Stunslinger.com Blog

I thought of a few more, and decided I should add to my list of pet peeves:

• People who wear wireless ear pieces when they’re not talking on the phone.  At my last job, there was a woman who didn’t seem to realize that she could remove this wireless device from her head.  I don’t know why, but it’s horribly annoying to try and talk to someone with a blinking microphone attached to their ear.  Here’s a memo: It’s removable for a reason…remove it!
• Bicyclists who change between acting like cars and acting like people.  If you’re riding a bicycle on the road, I am more than happy to accommodate you.  I agree with the “see bicyclists” bumper stickers.  However, when I see a bike rider in my lane, and then he/she jumps into the crosswalk, I don’t know what to do.  I can’t say how many times I’ve nearly hit a bicyclist (well, I’ve never come closer than 5 feet, but in my mind it’s close) because they’ve randomly switched from riding under traffic rules to walking rules.  It’s not fair, and I’m peeved.
• People who park in lanes in a parking lot.  I saw this frequently in Salt Lake, and it always pissed me off.  These individuals actually think they’re so awesome they can block everyone’s way “because I’m only going in for a minute.”  Parking spaces don’t seem to contain them.  Often I’ve gone into the store, bought my items, and come out while they’re still “temporarily” parked in the lane.

My pet peeves include (but are not limited to):

• Anthropomorphized food in advertisements for food.  I don’t want to think that a cookie wants to be eaten, that’s downright disturbing.  And the commercial where cows are bothered by switching to soyjuice (I refuse to call it soymilk)?!  Yuck.
• Calling substances other than milk, milk.  That’s right, “coconut milk” is not milk.  “Soymilk” is not milk.  Buttermilk is milk, but it’s also disgusting.  I call these substances juices, as they are the juice of a vegetable.  If you hear me call the stuff I have on my cereal soyjuice, don’t try to correct me.  You are wrong, it is juice.
• Fad diets, diet pills, etc.  There is a proven way to lose weight: eat healthy and exercise.  I know, it’s a revolutionary concept.  I know it’s hard, I struggle with weight myself.  I have been called “big boned” and “healthy” too.  Still, I know that there’s one serious way to change my fitness level: making permanent changes to my eating habits and exercise levels.  That’s right, permanent changes.  Diets don’t work unless you make them permanent.  This is why so many people try 50 diets and end up fatter than before.  Eat more vegetables, fruits and lean meats.  Eat less prepared, fried, fatty, high sodium foods.  Get off the couch and move around.  I’m doing it, and I’m not exactly enjoying running yet, but I do it because I want to be healthy and to live longer for my sake and for my family.
• People who start arguments just to argue.  This is extremely prevalent on the internets.  Someone posts an incendiary statement, then others respond and the person makes more ridiculous statements.  I like discussions and debate.  I’ve actually changed my mind on topics, and changed some friend’s minds.  But that requires an honest debate, and these people aren’t after that.  Instead of acknowledging what a person says, they pick apart one small part of the statement and take the conversation in a wholly different direction.  This patterns seems to have carried itself all the way to our highest levels of government.
• Hippies.  I know it’s wrong and it’s rude, but I just don’t really like hippies.
• People who believe tearing someone else down makes them look good.  I’ve worked with some of these, been in school with others like this.  It’s ridiculous.  It may work in the short term, but in the end you end up alone and fired (hopefully).
• Spammers.  Need I say more?  This is inclusive of email, Myspace, popup ads, everywhere.  If I want something, I’ll go looking for it.  If I want my “pens xtended bey0nd 1mag1nat10n,” well, I wouldn’t want that anyway.
• People who write emails with txt message abbreviations.  No, I won’t C U L8r d00d.  It’s a computer with a full keyboard, use it.  It’s forgivable when using a cell phone to hastily enter a txt message, just because it’s so annoying to type out words on a cell phone.  But only then.  Note: LOL and other similar, descriptive abbreviations are acceptable in IM, simply because it sounds less ridiculous than typing, “I’m laughing out loud right now.”

It’s been a while since I ranted in a post.  Perhaps I have some pent up frustration.  I’ll never tell.

Last week I tweeted that my wife took the car in to get a new starter. For the past few weeks we’ve been having to finesse our starter. It began not starting properly, and we found certain tricks to get it going: primarily turning the key in the ignition v e r r y s l o w l y.

So anyway, we took it to Pep Boys because it was close. They said it would be done today likely, and they would call us when it is finished. This was good because my wife was off work today, but we both work tomorrow. It would be nice if we could both drive to work. We knew they closed at 9pm.

Before we knew it, it was 8:15pm and we hadn’t heard a thing. I called them at 8:30 and they said, “Oh, yeah it’s finished.” So we rushed over there, and were able to pick it up. The thing is, my wife asked why they didn’t call us when it was finished. They said they did call once, but our line was busy. They said that if it’s busy, they just wait for the customer to call in.

Really? That’s their policy? They said, “Usually it’s people on the internet and we have no idea when they’ll be off.” Right, or the person could just be on the phone briefly. I’m not saying they need to check back every five minutes until they reach someone, but couldn’t they try back at least one other time? Would it really be that difficult to wait 1/2 hour and then call back? I think not! It just seems like good business…but then again, I’m not a business person.

Oh yeah, then they parked it in their parking lot with all the windows down. I’m not saying we have a ton of stuff to steal, but come on!

No, I cannot.  It seems like as soon as people find out I’m a psychologist-in-training the next question is always, “Can you read my mind?”  Is this a common belief about mental health professionals, that we have some supernatural ability to see into a person’s mind?  Believe it or not, we actually are normal people without ESP who work hard to learn strategies to help people.  I wish I had ESP, it would make part of my job much easier!

Another one I get is, “are you analyzing me right now?”  This one is harder, because it seems as if people are somewhat distrusting of me.  They’re worried that I’m working my voodoo on them, and they don’t necessarily like this.  I guess this is actually related to the first question: if I have ESP and I’m using it on them, that’s a scary proposition.  Thankfully I’ve learned to have good boundaries.  When I walk out the door of work, I stop “analyzing” people.  I actually don’t want to sit around analyzing people…that’s part of my work.  When I’m at home or at a party, I just want to relax and have a good time.

Perhaps I sound a bit frustrated.  It’s true, I’m tired of hearing these questions.  I know people are just curious, but it’s tiring.  I don’t ask investment brokers if they’re sizing up my assets at a party (unless I think they’re hitting on me), and people don’t ask my wife if she’s evaluating their furniture at a party (she works at a consignment furniture store).  I guess it’s not as bad as physicians, who probably get asked to look at rashes or weird growths at parties.  Sigh.  I still love my job!

Enough complaining.

Sunday the wife and I used our New Every 2 program through Verizon to get new phones.  My old one had a horrible battery that died frequently, and rather than get a new battery, I opted for a new phone.  I got a Razr V3m because I like a very slim phone that is unobtrusive in my pocket (which my old phone wasn’t).  Seemed great, but tonight I’m taking it back, here’s why:

1. The battery life isn’t much better than my last phone.  I don’t know if this is a fluke, but it’s annoying.  My wife got a new LG Chocolate (the brand new smaller one) and just had to charge it for the first time this morning.  I had to charge mine Sunday night, and then again yesterday (Wednesday).
2. The external screen that shows the caller ID/time has tiny print, and horrible contrast.  Basically, if I try to look at it in daylight, I have a hard time reading it.  Thanks to Verizon, I can’t change anything about this screen.  Plus, it uses three colors (green, red, yellow) in the background that look washed out and the “black” writing is more like a dark gray.
3. I took a picture with the phone’s camera and tried to send it to myself in a PIX message (thanks for not enabling Bluetooth OBEX Verizon), and it wouldn’t work, despite having full service in my living room.
4. It’s purely a vanity thing, but there’s not much I can customize without hacking the phone.  My old one, a Motorola v710 which was great, let me pick different themes that changed menu colors and things.  Not on this one.

So these aren’t the biggest deals, but when it’s a brand new phone I’ll have for two more years, I don’t want to be this dissatisfied in my first week.  Thankfully Verizon has a good return policy, so I’m going to exchange it for the LG VX8700 tonight.  I’ll be upgrading an OK 1megapixel camera to a good 2megapixel one, theoretically better battery life, more customizeability, an external display that is readable in daylight (I checked my friend’s), and a phone without crippled Bluetooth.

So I logged in to my bank account to check my balances and I saw a “non-sufficient funds” notice.  What?  Then I noticed that a major deposit we made was “adjusted” out of my account before the money was to be transferred to my savings account.  So when the transfer came through, the money wasn’t there, and I got charged.  But it shouldn’t have been “adjusted” in the first place.  WHAT?!?

So I called customer service to get this straightened out.  Of course it rang through to what I’m sure is a call center in India.  The woman was nice enough, but unfortunately she wasn’t super helpful.  In fact she basically read to me the information I saw on the internet.  Helpful.  I agreed with the information she read me, and then she said she could open an investigation ticket.

Basically, I called them just to tell her what to write into a form.  I could have done this for myself in less time.  Amazing.

Luckily we had a good experience the only other time we had to contact WaMu.  Here’s hoping for another good experience.

As the title says, I have a love-hate relationship with programming.  Ever since I first started programming C++ years ago, my life has been plagued by minutiae.  There’s nothing quite like spending an hour trying to figure out why things aren’t working right, just to find a misplaced semicolon or misspelled variable name.

Tonight I had this issue, while sorting through a website I’m building with Wordpress as a CMS.  I used my own template to render a portfolio, and once I had the basic XHTML in place, I tried to add a CSS file.  Seems like a simple task, one I’ve done multiple times.

I’m working to implement frameworks in my work, so I fired up my reset and tabbed-navigation CSS files and saw….nothing.  WHAT?!  Usually when something like this happens, it means I added an extra “/” at the beginning, and it’s looking outside the folder where my CSS is.  No luck.  So then I viewed the CSS using the Web Developer extension in Firefox.  Instead of CSS, I saw XHTML.  Ok, now I’m confused.

Finally I gave in and used the Wordpress default: style.css.  I used their function to get the location of the CSS.  And it worked.  But I wasn’t happy.  Then I got up to get a snack and it hit me: I forgot to add the wp-content/themes/theme-name part to the filename.  How could I forget that!?  Well, I guess it is because I’m not used to building Wordpress sites, so I don’t have to worry about their folder structure.

But at the same time…it’s so rewarding when it works right!  This is why I spend my days working with people, in comparison to computers, they’re easy!

I was reading an article about this year’s Ozzfest being free to fans.  Apparently they’re having bands play for free and they have sponsors who are covering the travel costs of the festival.  The article was an interview with Sharon Osbourne, who said this move was a way to combat the inevitable rising cost of a traveling festival, which gets passed on to the ticket-buyers.

The reason I’m writing is the argument ticket companies used in the article to argue why this is a bad idea.  Their argument was that by offering the tickets for free, Ozzfest is being devalued.  They said that Ozzfest is a commodity which is worth something, and by not getting adequate compensation, Ozzfest is devalued.

Really?  I just don’t buy that argument at all.  If we really espouse that argument, the more we charge for something, the more valuable it is.  So, if Ozzfest wanted to be the best tour out there, they’d charge $250 per ticket.  Instant value, purely because of the ticket prices.  Wouldn’t most people argue that the value of a concert is determined by the bands playing, and what type of show they put on?  Or maybe the band’s music doesn’t sound as good when you haven’t paid for the opportunity to hear them.

I’m betting there’s another argument, one the ticket companies really can get behind: They don’t make any money on a free concert.  Of course they can’t say that because it’s bad PR.  But really, I doubt they care much about the “value” of the concert any more than the monetary value of each ticket.

I’m just sick of PR people spinning crap responses that don’t even make logical sense.  Free concerts devalue the bands playing?  Please.

A friend of mine is moving to Utah in a month and we’re trying to help him get a good rental house.  My friend has a few needs, primary among these is a secure place to park his motorcycle.  Unfortunately, garages are not the most common part of houses around here.  Back in Oregon, it’s extremely common, but not here in Salt Lake.  Perhaps it’s because the weather is so rainy back home, and so consistently nice here, or maybe not.

For whatever reason, it is less common to find a place with enclosed parking here than in Oregon.  So we’ve been looking on craigslist and asking the people we know for recommendations.  My friend found a place that advertised 100 square feet of extra storage, which seemed perfect for motorcycle parking.

He contacted the guy renting it, and asked if he could look at the place when he visits SLC tomorrow.  Now, he’s flying out here to look for housing from another state.  But the guy emailed him back, saying they’re in a mighty hurry to get the place rented and couldn’t he come look at it sooner?  Sure, he’ll just pay a few hundred extra dollars to change his plane tickets because you want to get the place rented sooner.  The guy prattled on about having so many applications and really needing to have it rented ASAP.

So we agreed to go look at it for my friend.  I emailed the landlord Monday evening to set up a viewing time.  I said I had to work 13 hours on Tuesday, so would have to come see it Wednesday after work.  The guy emailed back talking about “sooner the better” and all the applications they have.  I said I needed to spend a minute or two with my wife before falling into bed, so it’d have to wait.  He said “well, if it’s important, I can still meet you Tuesday.”  Of course it’s important, enough with the guilt trip!  At this point, if it were up to me I would’ve just blown the guy off.  I just don’t respond well to this high pressure sales tactic.  If you have so many applications, you don’t need to rush me in, because you have all of these other options!

Needless to say we ended up viewing the place on Wednesday evening.  Again he kept reiterating the “stack” of applications, and they were going to make the decision Wednesday night, so if my friend wanted the place he should contact them immediately.  Now, I should mention this is no gem of an apartment.  It’s very much a basement apartment, in the bad sense.  I had to stoop to get through doorways, there were random holes in the wall where outlets were and the whole thing was dark and poorly laid out.  I’m sure he would’ve preferred to have my friend sign a contract without seeing the place.

So my friend decided to pass on it, after hearing from me and seeing the pictures.  Good choice.  Then today the guy emailed us saying, “Just wanted to know if you’re still interested.  There’s still a chance.”  Right, because everyone in that stack of applications didn’t live up to the information you don’t have about us?  I’m beginning to think this “stack” of applications meant a stack of blank applications.  Technically not lying, he didn’t actually say they were completed applications!

Freaking salespeople… I seem to live in a state full of them!

Yesterday the wife and I went to rent a movie at the local movie rental store, which we’ll call Hollywood.  Now, the past several times I’ve tried to rent a movie, it’s been difficult.  When I get to the counter they ask for my phone number to pull up the account.  It’s always difficult.  I have a cell phone, a home phone, and my wife has a cell phone.  I’m certain it’s one of these three numbers, but I can never remember which one.  Furthermore, after trying all of these and having problems, they just look it up by my last name.  So the same thing happens now, and the guy looks up my account by “Stunslinger” and it turns out the person who entered my phone number into the computer switched two numbers around.  So it really wasn’t my fault all along!  Phew.  The guy changed it to the correct number (why in the world didn’t someone do this the last four times!?!).  Problem solved.

So we rented the movies (Music & Lyrics and The Good Shepherd) and went to leave.  Being a gentleman I let my wife into her side and walked around to mine.  I stuck the key into the door lock and noticed a woman and man walking to the car next to me.  The timing was off, so she would either need to wait while I opened the door or do something else.  She chose to do something else.  She said, “excuse me” and walked forward.  I interpreted this to mean, “I’m going to slip past you and wait behind you while you open your door and get in.”  I was wrong.  What she meant was, “I’m going to just walk up to my door, open it and get into my car.”  What!?!  Seriously, it was the dumbest move I’ve seen in a while.  After I got into the car my wife just looked at me and we burst out laughing.
To follow up with the whole thing, the guy driving the car waited forever to back out of his spot.  Now, as I mentioned already, they were in their car first and their engine was on.  In my world, this means you go first.  Since I’m wary of backing out and having them back out at the same time causing an accident, I waited an awkward amount of time for him to finally back out and take off.  Some people.

I have to hope they weren’t trying to be a pain, but rather they were just oblivious.  This is a trend I am noticing here, and I’ll write more about it in the future I’m sure.  I even have a term for it, and it’s specific to this state.  I’ll share it later, I promise.  I think it deserves its own post.