Piker. @Gatopescado is proudly up to 25 vehicles of greater or lesser runningness (runningtude?) at his stately manor.
My vacuum cleaner up and died today.
RIP Miele White Star, 2003-2025. You were the only vac my first greyhound wasn’t afraid of.
Not happy having to shell out $350 for another vacuum this month … it’s always something.
My car, a 2005 Toyota Hilux D4D is subject to a recall, apparently there is a risk of metal parts flying out when the airbags deploy.
Now, I can imagine this, as I discovered that my then 2 year old had inserted an Allen key into the steering while playing in the car (I was moving my then 6 month old into the house). It was all fine until later, the Allen key got jammed and it locked the steering at highway speeds with both kids in the back.
Fortunately, with some really rough steering wheel abuse, it became loose again. I stopped, called for a tow, got it removed. Anyway…
So Toyota is doing a recall. I get a free airbag replacement - those things are not cheap.
But the fucking form I need to fill in insists I ALSO need a very expensive service, and I cannot opt out. No, you fuckers, I service that vehicle, just not through you. It has just gone through a major service, a month ago, with elements of a major rebuild, due its age. I do not need to make your product recall an excuse for you to recover your costs by servicing my vehicle.
As much as I’m emotionally attached to the old Sebring, it has to go. The Canada Kidney Foundation will tow away any donation within 24 to 48 hours and provide a “minimum” tax credit of $700 (I said $600 earlier somewhere before, but it’s gone up).
Also, the lovely ex-wife (heretofore, “LXW”) told me today that the mechanic doing the safety certification commented on how much work had been done on the car while doing the underbody inspection. I knew this from the inch-thick set of maintenance records the LXW showed me. But I don’t think it’s any indication of lack of reliability of the vaunted Camry. I know the LXW, and I know that in any situation where a mechanic says “this may be a problem in the future”, the LXW will always say “fix/replace it now”.
So this old Camry is, to a large extent, mechanically rebuilt to almost brand-new condition. I can’t believe I almost let it slip away!
Hooray for a good decision made timely. Beats the heck out of a long-running chorus of "If only"s later.
I have a fresh rant.
~18 months ago I refurnished my life after leaving my tiresome ex-wife (hereafter TXW 
) and letting her keep substantially all my / our worldy goods. In the course of that I applied for several store-specific or store-branded credit cards who had “0% APR for umpteen months” come-ons. One of which, the subject of this thread, is for an upscale housewares chain. Not Williams-Sonoma but in that league. The folks who buy their overpriced trendy stuff are not poor and probably not poor credit risks either.
Fast forward to last month and the card in question has long since been paid off. It’s not one I use routinely, but I still get X% off at their cash register or website if I use their card, so I’ve kept it open despite using it only ~2x/year.
Fast forward to last month. The retailer announces they’ve got a new card affiliate and they’ll be sending us all a new card. They’ll handle the balance transfer to the new card issuer and after date X the old card (and issuer) is dead; long live the new card (and issuer). A micro-vexation for no apparent benefit to me, but OK; this sort of business turbulence for the sake of business turbulence stuff goes on all the time.
Fast forward to last week-ish. The new card arrives in the mail as advertised and goes live a couple days after that. So I stick it in my wallet to use it a couple times to test it. Likewise stick it in my phone and use it from there a couple times to test it. Works great, yaay! And then when I get the first bill I’ll set up my bank to pay it, and then everything will be in readiness for me ever using it again later. So far so routine, so organized.
Fast forward to this morning. And now comes the start of real vexation. Get their website access set up. Discover that my statement closing date was a couple days ago, so I have one test purchase on a freshly issued statement and the rest will be on the statement that’ll close mid-Nov. A bit awkward, since I’ll have to pay twice, but no matter which date they had picked for the cutover, somebody will have a statement cutoff date right near then. Just happens I’m one of them.
Discover that they’d successfully transferred my zero balance from the old issuer. Hooray for that much!
Also discover the fresh new bill for my one transaction includes $0.39 of interest on a ~$200 purchase made 2 days before statement closing. WTF? A bit more reading of the terms indicates two things. Firstly, they charge 32% APR (!) and secondly, they charge interest from the date of the transaction until paid in full. So I already owe them two whole days of interest. And counting.
There is no no-interest grace period even if you pay the balance in full each month! I have never in my life had a card with terms like that. I know it’s legal, but I’ve never seen it. WTF!!1! Bastards!!1! 
Anyhow, I instruct my bank to pay the entire up to the minute balance, and that’ll take a day or two. Of course this happens close enough to the weekend that it’ll be Monday before the payment arrives even though its electronic, not paper & snail mail. At which point that account is being closed with extreme prejudice.
I wonder several things:
- How much more is this junk-grade issuer paying the retailer than the old junk-grade issuer did to incentivize them to change issuers?
- How many customers will even notice the major change in terms?
- How many of their well-heeled customers will react with outrage as I did, cancel their cards, and rather loudly tell the world what a shit move this retailer just pulled. IMO I’m not shopping there again using their card or any other. Sux to be them.
Enshittification continues apace. Be careful out there; I think we can expect that current politics will pretty well gut what little regulatory protection we are used to receiving against corporate crapola.
This morning, I once again watched as some idiots risked their life running in front of a moving train. At the station I take to work, there are parking lots on either side of the platform, so depending where you park, you have to walk across the tracks either in the morning or afternoon. There is a dedicated crossing point, with lights and a bell indicating when you shouldn’t cross, because THERE IS A TRAIN COMING. The outgoing train from Boston comes about 7 minutes before the incoming train arrives, and even though there are flashing lights and the train blasts it’s horn, people will still cross in front of it with seconds to spare just to get to the inbound platform. All they need to do is slip on the asphalt or trip on the track, and they’ll be dead as Dillinger. Why? What’s the point? It literally does nothing for you. The train you’re running to catch won’t arrive until the train you’re running in front of is long gone. If you insist on putting your life at risk for no reason, just stay home and make toast while taking a bath.
Darwinism.
That sucks!
This is actually standard for most credit cards I have used when you use a balance transfer offer (it is in the fine print). If you use the card for any purchases while you still have a transferred balance, you lose the grace period. This is not a problem if at the same time you have 0% promotional APR on purchases, but those you tend to get only when you first have the card. I have seen only one credit card company that does not do it that way, where as long as you pay in full to cover the purchases you made during the given statement dates (+ the minimum you need to pay for the balance transfer), you keep the grace period. I accidentally charged a card that had 0% balance transfer one time, and paid for the purchase immediately after I realized what I had done. Then I called the credit card company and they refunded the extra interest.
//i\\
I’ve never done a balance transfer. Good to know that trap exists. Thank you.
This was a new non-promotional purchase on a card with an existing zero balance from inception. The terms on ordinary new purchases, existing balance or no, are that interest is charged daily, period. That was new to me.
As said, I knew such terms were legal and are sometimes used on rip-off cards sold to folks with crap credit. I just wasn’t expecting this retailer to pull that same crap on their (presumably loyal frequent flyer) customers who by and large have good credit and deep pockets.
Yeah, that is unusual. I don’t think I have ever had a credit card that worked that way, other than in the situation I described above, and I have had (and still have) many. I guess I was confused when you said you transferred a 0 balance which I thought meant a 0% balance. For me it would be grounds to immediately cancel the card, which I am generally loath to do since doing so means the amount of unused credit goes down which means your credit score does as well.
//i\\
Or doesn’t as the case may be.
I’d venture that a malfunctioning vacuum would be more like to blow than suck.
Spam is annoying me today. I’ve been getting more spam calls lately, so apparently my information has been sold recently. I’m also getting mail for people who lived at this address years ago. When does that ever stop? The current one is Medicare spam, for someone who maybe lived here more than ten years ago, if at all.
I’m fed up with spam email. Spammers have made email nearly useless. There are some stores that I want to get email from so I know when they’re having sales, but that doesn’t mean I want to get at least one email every single day! My email is downloaded to several devices, so it’s really email overload.
Much easier to hit 'em if someone tees 'em up for you!
Suck it, hoser!
Well I pit Resorptive Lesions in cats. Thomas already had a bunch of teeth removed before we adopted him. He has been needy a lot lately and I suspected he was in pain. Was scratching at his mouth a lot. Bunch more teeth removed on Tuesday. That was a long, hard day for him.
Vet says he just has the back teeth left now that are enough to help him keep his tongue in place. He already drooled lots before! Vet says thats probably just a pleasure response to attention, rather than a dental issue. Anyway, he has a new normal to adjust to, but he will be more comfortable now at least.
Really just an excuse for a cat pic though.
Irresistible!!
An excuse for cat pictures is never necessary. 
