Potpourri Pot (heh heh I said "pot")

This is going to be a little bit of everything.  Total mish-mash.  Lots of things to talk about, none of them worthy of their own entire post.

Remember that midlife crisis I had last fall?  Yeah it's still going on.  Yesterday morning I was on the phone with Hitter (he was out of town over the weekend) and he tells me that his HR guy had sent him an email about a new job opportunity (just a new role within the same company)  This is not surprising, this company plays apple-cart-upset about every 18 months or so, and Hitter's been in this same role for 3 years now, so he's WAY overdue for a shakeup.  Of course I never really look forward to these games of corporate musical chairs, because this happens:

Yeah.  That's a lot of fun to deal with.  Side effects include irritability, short temper, complete lack of understanding, and general assholedness.  Except he's already been like that lately with the current position, so how much worse can the transition to something new be? 

Famous last words.

So anyway, I just kinda went "yeah whatever okay" when Hitter mentioned possible new position.  Right up until he said that it would involve a move.  And then my emotions got on the biggest baddest roller coaster ever. 

Just a few colors short of a Jackson Pollock painting

"OMG I might actually get out of Hillbilly Hell?!"

"Wait, when I imagined moving away, it wasn't to go to the east coast.  Ugh"

"Well, we wouldn't stay there for more than 2 or 3 years, I can do that.  And I'd get to move!"

"Hitter would never go for that, he couldn't be that far from his family"

"God what an ass, he is the reason I am so miserable!  Why won't he move away from here?  I hate Hillbilly Hell!"

"Wait, I'm a shitty wife.  Could I really move that far away?  I'd have to fly EVERYWHERE and I hate to fly.  So really I'm just blaming him and using him as the scapegoat but I wouldn't like it either"
"But there might be work and/or school opportunities out there that don't exist here"

"But the east coast is one giant city running into the next giant city, and my biggest problem here is that it's a freaking city"

"Seriously though, I want to get the hell away from this damned place!  I don't even care where I'm going next"

"Although... I'd have to leave my house and my pool and I kinda like them.  And I probably wouldn't get anything I'd like out there"

"But it would be an opportunity to get away from everything around here that's making me miserable, including my family."

"Except I probably won't be happy out there either.  I'm not sure if I've ever been happy.  And I don't think I ever will be happy.  Ugh.  Just... ugh."

It's like the lamest roller coaster ever.  Anyway the good news is I don't need to worry about it anymore because Hitter said he isn't taking it.  He wouldn't like the work, it's way out of his comfort zone and possibly not even something he really agrees with.  Althoug who knows with him, because he pretty much agrees with anything the Beloved Corporation does. 

So I think I'll quit thinking about that.  Or maybe I'll just quit thinking.

Random Internet Stupidity:

I got this in an email.  Don't get me wrong, I love me some Mike Rowe... *drool*... but seriously?  He's doing videos telling idiots they need to get their oil changed?  Wow.  I can't decide whether to be more annoyed by Ford thinking they need to make videos telling people that if the check engine light comes on you'd better... well... check the engine, or by the fact that I think Mikey boy has finally hit the "overexposure" status.  Perhaps a while ago. 

His voice is still dreamalicious though. 

New subject: my year-in-pictures is still going, although sometimes it's not very interesting.  I made it all the way to oooooooh about January 11 before I realized that some days I just don't have anything photo-worthy in my life.  So I've been randomly filling the boring days in with extra pictures from interesting days.  In some ways, that's probably a good thing though.  Then I can remember that good things do happen sometimes, and occasional boring days aren't the end of the world.  [/philosophical comments]  And then there were a couple days when I had specific pictures in mind that I wanted to use on those specific days... didn't get the pictures... and then didn't update the album. 

Today I had to catch up on two weeks worth of pictures.  There was much procrastination of anything that others would consider "productive".  Kitchen's still a mess, house didn't get cleaned, dog needs more exercise (although thank goodness the co-dependent beast actually spent an entire half hour in the back yard today without me) laundry didn't get done, trim didn't get painted, closets didn't get decluttered, office stuff didn't get organized, and most importantly, Hitter's model train didn't get landscaped.  Most importantly to him anyway.  I really don't care much, and I didn't feel that his hobby needed to be prioritized above mine, but I'm probably still going to catch hell for it tomorrow when he gets home.  *sigh* 

I think that's enough for now.  Way past my bedtime. 

Oh great, I have a creepy stalker

As usual, I feel compelled to refer my readers back to a previous post, this time the sleepless adventure.  It's an obsession, don't mind me.  And it turns out I apparently have at least three readers!  There's Best Friend in the Eastern time zone, Best Friend in the Mountain time zone, and a new reader who works for a company that manufactures a product I previously referenced.  I'm not going to say which one, but the item in question is a piece of furniture upon which people sleep... using their number...  and I hate said product. 

I mean it's one thing to want people to read your blog.  But I'm not sure a customer service rep was exactly what I had in mind.  Especially one who is trying to convince me to love Hitter's bed.  First of all, how cushy of a job is that where he just reads blogs all day searching for product complaints?  Secondly, it was NOT a robot-reply, a human being had actually read what I wrote and looked at my pictures.  He referenced things that were very specific to me.

Also, I'm definitely not posting about this on Facebook... one of my nerdy high school friends will correct my damned grammar!  Asshole.  I didn't really mind the first comment too much, but the second friend thanking the first one kinda pissed me off.

I seem to be on a tangent. 

Moral of story here is new readers are good, creepy customer service stalkers are creepy.  (Clarification: new readers who are NOT members of my family, or friends of members of my family, or who would in any way shape or form let this crap get back to my family.  I think I need to delete all the family stuff and then not worry about whether or not the blog goes public)

God wants me to be rich, Part 2

Remember when the fates were giving me money?  It's happening again.  Well, the fates are trying, but MasterCard might be resisting. 

MasterCard is an asshole.

Clear back in December, I had just received the next two DVDs in my Netflix queue and I went to pop them into the DVD player in the living room and watch......

Wait, I need to give some background.  I'm a tightwad.  Sometimes.  I mean I had to get a camper and a brand new car and a smart phone and a laptop and a swimming pool and an acreage and new office furniture and my shiny new KitchenAid and... and... and... other stuff.  But by gosh and by golly I do NOT need to be spending $35 on a cheap little DVD player for the living room, because we have a portable take-along-in-the-car DVD player that has cables to use with a regular TV too if you want to.  And that's good enough for me! 

I may be a hypocrite.

So this portable DVD player doesn't just have a tray you drop the DVD onto, it has that little spindle thing that the DVD snaps onto. 

And nothing happened.  The DVD wouldn't play.  Wouldn't even get to the menu, much less actually play the movie.  So I opened it up to take the DVD out and check for scratches or dirt or whatever, which is a pretty common issue with Netflix.....

Discs snapped in half are not so common.  *sigh*  So I get out the other movie, checked it to make sure it wasn't broken before putting it in, stuck it into the DVD player, pushed play... and.....

*sigh*

Cracked that DVD too. 

At this point I was left with a moral dilemma.  Do I just stuff the DVDs back into the envelopes and ship 'em, hoping Netflix thinks they broke in the mail? Or do I not be a big fat jerk, and actually 'fess up to the fact that I broke them? 

I tried to be an asshole.  I really did.  I had gone so far as to put them back into their envelopes and seal it all up, and had them sitting on the TV cabinet waiting to go out in the mail.  But then the goody-two-shoes inside me took over and was all "that's just not right" so I got on the Netflix website and clicked on the "I lost or broke a DVD" button... twice... and they charged me like $30 for the two movies.  But at least I still had my soul...

Fast forward to last week.  We're having the Winter Storm of the Century (aka Snowpocalypse, aka Blizzargeddon) and we get a phone call from MasterCard asking if I was off making hundred dollar purchases at 4 different pharmacies that day.  Kudos to our credit card company for calling immediately (unlike fucking Citi Card and their shitty fraud detection unit... but that's a post for another day) so we got my card canceled and they're issuing me a new one. 

Fast forward to yesterday.  I've had two other movies out for like two weeks now... which is a stupid giant waste of money... and I need to go run some errands anyway, so I plan to take the two movies along and stuff them in the nearest blue box.  I grab two red Netflix envelopes from the top of the TV and head out the door.  Then last night I'm sorting through my mail... and find a Netflix envelope.  Hmm...  Did I mail back the Wii disc? 

Then this morning I open my email. 

I had mailed back the broken DVDs... that I had already admitted to breaking...

AND NETFLIX REFUNDED MY MONEY!

To the credit card that was emergency-closed last week.

I'm not entirely sure I'll ever see this money, but God wants me to be rich.  And that makes me happy.

P.S. Now I need to find where that other movie is...  and I'm clueless.

www.stupidity.dum

Ha!  I found the snipping tool for one-click screenshots!  (and I have no life)

So I'm starting a new regular feature: stupid shit I find on the internet.  Don't expect it to be real regular. 

Item #1

So I want to see a black-and-white Bing Crosby movie about a priest and a nun and the Bible's Christmas story, and therefore I would like to see The Shawshank Redemption?!  Prison violence?  Seriously.

Item #2

Really, Netflix?  Really?!?  Because I watched a movie where the US got the shit bombed out of them and a crapload of people died and we got our asses sucked into World War II, you think I'll like MARMADUKE?!?!?  I don't even know what to say here.

Item #3 (no more Netflix, at least not today) Holy crap this is fuzzy, you don't have to read it, I'll kind of summarize below.

In a nutshell: a college football team is coming off a very lackluster season, lots of fans are disgruntled and/or losing interest, and now rumors are flying of massive recreational drug use on the team and a rash of suspensions to come.  Above is the announcement of the press conference to discuss this crap.  What does their website do?  Use this "exclusive access to the press conference" to try to sell an All-Access membership to the site!  Fucking brilliant!  Cuz I really wanna give a team a crapload of my hard-earned money so I can listen to the coach and AD babble about how their players are a bunch of coke-heads.

And then on top of that, it wasn't even exclusive access.  I watched the whole press conference live online on one of the local TV news channels' sites.  For free.  I guess what I'm saying is that the only thing dumber than the team's website using this scandal as a money-making opportunity, is anybody who was dumb enough to fall for it and whip out their credit card.

Although at least for now the rumors seem to have been blown WAY out of proportion.  And I admit that "my hard-earned money" is laughable... I haven't earned any money in like 3 years. 

Item #4

They're open 24 hours over two days?  Or they're in an alternate universe where there are 24 hours between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.?  Or they aren't open the whole time between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. so it ends up adding up to 24 hours total between Monday and Saturday and you have to guess which hours they're open?  I'm confused.

This one had a happy ending though, but it's a really long story so you should probably just quit reading here.  It is a lot more rampant stupidity though so I'm going to keep typing.  I have been wearing New Balance 609 shoes for YEARS.  I got my first pair long before Hitter and I were even dating, and we're closing in our 6th wedding anniversary.  Every 6 months to a year (depending on just how ambitious I've been at exercising) I'd go get a new pair... no worries, no effort, just get the exact same shoe and life was good.

And then it happened.  New Balance discontinued the 609.  And my life spiraled into a fiery pit of despair.  Not really, but I did have to put some thought into shoe shopping again and considering I'm not a very good female, I hate to shoe shop.  So... I went to the trusty internet and searched for "replacement for NB 609" and google said "get NB 623" and I'm all "thank you google!"  so I ordered shoes from the website (I've had bad luck with running all over the bi-county area to find a damned pair of shoes in stock) along with a pair of hiking shoes.  This was clear back in October... and I didn't open the box right away for some unfathomable reason.  And when I did... the hiking shoes were just right, the cross trainers were a freaking men's shoe!  I mean they said size 9 but they were significantly bigger than my feet.  So I'm all embarrassed that I was such a fucktard that I accidentally bought myself a men's shoe, and a bit pissy with NB that they didn't notice that I ordered two pairs of shoes in the same size but one was a women's and one was a men's but that was mostly cuz I wanted someone else to blame...

I procrastinated for about two months because I hate to ship things and didn't have a shipping box that a shoebox would fit in.  Finally I went "wait, I know there are New Balance stores, why don't I see if I can just return the shoes to the store?!"  so I go and sure enough, the guy is all "yep you can return them.  We won't pay for your shipping or anything, we'll just give you back the full retail price on the shoes..." and I looked at my receipt... the shoes had been on sale for 20% off and I got them with free shipping.  I started to say something and he kind of gave me a look like "seriously, don't make me do extra effort" so I shut up and then he asked if I'd just like to trade those in on the right shoes and I said sure I'd love to.  So he looks at the box and goes "wait, these are women's shoes" and I got even more confused and embarrassed, until he finally realized that the outside of the box said women's shoes but the shoes inside were men's.  And then he traded me straight-up for the shoes, even though the ones in the store weren't on 20% off sale.  It's like the shoes were paying me to take them!  Best shoe shopping trip EVER. 

I hope nobody is reading at this point, because seriously that was a dumb story.