EDUMUCATION.COM

Another federal election is just around the corner for us Canadians. Yet again, we will be going to the polls and choosing an MP to neglect us for the next few years (if the government lasts that long).

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m getting pretty tired of doing my duty as a citizen, voting because I care about the direction we head into and having that thrown in my face by virtue of the fact that my concerns are largely ignored.

Regarding the leaders of each party and the parties themselves, there is very little choice these days for people who care about politics and the political process. We are presented with a choice between asshole #1, asshole #2, asshole #3 and a few other candidates who never stood a chance. The election song and dance is exactly the same each election from all major parties and leaders. They promise this and promise that, with no intention on ever following through on those promises. Then they get elected and ignore us for another few years.

We deserve better! It’s time we started demanding more of our leaders! We should be doing more to leverage the power of social networking and the Internet to force our elected public servants to serve us, with respect for us. Put politicians on notice and make them understand that their position is not a gravy train to be ridden with disdain for the public that they are supposed to be serving. I’m tired of being lied to. I’m tired of politicians who think they’re above the law. And I’m tired of being ignored after the votes have been cast. Again, we deserve better!

Yay! It’s my favourite time of the year… TAX TIME!
It’s that time of year, when I get to go through the million receipts I’ve collected and add them all up, organize them, double check my addition skills, factor out the taxes from the totals, add the taxes back in to some totals, reorganize the receipts, etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum!
Can’t we just skip the whole concept of paying taxes? Please?

I have a bunch of stuff up for sale on Kijiji.ca. It’s mostly just some old electronics stuff (DVD Recorder, CD Player, Stereo Receiver, 36 Inch CRT TV, USB External Hard Drive) and an apartment sized dryer. Kijiji is pretty much like craigslist.

(Maybe I should try craigslist too, but that’s another topic)

I looked around at similar items on Kijiji before listing my items. I’m not unrealistic or stupid, so I wanted to price my items accordingly so that they were reasonably priced and would sell.

In every case, the potential buyer wants a lower price and it doesn’t matter what the item is priced at. And I’ve deduced that the reason they want a lower price is not at all about spending less money. It’s about the buyer setting the price on their own terms.

Of all the items I’ve listed, I’ve only sold the stereo receiver so far. I bought it years ago and barely used it. It was top of the line in it’s day and cost me over $500 new. I listed it for $75 and it was a steal at that price. The buyer and I exchanged e-mails back and forth before he came to my home to pick it up. Price was never mentioned in our exchanges. It was only after he came to my home to see the item and had already decided to buy it that he offered me $70 for it. At the risk of wasting that time and having to go through all that again with someone new, I let him have it for $70. He bargained me down $5 on an item that was already a deal and he already knew he wanted. I guess he wanted to feel more in control?

Whatever.

I went to upgrade WordPress for my blog yesterday.
Simple operation, right? Especially since WordPress now offers upgrades in a fully automated process.
Unfortunately, not so.
The upgrade rendered WordPress inoperable and fucked my database!
I was able to salvage some old posts and repost them, after deleting the old install and installing a fresh copy with a fresh database. As a result, the old posts all have yesterday’s date on them and there are no longer any comments on my blog.
That really sucks! The blog was 5 years old!
The only saving grace was that I barely blogged at all over the past 2 or 3 years, so there went a ton of posts lost.

Better get back to posting!

Joe Pesci only told us half the story in that Lethal Weapon movie.  It’s the movie where he is complaining about the Drive-Thru experience.  “They Fuck You At The Drive-Thru”.  You know the rant.
You go to the drive through and they never get your order right.  Well, it seems like never.  Actually, they DO get the order right about 50% of the time.  The other 50% of the time, something is wrong with the order.
Odd, when you think about it, really.  I would think that if you’re going to screw up an order, then you would want to be screwing up an order of someone who is eating inside the restaurant.  That way, when they discover that they got fucked, they could calmly go to the counter and get their order corrected.  It’s an inconvenience, but a minor one.
When they fuck you at the drive-thru, however, it is usually later on when you discover that you got fucked.  You get your food and then drive back home or to work or to wherever you were headed with your meal.  You finally get to your destination and then realize that the food that you ordered is NOT in the bag that you’re holding.  To correct the situation then, requires another drive back to the restaurant you just came from.  Quite often, you don’t even have time for that crap.
As I said, that’s only half the story…
The other thing that really pisses me off about drive-thrus is their NEED to upsell me.  I order a burger and a drink because I want a burger and a drink.  If I wanted fries, I would have ordered them.  Simple concept.  Right?  Not to the people running these places.
There must be some sort of standard training video that drills into the heads of the staff, the concept of upselling other items to me.  That really doesn’t bother me.  It’s inconvenient, but only in a minor way.
The thing that really bugs my ass about it is that they are rude about the upsell process.  The person on the other end of that drive-thru speaker can’t even wait for me to finish placing my order before trying to sell me fries.  In fact, they are SO concerned with selling me those fucking fries, and interrupting me to ask if I want them, that they inevitably have to ask me to repeat my order because they weren’t listening to me when I was ordering!
Here’s a tip for anyone who works in a drive-thru.  Wait until I completely finish ordering.  Then, and only then, ask me if I want more than I ordered.  And, get my order right!

I really despise the typical “pass this on” e-mail. I get far too many of them and I NEVER pass them on. I don’t care if I won’t get good luck. I don’t care if “something amazing” or something “really cool” will never happen to me because I didn’t pass the e-mail on to everyone I know. I really don’t give a shit if I will supposedly have “bad luck” for the rest of my life. (If “God” is going to punish me for the rest of my natural life because I didn’t pass along a fucking e-mail, then I have a few choice words for him when I die.) Who the fuck makes these things up any way? Don’t you people have anything better to do than to clog up my e-mail box with useless text? I get enough SPAM! Now I have to deal with SHIT coming into my e-mail box from people because they’re too superstitious to just let the e-mail die?

I have news for everyone. You won’t get good luck. You won’t get bad luck. SHIT HAPPENS. Sometimes people get what they deserve. Sometimes they don’t. It’s all a roll of the dice. And, since everyone seems bound and determined to pass crap along to everyone else… Feel FREE to pass this along to whomever you feel like pissing off today!
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For those of you who hate chain letters or don’t believe in them, this one is REAL. It works. I’ve seen it happen. Please forward this e-mail to everyone you know, even if they don’t have an e-mail address.

If you forward this message to 5 people, you will get an e-mail within 1 week!
If you forward this message to 10 people, you will get an e-mail within 5 days!
If you forward this message to 15 people, you will get an e-mail within 3 days!
If you forward this message to 20 people, you will get an e-mail within 1 day!
SUPER SPECIAL BONUS…
IF YOU FORWARD THIS MESSAGE TO 50 PEOPLE, YOU WILL GET AN E-MAIL WITHIN 1 HOUR!!!!!!! GUARANTEED!

My friend’s neighbour’s brother’s dentist’s assistant has a dog that bit a woman in the park who mentioned that she forwarded this e-mail to 50 people and she got an e-mail in 15 minutes!
My sister’s friend’s boss’s husband is a police officer and he said he stopped a vehicle being driven by a woman who’s cousin’s mother’s neighbour’s housekeeper forwarded this e-mail to 1000 people and she got an e-mail within 3 minutes!!!
Another man who received this e-mail didn’t forward it, and he died an excruciatingly painful death almost instantly! But, as he was falling to the floor, his hand accidentally hit the keyboard, which forwarded the message for him. HE RECEIVED AN E-MAIL WITHIN 1 MINUTE!!!!!!!
Don’t let this happen to you! You MUST forward this e-mail to everyone!
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P.S. We’ve all seen e-mails like this one. I especially like the one that says that some company is “tracking” e-mails and will pay you for each person you send it to. It’s a crock of SHIT! Don’t waste your time or your bandwidth! Tracking e-mails is not even within their ability, and they are definitely not going to pay you to send e-mails!