The last minute MMP

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

It is not my fault. I had everyone sign a waiver indemnifying me against any and all damages, loss of wages and/or property, tardiness, crabgrass, global warming, rickets, damage to underpants, goiters, new Coke, inflation, bad spelling, grammar and/or punctuation, the hole in the ozone layer, irritable bowels, excessive cerumen production, enlarged prostates, cancer, dust mites, unfavourable manifest destinies, the rise in popularity of Kim Jong Il hairpieces, Mondays, declinations of the TSX composite index, mosquitoes, reality TV and the dogged persistence of Big Brother in particular, oil prices, Fox News, unwelcome holiday house guests, Africanized killer bees, Nigerian E-Mail scams, sunspot activity that causes you to miss the last ten minutes of House, Gary Larson’s retirement, Bill Keane’s refusal to follow suit, soufflé cave-ins, Huitlacoche, The Grudge 2, counterfeit bus tickets, dishonest mechanics, computer crashes, spam, leather couch cushions that make embarrassing flatulent noises when sat upon, non-winning scratch-off lottery tickets, plumber’s cleavage, the ingredient responsible for making Denny’s mashed potatoes smell like urinal cakes, Allan confections, collectible spoon addiction, taxes, the Macarena, the gap in Condoleezza Rice’s teeth, that bully in the 5th grade – the one with the hair and the weird birthmark, bursitis, the disappearance of paper-wrapped bubble gum cigarettes that were packed with a ton of confectioner’s sugar that billowed out like real cigarette smoke when you puffed on it, the rise to religious power of ultra-conservative blowhards that all turn out to be philanderers, bigots, scammers and/or gay anyway, seedless oranges that aren’t, the overuse of Comic Sans, extended red lights, people at the checkout who embark on an extended spelunking mission through their coin purse to find exact change, shopping cart joyriders, bovine spongiform encephalopathy, clown porn, ugly ties, the time you ate altogether the wrong kind of mushroom, vanity plates, people who still think it’s funny to install a car horn that plays La Cucaracha, hhhhhhhalitosis, sweeps week fear mongering, telemarketers, Budweiser, cocktail wieners, the fact that “wieners” still makes me giggle, baked Alaska that clearly contains no Alaska, the new McDonald’s pies, foie gras, trans-fats, Rush Limbaugh, the unsolved disappearance of the Hostess Munchies, and belly button lint.

Clearly, your accusations are baseless.

ahem

Morning!

Obviously I’ve been caffeinated for the day.

My weekend was pretty sedate. I geeked out after I discovered an open-source 3D rewrite of the Build Engine, specifically designed for use with Duke Nukem 3D. Wee! I can play my old Duke on my PC again! And it’s cool playing in hi res with new 3D models 'n stuff, too. Did that with Doom ages back, but this is the first good Duke conversion I’ve come across.

Now if only I could get Omikron: The Nomad Soul working properly.

BusDude - That’s not being a bastage, that’s just calling people on their shit. Nothing wrong with that – gotta keep the laggards in line, after all. :slight_smile:

22

Hey everyone. Yeah, I’m back. My head hasn’t exploded yet. I don’t have any schoolwork to do today, so I’m using today to take care of a few things:

-Paying rent
-Closing my HSBC bank account that has sat mostly empty for months
-Emailing some researchers about summer work
-Looking for possible apartments for next year
-Shopping around for car insurance

Yeah, you read that last one right. My grandfather is offering me his Subaru for next year. Which means I don’t necessarily need an apartment within walking distance of the school and a grocery store, although that would be nice anyway. What it does mean is that if I take the car, the cost of rent and car insurance combined needs to be less than or equal to my rent this year. So cheap car insurance = good. Will keep you all posted, of course.

swamp thing, what’s UI? Did you quit your job?

Puggy, what’s a spool? And can someone explain to me why we’re saying Ellen with the odd coloring?

… This is what I get for being absent, I suppose.

And as for hole-ridden underwear, my position (which I suspect I share with many men) is that the quality of your underwear doesn’t matter, because the only people who are going to see you in it are more interested in seeing you out of it.

23

So I had an interesting experience this weekend.

How’s everyone else doing?

24

Morning, all (or afternoon, depending).

I am home for the day, as is #2 son, since today, a LONG time ago, Abraham Lincoln was born…in Kentucky. Whatever. :rolleyes:

Tis snowing, which does a body good, as always. I have muchos homeworkus to do today (at least I think so–I find that the day after my weekend at work, I have no brain power at all–and I can’t remember a damned thing. So, I think I have homework. I might have already done it. Wouldn’t that be nice? Dubious, though…)
I will take the blame for all of it and more, Winston Smith. But I will say this: no jury of my peers would convict.

MBG -I’m sorry to hear about that awful accident. I don’t listen to news at all on the weekends I work (basically, I just work and sleep)…I’ll go look on Yahoo for more.

My husband says he has to “figure out the computer situation” tonight, after my classes. I may not “see” any of you ever again… :eek: Not to sound too snarky, but he is good at disconnecting things, but not so good at re-connecting them. We need to move the connection apparatus (whatever it’s called), because the Handyman comes Wednesday to start on our basement! #1 son will soon have his own room! And I won’t be online…given that grad school is online, this is somewhat problematic. <gulp> (let’s hope he gets it all settled tonight). <crosses fingers>

25

I’ll take Things I Didn’t Want To Have To Google for $800, Alex.

I’m very sorry I did that. I can stay away from the pus threads, but clown porn? How can someone take something I love so much and turn it into something so evil?

And by that, I mean I love porn and hate clowns, in case you were wondering. :smiley:

26

I sort of forgot why Elle gets red. I think Rue started it. Yes, let’s blame him. :stuck_out_tongue:

LiLi the Easter Vigil Mass when my sister-in-law became Catholic lasted three hours. I kid you not. I’m still not over it. We were too wiped out for any sort of party after that. It was like MIDNIGHT when we got home!

27

Uh, he got laid off Friday…

Regarding underwear, I save the rattiest I have to wear to church, 'cuz it’s holey.

28

Good morning, all! Thanks for all the good wishes! I woke up to a card and a new Astros T-shirt! My baby loves me!

I’m sitting here on hold (terrible hold music) with the electric company. It seems they screwed up my transfer order for my son’s apartment, and are going to cut off service AT MY HOUSE TOMORROW instead of at the old apartment. Idiots! So ~maybe~ they have time to stop the disconnection, since it’s less than 24 hours. Who needs this kind of crap??

Got off with them, and talked to hubby who said to put a note on the meter to get the workman to call in to verify the disconnection. He’s so smart!

So I put in a load of laundry, and I’ll later be making an apple pie for my honey. That’s what he requested for his present! And Mexican pork chops. Yum!

Have a good day, everybody!

29

Great. Considering how often you post anymore, we’ll have to wait a week to hear this story.

Unless you wanna come back in sooner and let us know.

I can’t believe it’s lunch time already. This day is going really fast.

30

had the day off, so lazed about playing Warcraft, much the same as he did on Saturday and on Sunday… Nothing notable to report.

31

Mindfield should really lay off the caffeine.

Off to work. Joy. I will get into trouble for something ridiculous. “If you would only untie string in the exact way I show you we wouldn’t be having this problem! And I can’t buy furniture because of off-gassing! Or go on vacation because my cats will die!”

32

C’mon welby. Don’t make us beg!

33

A “spool” is a water feature that is bigger than a spa but smaller than a pool…hence “spool.”

Ellen, when my daughter became RC a few years ago, she received the first four sacraments all in the same ceremony. There were a lot of family members who weren’t expecting the marathon at church either.

34

Ellen is in red, because her name is EllenCherry…ya know, like cherry red? Hello? Are you in there?
:cool:

Off to do homework–yuck.

35

Good, cause loving clowns and hating porn would be wrong. Well, love your clown, but don’t love your clown. That would be like clown porn, which would turn Drae into a hater.

This circular stream of consciousness has been brought to you by Caffeine[sup]TM[/sup]. Caffeine[sup]TM[/sup], keeping that annoying sleep thing at bay since 0300GMT.

36

I’ve been working on my sock - 3 inches so far! It’s incredibly dull, knitting round and round in a tiny circle. I’m not sure that sock knitting is for me, but I have 2 more classes to go, so maybe it gets more interesting. I’ve finished 2 “A” swatches, 2 more of those to go, 1 “B” swatch, 2 “C” swatches, and one more swatch for a different class. I confess, I bought, well, ordered a sweater’s worth of yarn on Saturday. It’s pretty! 3 bags of yarn. Sigh.

I’ve decided that I need a computer desk immediately. I would like to be able to sit at the computer like a normal person. I also want dining room chairs, and something to sit on in the living room, besides the floor.

37

Why am I feeling lost in this thread today? Is it me, or is it making even less sense than usual? :dubious:

38

Daaaaamn. Gettin’ a little snippy in our old age, eh?

I was actually getting ready to type it, but my boss came in and grabbed me for an “emergency” meeting. The “emergency” was that someone not in my department and not in my control wasn’t doing thier work, and how did I think I could address this? Did I mention I work for a fool?

So anyhoo, I was at Ruby Tuesday’s yesterday with the wife for a quick lunch. When the bill comes I give it a cursory glance and yank out my wallet, then think “How in the hell did this get so expensive?”

SO I went and grabbed a menu and discovered that every item on the bill was $.50 more than on the menu. I called our waiter over and pointed out the error. He disappeared for about 10 minutes and came back with out bill.

“The manager says the menu is wrong.”

“Okay, you should probably fix that. Can you correct the bill?”

“The bill is correct, the menu is wrong.” Welbywife, at this point, huffs. For those not in the know, a huff by Welbywife is the precursor to an ugly, possibly violent confrontation. Hoping to avoid this, I get up and say “Let’s go talk to the manager about this.”

Instead of a real manager I get Luis, a pimply faced slightly post-teen proudly wearing his Assistant Manager tag. I explain the situation, and ask him to correct the bill to reflect the prices on the menu. Luis however, apparently thinks that Ruby Tuesday’s incorrect menu is somehow my fault. After a few minutes of nonproductive discussion, Luis says “Just pay the bill. We’re only talking about $2.50 here.”

I tell Luis “Okay, here’s what I’m gonna do. I’m going to pay this bill, less the $2.50 you over charged us. Since it’s only $2.50 we’re talking about, you can go ahead and soak that up and get your menus corrected.” I walk back over to the table, and between Welbywife and myself we come up with exact change for the bill - less $2.50, and place the money on the table. We get up, put on our coats, and head for the door. In the meantime, Luis has sprinted over to the table, counted the money, and come up $2.50 short.

“Excuse me, sir. You haven’t paid your entire bill.”

“Yes, Luis, I have. I paid the amount listed on the menu, plus tax, for the food that we ordered.”

Luis is a bright one. Luis decides he’s gonna get all legal on me. “Sir, we reserve the right to change our menu prices. The price for items on the menus has changed. If you don’t pay your entire bill, I will have to call the police.”

Welbywife huffs. Huffs again. Then explodes. I don’t remember it all, and I don’t understand it all either. She often lapses into Russian when she’s really pissed, and I think it’s safe to say she was pissed.

Things I caught: Idiot. Stupid. Call the police right now you (insert long list of Russian expletives)! Every customer in here should check thier bill because this guy will try and rip you off.

The rest was a grey haze. Luis is simply taken aback, assistant manager training did not prepare him for a 5’7" Russian woman with a very, very bad attitude. Welbywife, at this point, has been speaking in Russian for so long and so loudly that Luis turns to me and says “I don’t understand what she’s saying.”

“What she’s saying is, go ahead and call the police. But before you do that, you might want to call a real manager and find out who’s right here.”

“I’m a real manager.”

“Oh, sorry. Then perhaps you should call the store manager and talk to him.”

“Wait right here.” Luis disappears. Welbywife and I walk out the door and get in the car. As I drive off, I see Luis in the parking lot very obviously taking down my license plate number. So far, the police haven’t raided our house, so I’m gussing Luis didn’t get a chance to call the cops.

Now Welbywife and I must live in fear.

39

Damn good tale, Welby. What a putz that guy was - it’s classic American Chain Resteraunt behavior. :slight_smile:

40

I think the police should live in fear of Welbywife! You go girl!