to go screw himself  (I didn’t use those words exactly, but he got the point) & he was still getting the non-paying bidder strike.  I also pointed out (as I like to do) that once he gets 2 of those strikes, most sellers will  block him from bidding on their stuff.

 

This is when he decided to go all after-school special on me and tell me that he’d learned his lesson and won’t do it again, like I give a fuck about what he does to other sellers.  I want my goddamn $84…

 

“You’re totally right, I’ve made a mistake, and a miscalculation when bidding, you have the right to punish, but like I said I’m very sorry about this situation and had you into it, I’ll appreciate if you do not go with the strike for this time, like I said it was wrong bidding with miscalculation, it is my fault, and people can do mistakes in some occasions, I accept I’m not perfect, and very sorry and learned from my mistake and will be more careful when bidding on ebay,
best regards,”

 

I wasn’t biting, I stood firm and gave him the starving children speech…

 

AND IT WORKED.  The first time in history the starving children speech worked!:

 

“I see…I hope that will help financially, I paid for the item, please send via REGISTERED/SIGNED mail,
regards,”

 

HAH!  He even paid for me to send it registered mail so I have signature proof that it was delivered.  That was the first time I’ve ever been able to bully someone into paying for something, ahhh, sweet sweet victory.

 

Asshat #3 thought that she got away with it, but she really didn’t…

 

It started simply enough with a question before she bid:

 

“I live in France.
Do you offer reduced shipping if I buy multiple items?
Thanks for your answers!”

 

I was all “Sure, no problem.”  Then the auctions end.

 

“I don’t understand ! I’ve placed a bid of 32 dollars on each skipper and I won only one skipper??!”

 

The skippers ended around $24, so obviously she didn’t bid on both of them, she just thought she did because she was smoking too much crack or something, regardless I knew where it was heading…

 

“I’ll have to ask to cancel my bid …
The sale was interesting for me if I could combine it with another object. In this case, it is too expensive with the shipping …
I am disappointed!
And the person who won the first skipper will be happy: Make her an offer. She will accept.
Arg, I’m so disappointed.
Ebay can not do anything for me, I am seller myself, and it’s too complicated.
I was told $ 32 maximum per doll, and there I see that the first was won in 20.50.
What do you think? We cancel the auction?

Otherwise, you can cancel the sale with the person who won the skipper blonde … And I sell it at 25 dollars!
;)
…
I know it is wrong but I always ask;)
Thank you for your answers.”

 

After that we went through the starving children/non-paying bidder strike argument for a while (It was several emails, I’ll spare you from those).  And then we arrived at:

 

“You are not a good trader.
So I hesitate …
What do I prefer? …
Do not pay and have a bad point?
Or pay and make you a bad evaluation?
I do not know …

It’s a shame.”

 

Neat.  Feedback extortion.  I sent her message to Ebay and reported her.  Later on I did manage to get her to change her mind and pay for the damn thing, but by that point I had sweet talked the back up bidder into buying it, so it was already sold.  I had to cancel her bid, but I still had the satisfaction of having reported the feedback extortion.  They won’t tell me if they did anything about it, and they probably didn’t, but it still felt good…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Car-to-Car Missiles Should Come Factory Standard (Part 1)

So I live in a small town that just so happens to have a heavily trafficked 4 lane highway running through the center of it.  There are a lot of people who just drive through on their way to somewhere else (I like these people), but there are also a lot of local people driving up and down the damn road all damn day. ( I don’t like these people.)

 

You know why I don’t like them?  Is it because they drive too fast and are constantly weaving in and out of traffic?  Blowing through red lights and stop signs?  No, I wish.  According to my estimates, at least 87% of the population of this town is comprised of defensive drivers.  Do you know what happens when you get that many submissive people together in the same place in automobiles?  I’ll tell you what happens.  It pisses the offensive drivers off to no end.  (We are the 13 Percent!)

 

These goddamn people insist upon driving in the right goddamn lane, no matter what.  There could be a dead fucking body laying across the right hand lane and they’d all drive over it before moving over to the left.  There could be a little old lady doing 13 mph in the right hand lane and she’d have 50 goddamn people lined up behind her and a completely open left lane.  The only people in this town that use the left lane are me, my immediate family and all the people who are driving through from out of town.  (Unless it’s fucking snowing.  Then they apparently get all confused and get themselves out there in the left lane and can’t find their way back to the right lane, thus creating a moving road block.  Assholes.)

 

Here’s where you say “Why is this a problem?  You should be happy they’re letting you have the fast lane.”  While a lot of the time that’s the case, sometimes I feel like I should be allowed to blast cars out of my way with some type of incendiary device .

 

Like when I’m trying to get onto the damn highway from a parking lot or a side street.  They all have the little merging lanes so that I (in theory) should be able to make a right turn with relative ease.  There is plenty of wide open road where the right hand traffic can see someone needs to merge, but do you think those fuckers would move the hell over to the left hand lane for a few moments and let someone in?  HELLS NO.  I’ve already sat there while 25-30 cars who have no real urgent need to be in the right lane drive past in a single file line with a completely open left lane.  They see me sitting there, trying to get in, but will they move over for a moment?  No.  I hate these asshats soooOOOoooooo much.

 

How fucking hard is it to move over to the other lane and let someone merge???  I do it all the time!  You see someone trying to get out, you move over, unless you need to make an immediate right turn.  It’s not rocket science people!  It’s to the point now where I start evaluating the cars that are trying to merge before I let them in.  ”Does this look like one of those assholes from the other day that made me sit and wait for an extra 4 minutes to get out of the grocery store parking lot?”  If I think they look like an asshole I don’t let them in anymore, eye for an eye bitches.

 

No one’s safe from these assclowns on the secondary roads either.  There are a few 4-way stops that are heavily trafficked.  I encounter them multiple times every day and it’s always a treat.  There’s nothing more “special” than having 4 defensive drivers meet up at a 4-way stop.  The rules of stop sign right of way are not difficult people, if you got there first, you go through the stop sign first and then it goes in a circle to the right and traffic flows smoothly.  Not with these assholes.  It turns into this fucking non-verbal argument of over-politeness EVERY SINGLE FUCKING TIME!

 

Every goddamn one of them sits there waving the other ones through.  It looks like a bunch of retards trying to hump a doorknob! (That’s a movie quote, so I’m allowed to say retard).  They’re all sitting there flapping their arms at each other, it’s like watching bees have a conversation:

 

“No, no, you go first.”

“Oh, no,  no, after YOU!”

“No, no, I went first yesterday, it’s your turn today.”

“Well I’m not going through until you do, so you might as well just go.”

“Is that Nancy?… Honey, I think that’s Nancy.  HI NANCY!… Honey, let her go first, she’s such a nice lady, did you hear what happened to her husband… it’s a real shame…”

 

And then the real magic happens.  They all end up trying to go through at the same goddamn time.  Then they all stop and repeat this process 3 times before SOMEONE finally decides it’s ok to enter the fucking intersection.  And this happens EVERY FUCKING TIME A NEW CAR SHOWS UP!  The original 3 invite the new guy in like it’s some kind of fucking Elks club or something, they have a whole waving initiation ceremony and everything.  *I* am one of few people in town who hasn’t completed the waving ceremony.  I won’t fucking wave anyone through a stop sign anymore, I know where it leads.  When I get to a stop sign and there are 3 people sitting there waiting, I don’t even bother looking at them, I just blow through the fucking thing.  Half the time they don’t even realize someone went through they’re so busy flapping at each other.

 

And 2 people at a stop sign isn’t much better.  I’ve already had situations where I could see someone pull up to a stop sign 1/2 block away and then wait for me to get to the stop sign JUST SO THEY COULD WAVE ME THROUGH!  What the fuck?! Seriously!? Is there like a points system that I’m not aware of?  Like do you get to go to some higher level of traffic heaven if you wave a certain number of people through stop signs?  These people I like to fuck with.  I sit there and do the “no, no, you go” thing until I bully them into crossing the god damn street.  I don’t care if it takes an hour and a half and I’m on my way to the emergency room, that fucker is taking their goddamn turn, they’ll never learn without tough love.

 

And then we have the joy of the heavily trafficked one lane in each direction roads.  I just love these ones.  Particularly when there are passing zones.  You know why?  Because apparently “passing zone” means “accelerate like you’re trying to go back to the fucking future”.  These assholes will drive 35 in a 55 for miles and miles until we hit a passing zone and then they fucking floor it.  And since passing zones last like 1/2 mile at best, we’re back to 35 mph before I have a chance to finish my stream of obscenities.

 

It’s like a bonus when it’s a teenager who’s texting the whole damn time.  We’re on a narrow farm road with a bunch of hairpin turns and rapid changes in elevation and these little bastards are weaving all over the goddamn place LOL’ing with their BFFs.  I’ve considered following them to their destinations just so that I can watch their parents beat the shit out of them when I tell them what they’ve been doing.  One of these days I shall seek my revenge, but the problem is generally if I’m on that road I’m actually trying to GET SOMEWHERE.  I don’t have time to discipline you people’s goddamn teenagers.  If I had it my way I’d pull their asses over and beat them right there on the side of the road and take the fucking cell phone away.  (I could use a new one anyway…)

 

This post makes me feel like going out to find a puppy to kick, thus ends Part 1.  You’ll have to wait on the edge of your seats with bated breath for Part 2, coming soon…

There’s No Sex in your Violence…

So I’m at Walmart (Mecca of Stupidity) yesterday with The Boy.  We’re rooting through the $5 DVD bin alongside a lady with her 2 kids (Approx. 10 year old boy and 13 year old girl).  So they’re contemplating the movie “Orphan“.  I listened to the dialog for a few seconds then felt the need to intervene, I couldn’t let them waste $5 on this movie.  So I told them if they were dead set on seeing it, they’d be much better off spending the $1 at RedBox because although it wasn’t the worst movie I’ve ever seen (that would be A.I. starring the once-a-cute-kid-now-creepy-looking-adult Haley Joel Osmitt), I certainly won’t be watching it again, it was so damned predictable that I really thought I had developed psychic powers by the time it was over.  (Warner Bros. totally owes me $1000 for the lotto tickets I ran out and bought afterwards)…
At any rate, they were all “Gee, thanks for the heads up!” and I’m all “No problem”.  They then proceeded to ask me about several other movies in the bin, most of which I’d never seen, but apparently since I’d seen that one movie I was some kind of grand supreme movie god in their eyes, so I was polite (surprising, HUH?) and answered what I could (who am I kidding, I didn’t want to admit I hadn’t seen them, so I made shit up.  Hell, yeah, Scooby Doo vs. the Zombies, wasn’t that up for an Emmy last year, it kicked ass!).  It’s not everyday you manage to awe perfect strangers into accepting your opinion of $5 movies as if you were some kind of super hero, so I was enjoying the ride.

 

So I’m noticing that they are basically shopping for straight up horror movies.  That’s cool with me, I’m a fan of the genre myself, the fact that the kids were 10 and 13 didn’t bother me because I’m most likely one of few people who’ve had the pleasure of watching Nightmare on Elm Street before my seventh birthday.  (Credit to my parents:  they weren’t the ones who let me watch it, I watched it at a neighbor’s house, my friend’s dad was the crazy fun dad of the neighborhood, he was awesome… I had nightmares for weeks, my mom threatened to make him keep me at his house until I got over it.  As a result, I’m completely desensitized to that stuff now, thanks Sooty! :) ) .  As I’m listening to the dialog between the 3 of them, I hear the mom say something about “You can’t watch that one, it has a bad scene in it.”  I’m thinking “Ok, that must be a really over the top bad horror movie with an unnecessary rape scene thrown in, like The Hills have Eyes or something…” but then she proceeds to say it has a sex scene in it, and they aren’t allowed to watch sex scenes.

 

Ok, wait, she’s talking about straight up sex scenes?  Like regular R rated rolling around half naked, maybe a little boob-age, but no peener scenes?

 

I had talked to the 13 year old, we had shared a moment discussing our love for the SAW movie franchise, the movies where people are killed in the most painful, slow and horrible manner as is possible all the while showing the viewers all the gory details in full on Technicolor with Dolby Digital.  The movies where a guy actually had to saw his own foot off with a hacksaw to finally escape after being handcuffed to a pipe in a dirty bathroom for days with a dead body (ok, spoiler, it wasn’t really dead!).  Then there was the scene with the 2 guys and a table saw tug of war, if you haven’t seen it, I’ll spare you the details (although it really was awesome, I thought it was hilarious, the bitch totally deserved it).

 

Her mom was totally cool with her watching all of that, and apparently the 10 year old had seen some of this stuff too.  But according to this “you aren’t allowed to watch sex scenes” rule, the beginning of the DVD version of Wedding Crashers is off limits?  No Pretty Woman?  Hell even Titanic had some steamy-window action.

 

I didn’t think much of it while I was standing there because I was mostly paying attention to The Boy (He kept filling the cart with crappy B movies and trying to convince me to buy him some Blues Clues video and wasn’t taking “We’ll ask Santa” for an answer), so it wasn’t until later when I got home that I started thinking “Hey…. Wait a minute…”.

 

That woman was totally cool letting two very impressionable adolescents watch serial killers slice and dice helpless innocent victims with blood and gore all over the place but had put a moratorium on watching two people go through the perfectly natural process of attempting to create new life? (haha, yeah, I know that’s not why they’re really doing it, but we don’t have to tell the kids that…)  Does this mean it’s ok for the kids to grow up homicidal maniacs as long as they don’t have sex before marriage?  I don’t get it.   ”Go out and kill as many people as you need to, but don’t you dare come home pregnant!”  Does that mean she’s a Republican?  (This isn’t the start of some political feud, I’m a registered independent, I make fun of everybody.)

 

I wish I’d have thought to ask her that before I left the store, because I’m not sure she really thought that one through, and if she had, I’d have loved to hear her explanation.  I imagine it would have gone something like this:  ”… <blank stare> … <crickets chirping> … uh, ummm,… well, you see…“.

 

As a parent I am completely aware that my beautiful little baby is going to grow into a horny teenage boy some day.  I know he’s going to go out of his way to try to touch a boob and will look through JC Penney catalog bra sections if he has to just to catch a glimpse of some cleavage.   Am I comfortable with it?  Not really, I don’t think there are many parents out there who want to think about their kid’s “private time”, but the feeling is mutual, the kids don’t want the details of their parents private moments either, so we’re pretty much even in that respect.  One thing is for sure though, I’d be far less horrified walking in on him watching RedTube wearing nothing but his socks and a box of tissues than I would walking in on him dismembering the old lady who lives next door. (It is kind of fun to imagine that conversation though…”Trust me mom, she had it coming, I swear!” “Damnit, look at my new carpet, how many times have I told you to do this shit this in the garage?!?  This is totally coming out of your allowance!”  Classic.)

 

My point is, both are “Oh, gee, I guess I should have knocked…” moments, but one of them carries accessory after the fact charges and hefty legal fees, the other just makes it a little difficult to hold eye contact for a few days.

 

So what the hell is going through this woman’s head, that’s what I want to know. Obviously if these kids are mature enough to watch someone get cut in half long ways they should be able to handle a little slap and tickle.  Loosen up Lady, expand your horizons, go rent Hot Tub Time Machine or 9 1/2 weeks or something and have some fun, make Love, not War for a while. I realize the planet is over populated, but even Dexter will postpone a kill for an easy BJ.  And after all, our goal as parents is to make sure the kids are well rounded.  If you’re going spend Family Movie Night watching something inappropriate, you might as well go all the way, because you know damn well the second they get to their friends’ houses the little bastards are totally going to ignore you and watch that shit anyway, so really you’re just censoring yourself.

And so it begins…

So I signed a petition on Change.org once…  Now I get emails all the time asking me to sign more petitions (I equate it to petting a stray kitten, now it won’t leave me alone).  If I’m in the mood and it seems like a valid cause, I’ll click their links, but most of the time I ignore them, I mean who really cares about prisoners on death row or starving children, right? (I’m not serious people, don’t send me hate mail!)  So I’m going through my email today and for the second time this week I’ve gotten an email urging me to sign a petition to support some guy whining that Target is opening at midnight on Thanksgiving day and he’s not going to get to spend time with his family because he has to go in to work…

Really?  That’s all it takes to initiate a global petition?  (I thought for sure there would have to be some sort of screening process for these petitions.  Someone remind me later to start a petition for them to bring back Crystal Pepsi).  So, I know it’s going to piss me off, but I click the link anyway telling myself surely there has to be more to this story, (like they’re stripping him naked and making him carry groceries to peoples’ cars for tips, and in doing so he has no where to put the money, so he has to carry the dirty singles in his mouth, eww!) but sadly I’m mistaken, that is the whole story.

Out of curiosity, I read through their list of petitions:  ”Death row inmate wants DNA test, Tell Ecuador to stop raping/torturing LGBT people in fake clinics, Stop a live fucking bull from being set on fire in Spain, etc”  then you see this asshole whining because he has to go to work a few hours earlier than usual in his nice warm, well lighted, clean, and comfortable working environment.  And it’s at the top of the list.  AND his damn petition has MORE SIGNATURES THAN THE OTHERS!?!?.

WTF is wrong with you people?  Seriously, if you’ve signed this you need some kind of mental evaluation or a punch to the throat.

Sure, it sucks to have to work on a holiday, and by all means, complain to your coworkers, I know *I* would.  Hell, get a group together and have a great big pity party in the break room, but a petition?  Screw you.  Your ass should have thought of this before you signed up to work in Retail.  Hindsight is 20/20, maybe you should have smoked a little less weed and gone to college or trade school or something dude. Do you see any firemen, doctors, nurses or SHEETZ employees whining like a little bitch?  How about our service men and women overseas who are not only dodging freaking IEDs and eating freeze dried turkey product on Thanksgiving, but also haven’t seen their families in months or longer?  And you’re complaining because you’re going to miss out on 3 hours of after-dinner family bickering with people you most likely see everyday and are only pretending to like you anyway (poor bastards)?

Grow up dude and stop with the “It’s my RIGHT AS AN AMERICAN” bullshit.  There’s  nothing about “Thou Shalt Not Work On Thanksgiving”  written into the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, I checked.

The unemployment rate is really high right now, there are most likely a hundred people waiting to take your crappy PART TIME  job if you don’t want to do it (btw, let me just tell you how much more the fact that he’s only a part time employee pissed me off, I can’t quantify it, but it was definitely a higher level of pissed-offed-ness than usual),  people who would be thankful for the overtime and extra pay during the cold weather months/Christmas shopping season.  I mean, it’s THANKSGIVING for Christ sake, it’s not like it’s Super Bowl Sunday.  You can’t even hide behind religion on this one.

Plus who says you can’t spend time with your family?  You have all damn day to spend  with your family, the store doesn’t open ’till midnight, genius.  So eat your damn turkey mid-day, chill for a few hours, take a little nap and then go to work and do a passive-aggressive half-assed job like the rest of us would.  (Actually, the rest of us are going to be resting up to go shopping, this midnight thing is sounding better and better all the time…)

There are little kids in sweat shops somewhere working around the clock making like 5 cents a month to make the damn products that end up in these big box stores (Yo Target, I’m not calling you out on this, I’m just saying it happens, I read it on the internet somewhere so it has to be true…) and this is what people are up in arms about?  Really?  Assholes.

So I read this updated message today only to find out that since the last email I got, the media has picked up the story and now there are LENGTHY fucking news articles about this, IN SUPPORT OF THIS GUY?!  Am I being punked here?  Seriously, is Ashton Kutcher going to like fly around the country in a hot air balloon with a megaphone yelling “AHAHHAH!  GOT YA!  YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN THE LOOK ON YOUR FACE!!”  If that’s not the case, then maybe this idiot should sign up for a tour in Afghanistan so he has something real to complain about.

All that having been said, am I working on Thanksgiving?  Fuck  no.  I not only have Wednesday afternoon, Thursday and Friday off, but I’m being paid for it too.  I’m totally hitting Target at midnight Bro, see ya there…

Once upon a time…

… long long long ago there lived a race of people who were gifted with common sense and personal accountability. Everyone lived in relative harmony following rules and taking care of themselves and their responsibilities. Then one day a child was born and this child’s mother lost her damn mind and declared “Oh! Such a beautiful and perfect child as this shall not be meant to follow the rules of the land! No, this child is SPECIAL!” And she repeated that over and over until other people started agreeing with her just to get her to shut the hell up. Once that happened, other crazy ass women came forward and said the same thing of their children and then it just fucking ballooned out of control to the point that all the little children in the village were miserable little sons of bitches that no rational adult wanted to get anywhere near. The mothers thought they were the absolute angels, but the rest of the villagers were starting to see them for the insufferable little brats that they were. For some goddamn reason no one wanted to point out that these women were were going bat shit crazy and put a stop to it while there was still a chance. Fast forward to the year 2011 and now the entire race is plagued by RAMPANT STUPIDITY.

Ok, ok, that was the lamest story ever and how about that punch line, huh? See how I worked that in there? See, see! Oh I must think I’m SooOooOOOOoooo clever. I really don’t, I just started typing and that kinda happened. I’ll try not to do it again, but no promises. I never claimed to be a good story teller, I am an excellent typist though… At any rate, the reason I’ve created this website is for a non-violent outlet for my frustrations with the human race in my day to day life. I pride myself in having (what I feel) is an above average amount of common sense and it just pains me when I encounter people who seemingly don’t have any at all. I encounter a surprisingly LARGE quantity of these people on a regular basis so I should have plenty to share.

I know I can’t be the only one out there who’s wished for car to car missiles or who’s read at least one news article every single day that makes you seriously weigh the pros and cons of vigilantism. Has anyone else been to a Walmart lately? I swear that’s the Mecca of stupid people. I use the word stupid because it’s easy, but I am generally referring to people who are crude, that lack common sense and personal accountability. Those who shrug off their responsibilities and consider themselves the center of the universe. I have a great deal of sympathy for people who are actually just not smart, it’s these other bastards that have average intelligence levels but don’t show it that really grind my gears.