No longer…
And if you haven’t had a chance to see the 1 minute pro-shot clip of “Black Dog”:
Please, oh please, come to Madison Square Garden! I’m sure I can skip paying my mortgage that month!
Maybe social networking doesn’t suck
I’ve really been torn of late as to whether or not social networking actually works. I mean, I know it works, people are out there using sites to connect – but is it worth it? I finally gave up on Classmates. After 7 or 8 years on that site I’ve been contacted once or twice – and they wanted me to pay in order to respond. That’s just ridiculous. I also gave up on MySpace. I don’t know why it took me so long, but I finally realized that site sucks beyond belief for anyone over the age of 14.
So I actually deleted my accounts, and decided to move on to greener pastures. One friend pulled me into LinkedIn, which might be some sort of Ponzi scheme, but at least I haven’t lost anything yet. Seriously, if I’m in the market for a job sometime down the line, it’s probably a good place to start. I should probably take a look at it as I look for another SA at work, too. Since I haven’t been looking for business contacts that much, my profile has stagnated at a rather pathetic 10 connection… oh well.
On the social side, I’ve been playing around with Facebook just like everybody else. Hey, if you’re coming to this blog for cutting edge tech, you’re coming to the wrong place. My profile ain’t exactly thriving over there, either, but I have made contact with a couple old friends already. All of the bombing and pirate attacks can be a tad annoying, so I still have to figure out how to wade through the cruft to just get the good stuff.
Regardless, it’s paid off multiple times. Most recently, one of the other contestants from my first day of Millionaire taping (she’ll be on tomorrow) found me and we’ve been able to exchange a few messages. Then I connected to another one of the contestants (he went on Friday and carried over today) through her.
I lost interest in trying to remain completely private on the Internet the first time I wanted to share anything real about my life. It’s more a matter of trying to control what information gets out there. And when it comes down to it, I like having enough information out there so people from my past can re-connect – and having something like a Facebook profile makes that much easier. Try Googling “Thomas Slattery” – I doubt this site is going to be anywhere near the top. But social networks give a more refined search method when it comes to people.
I dunno, maybe I’m just babbling. Actually, at this point I’m just fishing for more people to be my friend – 14 people? That’s just sad…
Somebody lock up Mark
Please. For his own safety. Otherwise we will all feel responsible when he subjects himself to another round of this abomination of nature. CHRISTMAS TREE FLAVOR?!?!? WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT?!?! They must be stopped – or are you willing to risk the possibility of the creation of Melted Candle Wax Soda in next year’s Chanukah Pack?
I, for one, welcome our new DirectBuy overlords
By now I’m sure most of you have seen or heard all of the recent ads for DirectBuy – well, those of you who don’t fast forward every commercial with your fancy-schmancy DVRs and whatnot. Since The Woman and I would like to renovate/remodel our kitchen (and possibly a bathroom) next year and prefer to not spend lots of money, it seemed like a good place to check out. So I hit the website and, unfortunately, found out that everything was locked behind a membership. But a trip to one of their “open houses” couldn’t hurt and we signed up for one today. At the very least, I can claim that we didn’t lose anything but some time.
Let me start out by stressing that there really wasn’t a “hard sell” involved. When we made our final decision, there was no fight or argument to get the hell out of there. But I still didn’t leave with a great impression of them for one particular reason. You see, we had to sit through a fairly long presentation. It wasn’t bad, but it was certainly redundant. After awhile I just wanted to ask if I could go through the non-dumbed down sales pitch. I get it, retail stores mark up what they sell us. You want us to pay you money so that we don’t have to pay that mark-up. It’s not that complicated, just tell us what we can expect to save and how much it’s going to cost us and we can make the decision.
But they insist on giving lots of examples of how much you can save while only alluding to the dues and assuring you that you’re already paying “retail dues” anyway. It’s getting annoying but not a big deal, let’s just get to the end. Halfway through, however, they start dishing on the rules. Most of them make sense – you’re not supposed to reveal the prices to other people… can’t use them to negotiate with retailers… don’t use regular services when you intend on using DirectBuy anyway… All of it seemed reasonable in order to protect themselves and the manufacturers they use. And then they slip this one in that if you decline the membership, you can’t join later…
Wait… what… huh… That’s right, if you don’t sign up that day, you are BANISHED from DirectBuy for SEVEN FRICKIN’ YEARS! Who the hell operates like that? For the rest of the presentation I’m trying to figure out if they seriously mean that I can’t leave without making the decision. The Woman will let you know: I am king of “We have to sleep on it”. I do not like being put on the spot to make purchasing decisions. And this ain’t exactly a Costco membership. After spending an hour telling us all about how we’ve already been paying these dues to retailers for years, they finally give us the price: $4590 for the first 3 years! And you want me to make that decision immediately?!?!
Once again, I want to be fair here. That’s not an outrageous fee. If you’re making big purchases – especially cabinets, fixtures, etc. – you can easily be saving that amount of money right away. Then again, there’s no guarantee. But that’s something you have to decide for yourself. What really gets me, though, is that they didn’t bother pointing out any of this before hand. Oh, there’s a little line about it at the very end of the brochure they send you, but it wasn’t mentioned once in the 5 or 6 phone calls we received shortly after signing up on the website. When it comes down to it, I was in no position to make that decision today – had they been forthcoming with this tidbit, I never would have signed up for the open house at this time. Next year would be a completely different matter.
We had a long talk about it on the way home, but neither of us was that upset with the decision to walk away. When it comes down to it, that’s a lot of money to be spending to basically lock yourself into spending more money. All I could think of was what if things change in the next few months – then we’re screwed. No matter how much I might get aggravated by overpaying for some of our renovations down the line, nothing would compare to how I’d feel if we didn’t get our $4500 worth of savings out of this membership. And now that we’ve made it home and I’ve done some research I feel a lot better about walking away – just Google DirectBuy and take a look at the links that aren’t theirs.
Like I said, I’m sure it can save you money, but there’s no guarantee. And for that much money, I need a guarantee.
The day, it has come…
Coming to a TV set near you: ME!
Turns out, my episode of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire will be airing next week. That’s right, you too can find out whether or not I make a complete fool of myself by tuning into ABC at 12:30 PM on Wednesday, December 12th (well, that’s if you’re in this area – otherwise you’ve got to check the listings yourself).
I know there was mention of a party, but I don’t think we can pull it off this month. So we’ll probably look at a celebration after the holidays – maybe when the money comes in we can take turns rolling in a pile of singles or something. If anyone wants to swing by that night to watch it with us, drop us a line – or e-mail or whatever. Or just show up – we’re not picky.
Also of interest are the shows leading up to mine. Starting around this upcoming Wednesday will be episodes that we saw being taped, including people I hung out with all day in the “Green Room”. And since The Woman was stuck in the audience all day long, she’ll probably make a blurry appearance in the background on most of them. Can you feel the excitement?!?!
NaBloPoMo: A review of my failure
First, a shout out to Sara from Moving Right Along for providing the perfect badge for my “accomplishment” this past month:
As for NaBloPoMo, what can I say? I really did blow it. But I made it almost halfway through the month, and in the ended racked up 23 posts. That’s the most I’ve written in… probably at least a couple years. No, I won’t be winning any prizes, but I didn’t even realize there were prizes until a week or so into this thing. Since my goal was simply to get myself to start writing more regularly, I can claim success on that front.
Actually, I’ve even started to feel a little more focus this past week – less total randomness in how and when I post. Alright, there is a certain amount of randomness, but it’s the fun kind – not so much of the “I have no idea what I’m doing anymore” kind. You could almost say that I’m starting to feel some real inspiration these days…
I think I forgot the lyrics
We actually caught an episode of “Don’t Forget the Lyrics” – I know, what a fantastically creative name. This is a great show for The Woman because she can sing well and knows tons of lyrics. It’s terrible for me because… well… I can’t sing, and I tend to know a lot of bogus lyrics. So the entire time I keep thinking of Irene Cara and how she would destroy me on that show. There’s just no way I could remind myself that what I sing are not the right words.
Sure enough, eventually “Flashdance…What a Feelin'” becomes an option and the contestant absolutely has to go for it. And as she’s singing the song I realized, it’s not a matter of reminding myself what the real words are. Even for $350,000, with a microphone in my hand and TV cameras focused in on me, there’s no chance that I could resist belting at the top of my lungs: “TAKE YOUR PANTS OFF / AND MAKE IT HAPPEN!”
The world’s laziest spammer
Reading this eloquent example of phishing, I was in awe with how much effort was put into creating such a meandering butchery of the English language. The spammer must have been convinced that if enough words were out of place, the reader would be so confused that money would just flow from him without even realizing it. How diabolical!
I, on the other hand, am the recipient of lazy scams, such as the following:
THIS CARD CENTER WILL SEND YOU AN ATM CARD WHICH YOU WILL USE TO WITHDRAW YOUR MONEY IN ANY ATM MACHINE IN ANY PART OF THE WORLD, BUT THE MAXIMUM IS TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS PER DAY, SO IF YOU LIKE TO RECIEVE YOUR FUND THIS WAY PLEASE LET US KNOW BY CONTACTING THE CARD PAYMENT CENTER AND ALSO SEND THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION:
1.YOUR FULL NAME
2. PHONE AND FAX NUMBER,
3. ADDRESS WERE YOU WANT THEM TO SEND THE ATM CARD TO(P.O BOX NOT ACCEPTABLE)
4. YOUR AGE AND CURRENT OCCUPATION
5. A COPY OF YOUR IDENTITY
Did you notice step 5? I got an e-mail requesting a copy of my identity. This guy can’t be bothered with figuring out how to work complicated credit cards and social security numbers. It’s much easier if I just hand over a complete copy of my identity. I’m still not sure if that includes my fingerprints and retinal scans…
Perhaps the next one will include a more devilish approach:
If you desire to have so much fund at cost of little or no thing, please send your soul to the address that included below of this e-mail. Include a S.A.S.E. if you possibly need it back at later point.
Except it’ll be in all caps or something – so I know it’s real…
Another blog bites the dust
Scott Adams has decided he’s going to blog less. That seems reasonable. But now he’s also gotten rid of the full feeds, because the ad revenue just isn’t worth it for him. That’s right, the guy who created one of the most successful comic strips and has multiple best selling books isn’t making enough money off of his blog, so he’s decided inconveniencing his readers will help.
Listen, I get it. Advertising makes the world go round. But that doesn’t change the fact that every ad on his site is already blocked by – surprise, surprise – Adblock Plus. It also doesn’t change the fact that he could simply toss ads in at the bottom of his feeds anyway. And it certainly doesn’t change the fact that a very successful man is complaining to someone who is struggling with a mortgage that I haven’t bought enough of his books to support his financial demands. I’m not about to claim that I’ll never read or buy another Dilbert book again, but he put quite a bit of effort into showing just what his audience means to him all while painting himself as a martyr.
Oh well, that’s one less feed for me to keep up with…
Two heart attacks later…
Ever since the incident which I will not speak of, I’ve become rather obsessive about backing up data and not dropping hard drives – hey, I’ve only dropped two in the last month. Now The Woman knows to stay out of my way and not bug me at the computer with the simple phrase “I”m checking the backups”. In other words, unless you want every memory of your niece and nephew to disappear, just go back to watching TV.
And thus I found myself importing new photos this Sunday morning from the nonstop Thanksgiving weekend. It’s a multi-step process designed to confuse and astound passerbys and leave me with copies on as many devices as possible. And so when device number one stopped working, I got pretty nervous – we haven’t even gotten to the real meat of the process and it’s already bugging out. Of course, it turns out to be my own clumsiness as I partially yanked the USB cable out. After re-attaching, the photos get imported and the process continues with me just a little closer to death.
Then I start the master backup, wherein everything is duplicated onto two more drives in an array. My brain and heart stopped for about a minute towards the end as I heard the dreaded clicking noise. Great! Yet another drive goes belly up! But… why is everything still copying? Hmm… I wonder if that graduation tassel swinging from the side of my monitor could be simulating a failed hard drive sound as it bangs the casing of said hard drive… Well, what’s a few more gray hairs?
When all is said and done, Monday morning I come down to do some less important backups. Oddly, however, the system isn’t letting me view the backup drive. You know, the beautiful RAID array that holds my life. Probably just needs to be restarted… except now it won’t turn back on. Let’s flick a switch… now it’s on and still won’t be recognized… now I’m getting worried. Let’s switch from firewire to USB… wow, there’s everything. And running much more smoothly.
In summary, the universe is out to destroy me and has at least succeeded in taking a few years off of my life.