Speaking of cars.
Just when I’m thinking about trading mine off the freaking instrument panel lights up like a Christmas tree with warning lights. It now has 4 warning lights on and they are all for the traction control/AWD system. Something that would come in pretty handy in winter driving and the only reason I bought it. Fucking piece of shit. I made an appointment with the shop to get it in but I can’t get in until next Thursday.
Crown popped off, tooth beneath it shot. I’ll be out over a grand on my end of it.
Car door desperately needs to be fixed. Probably close to that, my luck.
Yay 2016! What a brilliant entry!
I don’t know where else to put this, but it’s really awkward when someone thinks they’ve really upset you and you are, in fact, only mildly irritated.
Dear Overly Emotional Friend,
I would have totally forgotten about it all by now if you would just stop apologizing and asking for forgiveness. I can’t “forgive” you because you didn’t do anything that needs forgiving. You need to forgive yourself, maybe, I don’t know. Please get over it. I would say I’m over it, but really there was nothing to “get over”.
Reminds me of my recent life lesson: Never tell a psycho that she is, in fact, psycho. It just doesn’t work out well, 'cause crazy folks are always the last to know.
This year: More or less everyone opposed to Bernie Sanders in america * the rest of the world.
Last year we had housemates. I don’t want to get into the saga of how they became our housemates or what happened while they lived with us. Let’s just say that when they finally moved out last summer we seriously thought about throwing a party 
We’ve kept in touch. They live three towns over in a complex which they can just barely afford, rents being what they are around here. The wife has always had trouble holding down a job because of her, shall we say, quirks (she’s what I call the “professor” type, long on theoretical scholarly knowledge and very short on everyday common sense things). As a result the husband had no choice but to interview for advanced training at his job. It involves management and it’s something he doesn’t want to to do but he feels he has no choice; ergo, he accepts it.
The wife just got fired from her latest job yesterday. They came over last night, and amid the weeping on her part and silence on his part, there’s something there which is making me silently scream OH HELL NO DON’T EVEN THINK OF IT!
"We’ve kept in touch. "
Well, there’s your problem right there!
(FWIW I remember bits of the story from last years rant. )
Smashy-smashied my 3 year old Samsung Note 2 on the floor this morning. Too old to bother fixing so I’m looking at new.
The problem is that I’m on a super-secret everything-included for a retardedly low price phone plan which doesn’t allow for upgrades on the hardware. A friend is a manager of a successful cellphone store, and he tipped me off to the plan and the secret handshake necessary to get it. Kind of like ordering from the secret menu at a fast food place, but instead of a Mc10:35 sandwich I get about $50 a month off of my bill and essentially unlimited everything.
The downside is that I’m looking at $799 plus 13% sales tax for an equivalent phone. I’m not able to buy an unlocked phone because I use my provider’s mobile TV service (also free! Weew!), which requires a provider-branded phone with special software.
I’m still in the black when you consider the monthly discount, but it’s going to be painful to walk into a store and fork out $900 while someone else is paying $249 for exactly the same product.
Just for poops and giggles, I calculated the amount that I’m saving monthly (to make sure that this situation is still worth it), and it’s actually in the $77 a month range.
Canadian cell phone companies are thieves!
Blame my husband. He’s still friends with the male ex-housemate. It’s the wife who’s the issue. She’s very friendly to me but I keep her at arm’s length for obvious reasons.
Fast! Fill up those extra bedrooms. Talk about your kids/grandkids coming to visit! Take in a paying boarder! Turn them into sewing rooms/libraries/dens/exercise rooms! Fill them with hoarded junk!
Do anything, but fast. It’s much easier to say no when you can honestly say “Sorry, there’s no room for you.”
How personalized? A data base with your name, maybe the car you were looking at, your address, the salesman you talked to - you could easily generate something that seems personalized, at the level you’d expect from someone working on a warm/cool lead (you having visited them):
Dear <firstName>,
Thanks for your vist last <monthOfVisit>. Just following up to find out if you are still interested in purchasing a <newOrUsed> <carMake>, or possibly some other <carModel>.
If so, please call me at <salesPersonPhoneNumber>.
Looking forward to hearing from you!
<salesPersonName>
Yeah, that’s a pretty straightforward mail-merge. And if they don’t know you’re not still looking to buy a car, then I would expect anyone working on commission to continue to reach out, even if there is no immediate response. Could be you’re still in the market, but something delayed the decision to purchase. Maybe you have talked to umpty-million and still haven’t found the Car of Your Dreams, and they are hoping to entice you back to their dealership.
I think that they will have software or a contractor with the software that will do it for them. Depending on what info the salesperson who originally talked to you entered into the system they can generate personalized emails asking how your pets are doing by name or that they hope your mother-in-law is doing better after her surgery.
Mail list manager software and sales contact management software are big business.
Grandmother died this morning. I’m already tired of being tactful to people offering their condolences. The fact of the matter is that she was a horrible old woman, and I’m relieved that she has gone on to whatever reward she earned in life. But I have to keep saying crap like “it was expected,” and “she isn’t suffering now,” and thanking folks who offer to pray for the family. The funeral is Sunday, and I suspect that I’ll be quite hung over on Monday.
“She isn’t suffering now…and neither are the rest of us.”
(Big Wolf Smile, very pleasant voice) “Oh, don’t be! She was a horrible old woman who deserved to die! Please don’t be distressed about her passing.”
I wonder if you’d be able to tack a phone lease or payment plan on top of the super secret service plan you have? They’re often really just tacked on with no tax or service charge added monthly, so it’s a same as cash kind of payment and often come out less than the retail purchase price over 24 months. Just a thought.
Obviously, this stuff has improved a lot since the last time I worked! I had no idea it was so easy/quick for a salesman to generate that sort of email. I guess I should tell each one I’ve bought the van and don’t need them so they’ll quit.
Now, you all have an idea on how to get the pop up ads to quit trying to sell me another van?? 
Pop up blocker and adblock should wipe those out too 